So the deer darted lightly by Hamish and bounded away to the burn.

But Maclean never bating his watch tarried waiting below;

30

Still Hamish hung heavy with fear for to go

All the space of an hour; then he went, and his face was greenish and stern,

And his eye sat back in the socket, and shrunken the eye-balls shone,

As withdrawn from a vision of deeds it were shame to see.

'Now, now, grim henchman, what is 't with thee?'

Brake Maclean, and his wrath rose red as a beacon the wind hath upblown.

'Three does and a ten-tined buck made out,' spoke Hamish, full mild, 'And I ran for to turn, but my breath it was blown, and they passed;

I was weak, for ye called ere I broke me my fast.'

Cried Maclean: 'Now a ten-tined buck in the sight of the wife and the child 40

I had killed if the gluttonous kern had not wrought me a snail's own wrong!' Then he sounded, and down came kinsmen and clansmen all:

6

Ten blows, for ten tine, on his back let fall,

And reckon no stroke if the blood follow not at the bite of thong!'

So Hamish made bare, and took him his strokes; at the last he smiled. 'Now I'll to the burn,' quoth Maclean, 'for it still may be,

If a slimmer-paunched henchman will hurry with me,

I shall kill me the ten-tined buck for a gift to the wife and the child!'

Then the clansmen departed, by this path and that; and over the hill Sped Maclean with an outward wrath for an inward shame;

50

And that place of the lashing full quiet became;

And the wife and the child stood sad; and bloody-backed Hamish sat still.

But look! red Hamish has risen; quick about and about turns he.

There, while they stood in a green wood And marvelled still on Ill and Good,

Came suddenly Minister Mind. 'In the heart of sin doth hell begin: "T is not below, 't is not above, It lieth within, it lieth within:' ('Where?' quoth Love)

'I saw a man sit by a corse; Hell's in the murderer's breast: remorse! Thus clamored his mind to his mind: Not fleshly dole is the sinner's goal, Hell's not below, nor yet above, 'T is fixed in the ever-damnèd soul''Fixed?' quoth Love

'Fixed: follow me, would'st thou but see: He weepeth under yon willow tree,

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70

Fast chained to his corse,' quoth
Mind.

Full soon they passed, for they rode fast,
Where the piteous willow bent above.
'Now shall I see at last, at last,

Hell,' quoth Love.