twelve o'clock
They had seen Tonald dance before , but this was different , for it was not Tonald McKenzie alone who danced before them , but the incarnate spirit of the Highlands , the unconquerable , dauntless , lawless Highlands , with its purple hills and treacherous caverns that fling defiance at the world and fear not man nor devil . Tonald finished with a leap as nimble as that with which a cat springs on its victim while the company watched spellbound . He slipped away into a corner and would dance no more that night . When twelve o'clock came , the dancing was over , and with the smell of coffee and the rattle of dishes in the kitchen it was not hard to persuade big John Kennedy to sing . Big John lived alone in a little shanty in the hills , and the prospect of a good square meal was a pleasant one to the lonely fellow who had been his own cook so long . Big John lived among the Crofters , whose methods of cooking were simple in the extreme , and from them he had picked up strange ways of housekeeping . He ate out of the frying pan ; he milked the cow in the porridge pot , and only took what he needed for each meal , reasoning that she had a better way of keeping it than he had .