“You needn’t boast about being English,” Jock said, looking at Mhor coldly.  “I don’t blame you, for you can’t help it, but it’s a pity.”

Mhor’s face got very pink and there was a tremble in his voice, though he said in a bragging tone, “I’m glad I’m English.  The English are as brave as—­as—­”

“Of course they are,” said Jean, holding Mhor’s hand tight under the rug.  She knew how it hurt him to be, even for a moment, at variance with Jock, his idol.  “Mhor has every right to be proud of being English, Jock.  His father was a soldier and he has ancestors who were great fighting men.  And you know very well that it doesn’t matter what side you belong to so long as you are loyal to that side.  You two would have had some great fights if you had lived a few hundred years ago.”

“Yes,” said Mhor.  “I’d have killed a great many Scots—­but not Jock.”

“Ho,” said Jock, “a great many Scots would have killed you first.”

“Well, it’s all past,” said Jean; “and England and Scotland are one and fight together now.  This is Carlisle.  Not much romance about it now, is there?  We’re going to the Station Hotel for tea, so you will see the train, Mhor, old man.”

“Mhor,” said Jock, “that’s one thing you would have missed if you’d lived long ago—­trains.”

The car had to have a tyre repaired and that took some time, so after tea the Jardines stood in the station and watched trains for what was, to Mhor at least, a blissful hour.  It was thrilling to stand in the half-light of the big station and see great trains come in, and the passengers jump out and tramp about the platform and buy books and papers from the bookstall, or fruit, or chocolate, or tea and buns from the boys in uniform, who went about crying their wares.  And then the wild scurrying of the passengers—­like hens before a motor, Jock said—­when the flag was waved and the train about to start.  Mhor hoped fervently, and a little unkindly, that at least one might be left behind, but they all got in, though with some it was the last second of the eleventh hour.  There seemed to be hundreds of porters wheeling luggage on trolleys, guards walked about looking splendid fellows, and Mhor’s eyes as he beheld them were the eyes of a lover on his mistress.  He could hardly be torn away when David came to say that Stark was waiting with the car and that they could not hope to get farther than Penrith that night.

The dusk was falling and the vesper-bell ringing as they drove into the town and stopped before a very comfortable-looking inn.

It was past Mhor’s bedtime, and it seemed to that youth a fit ending for the most exciting day of his whole seven years of life, to sit up and partake of mutton chops and apple-tart at an hour when he should have been sound asleep.

He saw Peter safely away in charge of a sympathetic “boots” before he and Jock ascended to a bedroom with three small windows in the most unexpected places, a bright, cheery paper, and two small white beds.