Lest the reader should fancy that we are here merely inventing a mode of action, it may be well to state that we have conversed with a man styled “the Rescue,” whose duty it was to watch the boys of Aberdeen while bathing on the dangerous coast there, and who told us that he had saved some hundreds of lives—many of them in the manner above described.
Every one in the boat was fortunately able to swim, more or less, except Milly and Aggie Anderson. With the utmost anxiety to save the latter, her Uncle Ian made a desperate plunge when the boat upset, at the spot where, in the confusion, he thought he saw her go down. He grasped something under water, which clutched him violently in return. Rising to the surface he found that he had got hold of Giles Jackman, who, animated by the same desire to rescue the same girl, had also made a plunge at her. Flinging each other off almost angrily, they swam wildly about in search of her, for Giles had observed that Barret was sufficiently intent on Milly.
But poor Aggie was in even better hands. Ivor Donaldson had kept his eyes on her from the moment that he could distinguish faces in the approaching boat. He was a splendid swimmer. Even against wind and waves he made rapid headway, and in a few seconds caught the girl by the hair. In his case the absence of a plan of rescue was to some extent remedied by sheer strength of body, coupled with determination. The poor girl did her best to choke him, as drowning people will, but, happily, she was too weak for the purpose and he too strong! He suffered her to do her worst, and, with the arm which she left free made his way gallantly to the beach, where Duncan and all the domestics were ready to receive them.
Barret and Milly had landed just before them. Immediately after Archie and Eddie were swept in amid the foam, and Junkie himself—who, like his brothers, could swim like a cork—came careering in on the top of a wave, like a very water-imp! With all the energy of his nature he turned, the moment his feet touched ground, to lend a hand to his friend Tonal’, who was not far behind him.
Thus, one by one, the whole party got safely to land, for the laird, although old, was still vigorous, and, like the others, able to swim. MacRummle came in last, and they had some difficulty in getting him out of the water, for he was rather sluggish, as well as heavy; but he was none the worse for his immersion, and to the anxieties afterwards expressed by his friends, he replied quietly that he had become pretty well used to the water by that time. It was a trying experience, however, for all of them, and, in the opinion of Ian Anderson, as he gave it to his wife when they met, “it was a queer way o’ feenishin’ off a fery extraor’nar Sawbath tay—what-ë-ver!”
One morning, not long after this incident, the gentlemen made up a shooting party to try the summit of the hill for mountain hares—their hostess having twitted them with their inability to keep the household supplied with hare soup.
“I will accompany you, gentlemen, to the shoulder of the first hill,” observed their host, as he finished his breakfast, “but not farther, for I am not so young as I once was, and cannot be expected to keep pace with a ‘Woods and Forester.’”
“That is not a good reason for your stopping short, laird,” retorted Jackman, with a smile, “because it is quite possible for the ‘Woods and Forester’ to regulate his pace to that of the Western Isles.”
“Well, we shall see,” returned his host. “And what does my reckless Milly intend to do with herself?”
“I mean to have a little picnic—all by myself,” said Milly; “that is to say with nobody but me and Aggy Anderson.”