two
o'clock
-- her son ! '' Often , too , did we sit , suppressing our very breath , listening to every foot that approached , and as one disappointment followed another , her despair became deeper and deeper , louder and louder , and its crushing weight sank heavier and heavier upon my spirit . Some of his young companions informed us , that Robin had long expressed a determination to be a soldier ; and , on the following day , I set out for Edinburgh to seek for him there , and to buy him off at any price , if he had enlisted . There , however , I could gather no tidings concerning him ; and all that I could learn was , that a regiment had left the Castle that morning at two o'clock , and embarked at Leith for Chatham , from whence they were to proceed direct abroad ; and that several recruits were attached to it , some of them only sworn in an hour before they embarked ; but whether my poor Robie was among them or not , no one could tell . I left Edinburgh no wiser , no happier , and in no way more comforted than I entered it , and returned to his mother a sad and sorrowing-hearted man . She wrung her hands the instant she beheld me , and , in a tone that might have touched the heart of a stone , cried aloud -- `` Oh , my lost ! lost bairn !