Bride of the MacHugh Quotes

“The honor a man carries in his heart cannot be explained, lass," he said slowly. "Nor can you measure the courage of a man who will not betray his friends, even though he faces disaster himself. We've no right to question, unless we have known the same dilemma and acquitted ourselves with the same integrity.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“Dreams were frail things, when all was said, and loneliness the only certainty.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“Aye, he thought, loyalty, that most irrevocable of clan codes, was a point of honor more fiercely and tenaciously held than a man's life; the rudest clansman seemed to be born with it in the marrow of his bones.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“The MacHugh thought it small wonder that he had loved her from his first sight of her. She was gay and lovely and hot-tempered, to be sure, with a beguiling way of turning sweet as sugared wine; and before God she had more than her share of arrogance and pride. But reflected in her direct blue gaze was a courage as unflinching and honest as a man's; it was a thing he had searched for all his life and never found till now.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“Aye, she thought, women must ever wait and steel their hearts against loneliness and fear; and the men would go riding out to war as long as the blood ran hot and proud in their veins. It was indeed a hard world, but she would not have it otherwise, not so long as Alex MacHugh drew breath in it, and her beside him.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“Above her, the triple summit of Ben Cruachan overhung the loch like a thundercloud; and the hills lay piled against one another, more purple than the heather, bluer than the still loch waters, lifting against the heart-shaking blue of a summer sky. It was no longer the Scotland of rain and mist, and whaups crying before a high wind; it was an enchanted place, touched with magic, as if each moor and hill had taken to itself the gay wild lilt of the Gaelic heart”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“I had been too long in a hot land. The skies were always blue and one never escaped from the smell of flowers. I'd have given my life for one clean smell of peat bogs and heather after a cold rain." He grinned and shrugged his shoulders.

"'Tis a contradictory thing. A man longs for foreign places, yearns for the roll of a deck beneath his feet and the feel of the sea wind, and when he has it he's still not satisfied. A Scot never loves Scotland so much as when he's away from it.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“She wanted to tell him how it was with her, but she could not. She could not tell him that when she was with him she was not a Campbell, nor a Lamond, nor a lady of Anne's court, only a rebellious lass with wild blood which sang in her veins till she felt afraid of nothing in the world. Nor could she find the words to tell him how strangely she liked the wind wailing around the parapets of the castle, and the mists touching her face, or how free and strong she felt when she was alone in that high world above the earth.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“She had never thought her name lovely until she heard him say it, his warm Scots voice lingering softly over the word.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh

“It was good, she reflected, to be among the proud Gaels. There was no formality among men here, where a man's pride of race stood him with the most noble company and gave him the air of a gentleman no matter how low his rank or birth. Even his grooms called the MacHugh by the familiar "Alex"; he was Chief of Clan MacHugh, but no feudal lord, and his clan was his family to the last rude scullion lad. Elspeth thought it incredibly heart-warming that men might keep such faith with one another, assuming respect for themselves and giving respect in return; she had lived too long in England, where pride of name and self-respect were matters reserved for only a few.”
― Jan Cox Speas, Bride of the MacHugh