{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_72064/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_72064","id":"gutenberg_72064","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/72064","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Humour","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Short Stories","Scottish fiction","Short stories, Scottish"],"text":"THE BOOK\n OF\n SCOTTISH STORY:\n _HISTORICAL, HUMOROUS, LEGENDARY, AND IMAGINATIVE_.\n\n\n SELECTED FROM THE\n\n Works of Standard Scottish Authors.\n\n \u201c_Stories to read are delitable,\n Suppose that they be nought but fable;\n Then should stories that soothfast were,\n And they were said on gude manner,\n Have double pleasance in hearing._\u201d\n BARBOUR.\n\n EDINBURGH:\n THE EDINBURGH PUBLISHING COMPANY.\n LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & CO.\n\n\n\n\n EDINBURGH:\n PRINTED BY THE COMMERCIAL PRINTING COMPANY,\n 22 HOWE STREET.\n\n\n\n\n PREFACE.\n\n\nNext to its Ballads and Songs, the Stories of Scottish Literature are\nthe most characteristic exponents of the national spirit. Allowing for\nthe changes which time and the progress of civilization have effected in\nthe national manners and character since the beginning of the present\ncentury\u2014the era to which the Stories chiefly refer\u2014they shall be found\nto delineate the social and domestic features of Scottish life as\nfaithfully as the Ballads do the spirit and sentiment of an earlier age;\nor as the daily press reflects, rather than portrays, those of the\npresent day. While Songs\u2014the simple expressions of feelings and\nsentiments, musically rendered\u2014change, in so far as they exhibit habits\nand manners, yet their form is lasting. Not so the Ballads, whose true\nhistorical successors are Prose Stories, as Novels are those of\nRomances.\n\nWhether we account for it on the theory that a larger infusion of the\nimaginative and romantic elements, characteristic of the Celtic race,\ngives additional fervour to the Scottish character, or otherwise, it is\na fact that in no other community, on the same social level as that of\nthe peasantry and working-classes of Scotland, has this form of\nliterature had so enthusiastic a reception. There can be no doubt that\nthis widely diffused and keen appreciation, by an earnest and\nself-respecting people, of Stories which are largely graphic\ndelineations of their own national features, has been the chief stimulus\nto the production of so large and excellent a supply as our literature\ncontains.\n\nThe present Selection is made on the principle of giving the best\nspecimens of the most popular authors, with as great a variety, as to\nsubjects, as is compatible with these conditions.\n\nThe favourable reception of the issue in the serial form, both by the\npress and the public, is looked upon by the projectors as an earnest\u2014now\nthat the book is completed\u2014that its further reception will be such as to\nassure them that they have not fallen short of the aim announced in\ntheir prospectus, viz., to form a Collection of Standard Scottish Tales\ncalculated to delight the imagination, to convey interesting\ninformation, and to elevate and strengthen the moral principles of the\nyoung.\n\n EDINBURGH, _August 1876_.\n\n\n\n\n CONTENTS.\n\n\n The Henpecked Man, _John Mackay Wilson_\n\n Duncan Campbell, _James Hogg_\n\n The Lily of Liddisdale, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Unlucky Present, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Sutor of Selkirk \u201c_The Odd Volume_,\u201d\n\n Elsie Morrice, _Aberdeen Censor_,\n\n How I won the Laird\u2019s Daughter, _Daniel Gorrie_\n\n Moss-Side, _Professor Wilson_\n\n My First Fee, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n The Kirk of Tullibody, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n The Progress of Inconstancy, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n Adam Bell, _James Hogg_\n\n Mauns\u2019 Stane; or, Mine Host\u2019s Tale, _Aberdeen Censor_,\n\n The Freebooter of Lochaber, _Sir Thomas Dick\n Lauder_\n\n An Hour in the Manse, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Warden of the Marches, _Edin. Literary\n Gazette_,\n\n The Alehouse Party, \u201c_The Odd Volume_,\u201d\n\n Auchindrane; or, the Ayrshire Tragedy, _Sir Walter Scott_\n\n A Tale of the Plague in Edinburgh, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Probationer\u2019s First Sermon, _Daniel Gorrie_\n\n The Crimes of Richard Hawkins, _Thomas Aird_\n\n The Headstone, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Widow\u2019s Prediction, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n The Lady of Waristoun, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n A Tale of Pentland, _James Hogg_\n\n Graysteel _John o\u2019 Groat\n Journal_,\n\n The Billeted Soldier, _Eminent Men of Fife_,\n\n Bruntfield, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n Sunset and Sunrise, _Professor Wilson_\n\n Miss Peggy Brodie, _Andrew Picken_\n\n The Death of a Prejudice, _Thomas Aird_\n\n Anent Auld Grandfaither, &c., _D. M. Moir_\n\n John Brown; or, the House in the Muir, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n Traditions of the Old Tolbooth of Edinburgh, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Lover\u2019s Last Visit, _Professor Wilson_\n\n Mary Queen of Scots and Chatelar, _Literary Souvenir_,\n\n A Night in Duncan M\u2018Gowan\u2019s, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n The Miller and the Freebooter, _Sir Thomas Dick\n Lauder_\n\n Benjie\u2019s Christening, _D. M. Moir_\n\n The Minister\u2019s Widow, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Battle of the Breeks, _Robert Macnish_\n\n My Sister Kate, _Andrew Picken_\n\n Wat the Prophet, _James Hogg_\n\n The Snow-Storm, _Professor Wilson_\n\n Love at one Glimpse, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n Nanny Welsh, the Minister\u2019s Maid, _Daniel Gorrie_\n\n Lady Jean, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n The Monkey, _Robert Macnish_\n\n The Ladder-Dancer, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n The Elder\u2019s Death-Bed, _Professor Wilson_\n\n A Highland Feud, _Sir Walter Scott_\n\n The Resurrection Men, _D. M. Moir_\n\n Mary Wilson, _Aberdeen Censor_,\n\n The Laird of Cassway, _James Hogg_\n\n The Elder\u2019s Funeral, _Professor Wilson_\n\n Macdonald, the Cattle-Riever, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n The Murder Hole, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n The Miller of Doune, \u201c_The Odd Volume_,\u201d\n\n The Headless Cumins, _Sir Thomas Dick\n Lauder_\n\n The Lady Isabel, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n The Desperate Duel, _D. M. Moir_\n\n The Vacant Chair, _John Mackay Wilson_\n\n Colkittoch, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n The Covenanters, _Robert Macnish_\n\n The Poor Scholar, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Crushed Bonnet, _Glasgow Athen\u00e6um_,\n\n The Villagers of Auchincraig, _Daniel Gorrie_\n\n Perling Joan, _John Gibson Lockhart_\n\n Janet Smith, _Professor Thomas\n Gillespie_\n\n The Unlucky Top Boots, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n My First and Last Play, _D. M. Moir_\n\n Jane Malcolm, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n Bowed Joseph, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Laird of Wineholm, _James Hogg_\n\n An Incident in the Great Moray Floods of 1829, _Sir Thomas Dick\n Lauder_\n\n Charlie Graham, the Tinker, _George Penny_\n\n The Snowing-up of Strath Lugas, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n Ezra Peden, _Allan Cunningham_\n\n Young Ronald of Morar, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n The Broken Ring, \u201c_The Odd Volume_,\u201d\n\n A Passage of My Life, _Paisley Magazine_,\n\n The Court Cave, _Drummond Bruce_\n\n Helen Waters, _John Malcolm_\n\n Legend of the Large Mouth, _Robert Chambers_\n\n Richard Sinclair; or, the Poor Prodigal, _Thomas Aird_\n\n The Barley Fever\u2014and Rebuke, _D. M. Moir_\n\n Elphin Irving, the Fairies\u2019 Cupbearer, _Allan Cunningham_\n\n Choosing a Minister, _John Galt_\n\n The Meal Mob, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n The Flitting, \u201c_My Grandfather\u2019s\n Farm_,\u201d\n\n Ewen of the Little Head, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n Basil Rolland, _Aberdeen Censor_,\n\n The Last of the Jacobites, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Grave-Digger\u2019s Tale, \u201c_The Auld Kirk Yard_,\u201d\n\n The Fairy Bride, _Edin. Literary\n Journal_,\n\n The Lost Little Ones, \u201c_The Odd Volume_,\u201d\n\n An Orkney Wedding, _John Malcolm_\n\n The Ghost with the Golden Casket, _Allan Cunningham_\n\n Ranald of the Hens, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n The French Spy, _John Galt_\n\n The Minister\u2019s Beat, _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n\n A Scottish Gentlewoman of the Last Century, _Miss Ferrier_\n\n The Faithless Nurse, _Edin. Literary\n Gazette_,\n\n Traditions of the Celebrated Major Weir, _Robert Chambers_\n\n The Windy Yule, _John Galt_\n\n Grizel Cochrane, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n The Fatal Prayer, _Literary Melange_,\n\n Glenmannow, the Strong Herdsman, _William Bennet_\n\n My Grandmother\u2019s Portrait, _Daniel Gorrie_\n\n The Baptism, _Professor Wilson_\n\n The Laird\u2019s Wooing, _John Galt_\n\n Thomas the Rhymer, _Sir Walter Scott_\n\n Lachlan More, _Literary Gazette_,\n\n Alemoor, _Chambers\u2019s Edin.\n Journal_,\n\n Tibby Fowler, _John Mackay Wilson_\n\n Daniel Cathie, Tobacconist, _Edin. Literary\n Almanac_,\n\n The Haunted Ships, _Allan Cunningham_\n\n A Tale of the Martyrs, _James Hogg_\n\n The Town Drummer, _John Galt_\n\n The Awful Night, _D. M. Moir_\n\n Rose Jamieson, _Anon._\n\n A Night at the Herring Fishing, _Hugh Miller_\n\n The Twin Sisters, _Alexander Balfour_\n\n Albert Bane, _Henry Mackenzie_\n\n The Penny Wedding, _Alexander Campbell_\n\n Peat-Casting Time, _Thomas Gillespie_\n\n An Adventure with the Press-Gang, _Paisley Magazine_,\n\n The Laird of Cool\u2019s Ghost, _Old Chap Book_,\n\n Allan-a-Sop, _Sir Walter Scott_\n\n John Hetherington\u2019s Dream, _Old Chap Book_,\n\n Black Joe o\u2019 the Bow, _James Smith_\n\n The Fight for the Standard, _James Paterson_\n\n Catching a Tartar, _D. M. Moir_\n\n\n\n\n THE BOOK OF\n\n SCOTTISH STORY.\n\n\n\n\n THE HENPECKED MAN.\n\n BY JOHN MACKAY WILSON.\n\n\nEvery one has heard the phrase, \u201cGo to Birgham!\u201d which signifies much\nthe same as bidding you go to a worse place. The phrase is familiar not\nonly on the borders, but throughout all Scotland, and has been in use\nfor more than five hundred years, having taken its rise from Birgham\nbeing the place where the Scottish nobility were when they dastardly\nbetrayed their country into the hands of the first Edward; and the\npeople, despising the conduct and the cowardice of the nobles, have\nrendered the saying, \u201cGo to Birgham!\u201d an expression of contempt until\nthis day. Many, however, may have heard the saying, and even used it,\nwho know not that Birgham is a small village, beautifully situated on\nthe north side of the Tweed, about midway between Coldstream and Kelso;\nthough, if I should say that the village itself is beautiful, I should\nbe speaking on the wrong side of the truth. Yet there may be many who\nhave both heard the saying and seen the place, who never heard of little\nPatie Crichton, the bicker-maker. Patie was of diminutive stature, and\nhe followed the profession (if the members of the _learned_ professions\nbe not offended at my using the term) of a cooper, or bicker-maker, in\nBirgham for many years. His neighbours used to say of him, \u201cThe puir\nbody\u2019s henpecked.\u201d\n\nPatie was in the habit of attending the neighbouring fairs with the\nwater-cogs, cream-bowies, bickers, piggins, and other articles of his\nmanufacture. It was Dunse fair, and Patie said he \u201chad done\nextraordinar\u2019 weel\u2014the sale had been far beyond what he expeckit.\u201d His\nsuccess might be attributed to the circumstance that, when out of the\nsight and hearing of his better half, for every bicker he sold he gave\nhis customers half-a-dozen jokes into the bargain. Every one, therefore,\nliked to deal with little Patie. The fair being over, he retired with a\ncrony to a public-house in the Castle Wynd, to crack of old stories over\na glass, and inquire into each other\u2019s welfare. It was seldom they met,\nand it was as seldom that Patie dared to indulge in a single glass; but,\non the day in question, he thought they could manage another gill, and\nanother was brought. Whether the sight of it reminded him of his\ndomestic miseries, and of what awaited him at home, I cannot tell; but\nafter drinking another glass, and pronouncing the spirits excellent, he\nthus addressed his friend:\u2014\n\n\u201cAy, Robin\u201d (his friend\u2019s name was Robin Roughead), \u201cye\u2019re a happy\nman\u2014ye\u2019re maister in your ain hoose, and ye\u2019ve a wife that adores and\n_obeys_ ye; but I\u2019m nae better than naebody at my ain fireside. I\u2019ll\ndeclare I\u2019m waur: wife an\u2019 bairns laugh at me\u2014I\u2019m treated like an\noutlan\u2019 body an\u2019 a fule. Though without me they micht gang an\u2019 beg,\nthere is nae mair respeck paid to me than if I were a pair o\u2019 auld\nbauchels flung into a corner. Fifteen years syne I couldna believed it\no\u2019 Tibby, though onybody had sworn it to me. I firmly believe that a\ngude wife is the greatest blessin\u2019 that can be conferred upon a man on\nthis earth. I can imagine it by the treasure that my faither had in my\nmither; for, though the best may hae _words_ atween them occasionally,\nand I\u2019m no saying that they hadna, yet they were just like passin\u2019\nshowers, to mak the kisses o\u2019 the sun upon the earth mair sweet after\nthem. Her whole study was to please him and to mak him comfortable. She\nwas never happy but when he was happy; an\u2019 he was just the same wi\u2019 her.\nI\u2019ve heard him say that she was worth untold gold. But, O Robin! if I\nthink that a guid wife is the greatest blessin\u2019 a man can enjoy, weel do\nI ken that a scoldin\u2019, domineerin\u2019 wife is his greatest curse. It\u2019s a\nterrible thing to be snooled in your ain house\u2014naebody can form an idea\no\u2019t but they wha experience it.\n\n\u201cYe remember when I first got acquainted wi\u2019 Tibby, she was doing the\nbondage work at Riselaw. I first saw her coming out o\u2019 Eccles kirk ae\nday, and I really thocht that I had never seen a better-faured or a more\ngallant-looking lass. Her cheeks were red and white like a half-ripe\nstrawberry, or rather, I should say, like a cherry; and she seemed as\nmodest and meek as a lamb. It wasna very lang until I drew up; and\nthough she didna gie me ony great encouragement at first, yet, in a week\nor twa, after the ice was fairly broken, she became remarkably ceevil,\nand gied me her oxter on a Sunday. We used to saunter about the\nloanings, no saying meikle, but unco happy; and I was aye restless whan\nI was out o\u2019 her sight. Ye may guess that the shoemaker was nae loser by\nit during the six months that I ran four times a-week, wet or dry,\nbetween Birgham and Riselaw. But the term-time was drawing nigh, and I\nput the important question, and pressed her to name the day. She hung\nher head, and she seemed no to ken weel what to say; for she was sae mim\nand sae gentle then, that ye wad hae said \u2018butter wadna melt in her\nmouth.\u2019 And when I pressed her mair urgently\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019ll just leave it to yoursel, Peter,\u2019 says she.\n\n\u201cI thocht my heart wad louped out at my mouth. I believe there never was\na man sae beside himsel wi\u2019 joy in this warld afore. I fairly danced\nagain, and cut as many antics as a merryandrew. \u2018O Tibby,\u2019 says I,\n\n \u2018I\u2019m ower happy now!\u2014Oh, haud my head!\n This gift o\u2019 joy is like to be my dead.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I hope no, Peter,\u2019 said she; \u2018I wad rather hae ye to live than dee for\nme.\u2019\n\n\u201cI thocht she was as sensible as she was bonny, and better natured than\nbaith.\n\n\u201cWeel, I got the house set up, the wedding-day cam, and everything\npassed ower as agreeably as onybody could desire. I thocht Tibby turning\nbonnier and bonnier. For the first five or six days after the weddin\u2019,\neverything was \u2018hinny,\u2019 and \u2018my love,\u2019 and \u2018Tibby, dear,\u2019 or \u2018Peter,\ndear.\u2019 But matters didna stand lang at this. It was on a Saturday nicht,\nI mind, just afore I was gaun to drap work, that three or four\nacquaintances cam into the shop to wush me joy, and they insisted I\nshould pay off for the weddin\u2019. Ye ken I never was behint hand; and I\nagreed that I wad just fling on my coat and step up wi\u2019 them to Orange\nLane. So I gaed into the house and took down my market coat, which was\nhangin\u2019 behint the bed; and after that I gaed to the kist to tak out a\nshilling or twa; for, up to that time, Tibby had not usurped the office\nof Chancellor o\u2019 the Exchequer. I did it as cannily as I could; but she\nhad suspected something, and heard the jinkin\u2019 o\u2019 the siller.\n\n\u201cWhat are ye doing, Patie?\u2019 says she; \u2018whar are ye gaun?\u2019\n\n\u201cI had never heard her voice hae sic a sound afore, save the first time\nI drew up to her, when it was rather sharp than agreeable.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ou, my dear,\u2019 says I, \u2018I\u2019m just gaun up to Orange Lane a wee while.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018To Orange Lane!\u2019 says she; \u2018what in the name of fortune\u2019s gaun to tak\nye there?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018O hinny,\u2019 says I, \u2018it\u2019s just a neebor lad or twa that\u2019s drapped in to\nwush us joy, and, ye ken, we canna but be neebor-like.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ay! the sorrow joy them!\u2019 says she, \u2018and neebor too!\u2014an\u2019 how meikle\nwill that cost ye?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Hoot, Tibby,\u2019 says I, for I was quite astonished at her, \u2018ye dinna\nunderstand things, woman.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018No understand them!\u2019 says she; \u2018I wish to gudeness that ye wad\nunderstand them though! If that\u2019s the way ye intend to mak the siller\nflee, it\u2019s time there were somebody to tak care o\u2019t.\u2019\n\n\u201cI had put the siller in my pocket, and was gaun to the door mair\nsurprised than I can weel express, when she cried to me\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Mind what ye spend, and see that ye dinna stop.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ye need be under nae apprehensions o\u2019 that, hinny,\u2019 said I, wishing to\npacify her.\n\n\u201c\u2018See that it be sae,\u2019 cried she, as I shut the door.\n\n\u201cI joined my neebors in a state of greater uneasiness o\u2019 mind than I had\nexperienced for a length o\u2019 time. I couldna help thinkin\u2019 but that Tibby\nhad rather early begun to tak the upper hand, and it was what I never\nexpected from her. However, as I was saying, we went up to Orange Lane,\nand we sat doun, and ae gill brocht on anither. Tibby\u2019s health and mine\nwere drunk; we had several capital sangs; and, I daresay, it was weel on\nfor ten o\u2019clock afore we rose to gang awa. I was nae mair affected wi\u2019\ndrink than I am at this moment. But, somehow or ither, I was uneasy at\nthe idea o\u2019 facing Tibby. I thought it would be a terrible thing to\nquarrel wi\u2019 her. I opened the door, and, bolting it after me, slipped\nin, half on the edge o\u2019 my fit. She was sitting wi\u2019 her hand at her\nhaffit by the side o\u2019 the fire, but she never let on that she either saw\nor heard me\u2014she didna speak a single word. If ever there was a woman\u2014\n\n Nursing her wrath to keep it warm,\n\nit was her that nicht. I drew in a chair, and, though I was half-feared\nto speak\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018What\u2019s the matter, my pet?\u2019 says I\u2014\u2018what\u2019s happened ye?\u2019\n\n\u201cBut she sat looking into the fire, and never let on she heard me.\n\u2018E\u2019en\u2019s ye like, Meg Dorts,\u2019 thought I, as Allan Ramsay says; but I\ndurstna say it, for I saw that there was a storm brewing. At last, I\nventured to say again\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018What ails ye, Tibby, dear?\u2014are ye no weel?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Weel!\u2019 cried she\u2014\u2018wha can be weel? Is this the way ye mean to carry\non? What a time o\u2019 nicht is this to keep a body to, waiting and fretting\non o\u2019 ye, their lane? Do you no think shame o\u2019 yoursel?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Hoot, woman,\u2019 says I, \u2018I\u2019m surprised at ye; I\u2019m sure ye hae naething\nto mak a wark about\u2014it\u2019s no late yet.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I dinna ken what ye ca\u2019 late,\u2019 said she; \u2018it wadna be late amang yer\ncronies, nae doubt; but if it\u2019s no late, it\u2019s early, for I warrant it\u2019s\nmornin\u2019.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Nonsense!\u2019 says I.\n\n\u201c\u2018Dinna tell me it\u2019s nonsense,\u2019 said she, \u2018for I\u2019ll be spoken to in nae\nsic way\u2014I\u2019ll let you ken that. But how meikle has it cost ye? Ye wad be\ntreating them, nae doubt\u2014and how meikle hae ye spent, if it be a fair\nquestion?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Toots, Tibby!\u2019 said I, \u2018whar\u2019s the cause for a\u2019 this? What great deal\ncould it cost me?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But hair by hair maks the carle\u2019s head bare,\u2019 added she\u2014\u2018mind ye that;\nand mind ye that ye\u2019ve a house to keep aboon your head noo. But, if ye\ncanna do it, I maun do it for ye\u2014sae gie me the key o\u2019 that kist\u2014gie me\nit instantly; and I\u2019ll tak care how ye gang drinkin\u2019 wi\u2019 ony body and\ntreatin\u2019 them till mornin\u2019 again.\u2019\n\n\u201cFor the sake o\u2019 peace I gied her the key; for she was speakin\u2019 sae loud\nthat I thocht a\u2019 the neebors wad hear\u2014and she had nae suner got it, than\nawa she gaed to the kist and counted every shilling. I had nae great\nabundance then mair than I\u2019ve now; and\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Is that a\u2019 ye hae?\u2019 said she; \u2018an\u2019 yet ye\u2019ll think o\u2019 gaun drinkin\u2019\nand treatin\u2019 folk frae Saturday nicht till Sabbath mornin\u2019! If this is\nthe life ye intend to lead, I wush to gudeness I had ne\u2019er had onything\nto say to ye.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018And if this is the life ye intend to lead me,\u2019 thought I, \u2018I wush the\nsame thing.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut that was but the beginnin\u2019 o\u2019 my slavery. From that hour to this\nshe has continued on from bad to worse. No man livin\u2019 can form an idea\no\u2019 what I\u2019ve suffered but mysel. In a mornin\u2019, or rather, I may say, in\na forenoon, for it was aye nine or ten o\u2019clock afore she got up, she sat\ndoun to her tea and white scones and butter, while I had to be content\nwi\u2019 a scrimpit bicker o\u2019 brose and sour milk for kitchen. Nor was this\nthe warst o\u2019t; for, when I cam in frae my wark for my breakfast, mornin\u2019\nafter mornin\u2019, the fire was black out; and there had I, before I could\nget a bite to put in my mouth, to bend doun upon my knees and blaw it,\nand blaw it, till I was half-blind wi\u2019 ashes\u2014for we hadna a pair o\u2019\nbellowses; and there wad she lie grumblin\u2019 a\u2019 the time, ca\u2019in\u2019 me\nuseless _this_, and useless _that_; and I just had to put up wi\u2019 it. But\nafter our first bairn was born, she grew far worse, and I becam mair and\nmair miserable every day. If I had been sleeping through the nicht, and\nthe bairn had begun a kickin\u2019, or whingin\u2019\u2014then she was at the scoldin\u2019,\nand I was sure to be started out o\u2019 my sleep wi\u2019 a great drive atween\nthe shouthers, and her cryin\u2019\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Get up, ye lazy body, ye\u2014get up, and see what\u2019s the maiter wi\u2019 this\nbairn.\u2019\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 this was the trade half-a-dizen o\u2019 times in a nicht.\n\n\u201cAt last, there was ae day, when a\u2019 that I had dune was simply saying a\nword about the denner no bein\u2019 ready, and afore ever I kenned whar I\nwas, a cracky-stool that she had bought for the bairn cam fleein\u2019 across\nthe room, and gied me a dirl on the elbow, that made me think my arm was\nbroken. Ye may guess what a stroke it was, when I tell ye I couldna lift\nmy hand to my head for a week to come. Noo, the like o\u2019 that, ye ken,\nwas what mortal man couldna stand.\n\n\u201c\u2018Tibby,\u2019 said I, and I looked very desperate and determined, \u2018what do\nye mean by this conduct? By a\u2019 that\u2019s gracious, I\u2019ll no put up wi\u2019 it\nony langer!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ye\u2019ll no put up wi\u2019 it, _ye cratur_!\u2019 said she; \u2018if ye gie me ony mair\no\u2019 yer provocation, I\u2019ll pu\u2019 yer lugs for ye\u2014wull ye put up wi\u2019 that?\u2019\n\n\u201cIt was terrible for a man to hear his ain wife ca\u2019 him _a cratur_!\u2014just\nas if I had been a monkey or a laup-doug!\n\n\u201c\u2018O ye disdainfu\u2019 limmer,\u2019 thought I; \u2018but if I could humble your proud\nspirit, I wad do it!\u2019 Weel, there was a grand new ballant hawkin\u2019 about\nthe country at the time\u2014it was ca\u2019d \u2018Watty and Meg\u2019\u2014ye have nae doubt\nseen\u2019t. Meg was just such a terrible termagant as my Tibby; and I\nremembered the perfect reformation that was wrought upon her by Watty\u2019s\nbidding her fareweel, and threatenin\u2019 to list. So it just struck me that\nI wad tak a leaf out o\u2019 the ballant. Therefore, keeping the same serious\nand determined look, for I was in no humour to seem otherwise\u2014\u2018Tibby,\u2019\nsays I, \u2018there shall be nae mair o\u2019 this. But I will gang and list this\nvery day, and ye\u2019ll see what will come ower ye then\u2014ye\u2019ll maybe repent\no\u2019 yer conduct whan it\u2019s ower late.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018List! ye _totum_ ye!\u2019 said she; \u2018do ye say _list_?\u2019 and she said this\nin a tone and wi\u2019 a look o\u2019 derision that gaed through my very soul.\n\u2018What squad will ye list into?\u2014what regiment will tak ye? Do ye intend\nto list for a fifer laddie?\u2019 And as she said this, she held up her\noxter, as if to tak me below\u2019t.\n\n\u201cI thought I wad hae drapped doun wi\u2019 indignation. I could hae strucken\nher, if I durst. Ye observe, I am just five feet twa inches and an\neighth, upon my stockin\u2019-soles. That is rather below the army\nstandard\u2014and I maun say it\u2019s a very foolish standard; for a man o\u2019 my\nheight stands a better chance to shoot anither than a giant that wad\nfire ower his head. But she was aware that I was below the mark, and my\nthreat was of no avail; so I had just to slink awa into the shop,\nrubbin\u2019 my elbow.\n\n\u201cBut the cracky-stool was but the beginning o\u2019 her drivin\u2019; there wasna\na week after that but she let flee at me whatever cam in the way,\nwhenever I by accident crossed her cankered humour. It\u2019s a wonder that\nI\u2019m in the land o\u2019 the living; for I\u2019ve had the skin peeled off my\nlegs\u2014my arms maistly broken\u2014my head cut, and ither parts o\u2019 my body a\u2019\nblack and blue, times out o\u2019 number. I thought her an angel when I was\ncourtin\u2019 her; but, O Robin! she has turned out\u2014I\u2019ll no say what\u2014an\nadder!\u2014a teeger!\u2014a she fury!\n\n\u201cAs for askin\u2019 onybody into the house, it\u2019s a thing I durstna do for the\nlife that\u2019s in my body. I never did it but ance, and that was when an\nauld schulefellow, that had been several years in America, ca\u2019ed at the\nshop to see me. After we had cracked a while\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018But I maun see the wife, Patie,\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201cWhether he had heard aboot her behaviour or no, I canna tell; but, I\nassure ye, his request was onything but agreeable to me. However, I took\nhim into the house, and I introduced him wi\u2019 fear and tremblin\u2019.\n\n\u201c\u2018Tibby, dear,\u2019 said I\u2014and I dinna think I had ca\u2019ed her _dear_ for ten\nyears afore\u2014\u2018here\u2019s Mr W\u2014\u2014, an auld schulefellow o\u2019 mine, that\u2019s come a\u2019\nthe way frae America, an\u2019 ca\u2019ed in to see ye.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ye\u2019re aye meetin\u2019 wi\u2019 auld schulefellows, or some set or ither, to tak\nye aff yer wark,\u2019 muttered she, sulkily, but loud enough for him to\nhear.\n\n\u201cI was completely at a loss what to do or say next; but, pretending as\nthough I hadna heard her, I said, as familiarly and kindly as I could,\nthough my heart was in a terrible swither\u2014\u2018Bring out the bottle, lass.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Bottle!\u2019 quo\u2019 she, \u2018what bottle?\u2014what does the man mean?\u2014has he\npairted wi\u2019 the little sense that he ever had?\u2019 But had ye seen her as\nshe said this!\u2014I\u2019ve seen a cloud black when driven wi\u2019 a hurricane, and\nI\u2019ve seen it awfu\u2019 when roarin\u2019 in the agony o\u2019 thunder; but never did I\nsee onything that I was mair in fear o\u2019 than my wife\u2019s face at that\nmoment. But, somehow or ither, I gathered courage to say\u2014\u2018Hoots, woman,\nwhat\u2019s the use o\u2019 behavin\u2019 that way? I\u2019m sure ye ken weel aneugh it\u2019s\nthe speerit bottle.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018The speerit bottle!\u2019 cried she, wi\u2019 a scream; \u2018and when was there a\nspeerit bottle within this door? Dinna show yoursel off to your American\nfreend for a greater man than ye are, Patie. I think, if wi\u2019 a\u2019 that ye\nbring in I get meat and bits o\u2019 duds for your bairns, I do very weel.\u2019\n\n\u201cThis piece o\u2019 impudence completely knocked me stupid, for, wad ye\nbelieve it, Robin? though she had lang driven a\u2019 my freends frae about\nthe house, yet, did ony o\u2019 _her_ freends ca\u2019,\u2014and that was maistly every\nSunday, and every Coldstream market-day,\u2014there was the bottle out frae\nthe cupboard, which she aye kept under lock and key; and a dram, and a\nbit short-bread nae less, was aye and to this day handed round to every\nane o\u2019 them. They hae discovered that it\u2019s worth while to make Patie the\nbicker-maker\u2019s a half-way house. But if I happen to be in when they ca\u2019,\nthough she pours out a fu\u2019 glass a-piece for them, she takes aye gude\ncare to stand in afore me when she comes to me, between them and me, so\nthat they canna see what she is doing, or how meikle she pours out; and,\nI assure ye, it is seldom a thimblefu\u2019 that fa\u2019s to my share, though she\nhauds the bottle lang up in her hand\u2014mony a time, no a weetin\u2019; and\nagain and again have I shoved my head past her side, and said, \u2018Your\nhealth, Mrs So-and-so\u2019\u2014or, \u2018Yours, Mr Such-a-thing,\u2019 wi\u2019 no as meikle in\nmy glass as wad droun a midge. Or, if I was sae placed that she durstna\nbut, for shame, fill a glass within half-an-inch o\u2019 the tap or sae, she\nwad gae me a look, or a wink, or mak a motion o\u2019 some kind, which weel\ndid I ken the meanin\u2019 o\u2019, and which was the same as saying\u2014\u2018Drink it if\nye daur!\u2019 O Robin, man! it\u2019s weel for ye that kens no what it is to be a\nfootba\u2019 at your ain fireside. I daresay, my freend burned at the bane\nfor me; for he got up, and\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018I wish you good-day, Mr Crichton,\u2019 said he; \u2018I have business in Kelso\nto-night yet, and can\u2019t stop.\u2019\n\n\u201cI was perfectly overpowered wi\u2019 shame; but it was a relief to me when\nhe gaed awa\u2014and I slipped out after him, and into the shop again.\n\n\u201cBut Tibby\u2019s isna the only persecution that I hae to put up wi\u2019; for we\nhae five bairns, and she\u2019s brought them a\u2019 up to treat me as she does\nhersel. If I offer to correct them, they cry out\u2014\u2018I\u2019ll tell my\nmither!\u2019\u2014and frae the auldest to the youngest o\u2019 them, when they speak\naboot me, it is _he_ did this, or _he_ did that\u2014they for ever talk o\u2019 me\nas _him!\u2014him!_ I never get the name o\u2019 _faither_ frae ane o\u2019 them\u2014and\nit\u2019s a\u2019 her doings. Now, I just ask ye simply if ony faither would put\nup wi\u2019 the like o\u2019 that? But I maun put up wi\u2019t. If I were offering to\nlay hands upon them for\u2019t, I\u2019m sure and persuaded she wad rise a\u2019\nBirgham about me\u2014my life wadna be safe where she is\u2014but, indeed, I\nneedna say that, for it never is.\n\n\u201cBut there is ae thing that grieves me beyond a\u2019 that I hae mentioned to\nye. Ye ken my mither, puir auld body, is a widow now. She is in the\nseventy-sixth year o\u2019 her age, and very frail. She has naebody to look\nafter her but me\u2014naebody that has a natural right to do it; for I never\nhad ony brothers, as ye ken; and, as for my twa sisters, I daresay they\nhave just a sair aneugh fecht wi\u2019 their ain families, and as they are at\na distance, I dinna ken how they are situated wi\u2019 their gudemen\u2014though I\nmaun say for them, they send her a stane o\u2019 oatmeal, an ounce o\u2019\ntobacco, or a pickle tea and sugar, now and then, which is very likely\nas often as they hae it in their power; and that is a great deal mair\nthan I\u2019m _allowed_ to do for her\u2014me that has a right to protect and\nmaintain her. A\u2019 that she has to support her is fifteenpence a-week aff\nthe parish o\u2019 Mertoun. O Robin, man!\u2014Robin, man!\u2014my heart rugs within\nme, when I talk to you about this. A\u2019 that I hae endured is naething to\nit! To see my puir auld mither in a state o\u2019 starvation, and no to be\nallowed to gie her a saxpence! O Robin, man!\u2014Robin, man!\u2014is it no awfu\u2019?\nWhen she was first left destitute, and a widow, I tried to break the\nmatter to Tibby, and to reason wi\u2019 her.\n\n\u201c\u2018O Tibby, woman!\u2019 said I, \u2018I\u2019m very distressed. Here\u2019s my faither laid\nin the grave, and I dinna see what\u2019s to come o\u2019 my mither, puir body\u2014she\nis auld, and she is frail\u2014she has naebody to look after or provide for\nher but me.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You!\u2019 cried Tibby\u2014\u2018you! I wush ye wad mind what ye are talkin\u2019 about!\nYe have as many dougs, I can tell ye, as ye hae banes to pike! Let your\nmither do as ither widows hae done afore her\u2014let the parish look after\nher.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018O Tibby, woman!\u2019 said I; \u2018but if ye\u2019ll only consider\u2014the parish money\nis very sma\u2019, and, puir body, it will mak her heart sair to receive a\npenny o\u2019t; for she weel kens that my faither would rather hae dee\u2019d in a\nditch than been behauden to either a parish or an individual for a\nsaxpence.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018An\u2019 meikle they hae made by their pride,\u2019 said Tibby. \u2018I wush ye wud\nhaud your tongue.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ay, but Tibby,\u2019 says I, for I was nettled mair than I durst show it,\n\u2018but she has been a gude mother to me, and ye ken yoursel that she\u2019s no\nbeen an ill gude-mother to ye. She never stood in the way o\u2019 you an\u2019 me\ncomin\u2019 thegither, though I was payin\u2019 six shillings a-week into the\nhouse.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018And what am I obliged to her for that?\u2019 interrupted my Jezebel.\n\n\u201c\u2018I dinna ken, Tibby,\u2019 says I; \u2018but it\u2019s a hard thing for a son to see a\nmother in want, when he can assist her. Now, it isna meikle she\ntakes\u2014she never was used wi\u2019 dainties; and, if I may just tak her hame,\nlittle will serve her, and her meat will ne\u2019er be missed.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ye born idiot!\u2019 cried Tibby. \u2018I aye thought ye a fule\u2014but ye are warse\nthan a fule! Bring your mither here! An auld, cross-grained,\nfaut-finding wife, that I ne\u2019er could hae patience to endure for ten\nminutes in my days! Bring her here, say ye! No! while I live in this\nhouse, I\u2019ll let ye ken that I\u2019ll be mistress.\u2019\n\n\u201cAy, and maister too, thought I. I found it was o\u2019 nae use to argue wi\u2019\nher. There was nae possibility o\u2019 gettin\u2019 my mither into the house; and\nas to assisting her wi\u2019 a shillin\u2019 or twa at a time by chance, or paying\nher house rent, or sending her a load o\u2019 coals, it was perfectly out o\u2019\nthe question, and beyond my power. Frae the nicht that I went to Orange\nLane to this moment, I hae never had a saxpence under my thumb that I\ncould ca\u2019 my ain. Indeed, I never hae money in my hands, unless it be on\na day like this, when I hae to gang to a fair, or the like o\u2019 that; and\neven then, before I start, her leddyship sees every bowie, bicker, and\npiggin, that gangs into the cart\u2014she kens the price o\u2019 them as weel as I\ndo; and if I shouldna bring hame either money or goods according to her\nvaluation, I actually believe she wad murder me. There is nae cheatin\u2019\nher. It is by mere chance that, having had a gude market, I\u2019ve\noutreached her the day by a shillin\u2019 or twa; and ane o\u2019 them I\u2019ll spend\nwi\u2019 you, Robin, and the rest shall gang to my mither. O man! ye may\nbless your stars that ye dinna ken what it is to hae a termagant wife.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am sorry for ye, Patie,\u201d said Robin Roughead; \u201cbut really I think, in\na great measure, ye hae yoursel to blame for it a\u2019!\u201d\n\n\u201cMe!\u201d said Patie\u2014\u201cwhat do ye mean, Robin?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Patie,\u201d said Robin, \u201cI ken it is said that every ane can rule a\nbad wife but he that has her\u2014and I believe it is true. I am quite\nconvinced that naebody kens sae weel where the shoe pinches as they that\nhae it on; though I am quite satisfied that, had my case been yours, I\nwad hae brought her to her senses long afore now, though I had\n\n Dauded her lugs wi\u2019 Rab Roryson\u2019s bannet,\n\nor gien her a _hoopin\u2019_, like your friend the cooper o\u2019 Coldingham.\u201d\n\n\u201cSave us, man!\u201d said Patie, who loved a joke, even though at secondhand,\nand at his own expense; \u201cbut ye see the cooper\u2019s case is not in point,\nthough I am in the same line; for, as I hae observed, I am only five\nfeet twa inches and an eighth in height\u2014my wife _is not the weaker\nvessel_\u2014that I ken to my sorrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, Patie,\u201d said Robin, \u201cI wadna hae ye to lift your hand\u2014I was but\njokin\u2019 upon that score, it wadna be manly;\u2014but there is ae thing that ye\ncan do, and I am sure it wad hae an excellent effect.\u201d\n\n\u201cDear sake! what is that?\u201d cried Patie.\n\n\u201cFor a\u2019 that has happened ye,\u201d said Robin, \u201cye hae just yoursel to\nblame, for giein\u2019 up the key and the siller to her management that nicht\nye gaed to Orange Lane. That is the short and the lang o\u2019 a\u2019 your\ntroubles, Patie.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you think sae?\u201d inquired the little bicker-maker.\n\n\u201cYes, I think sae, Peter, and I say it,\u201d said Robin; \u201cand there is but\nae remedy left.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what is that?\u201d asked Patie, eagerly.\n\n\u201cJust this,\u201d said Robin\u2014\u201c_stop the supplies_.\u201d\n\n\u201c_Stop the supplies!_\u201d returned Patie\u2014\u201cwhat do you mean, Robin? I canna\nsay that I fully comprehend ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cI just mean this,\u201d added the other; \u201cbe your ain banker\u2014your ain\ncashier\u2014be maister o\u2019 your ain siller\u2014let her find that it is to you she\nis indebted for every penny she has the power to spend; and if ye dinna\nbring Tibby to reason and kindness within a month, my name\u2019s no Robin\nRoughead.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo ye think that wad do it?\u201d said Patie.\n\n\u201cIf that wadna, naething wad,\u201d answered Robin; \u201cbut try it for a\ntwelvemonth\u2014begin this very nicht; and if we baith live and be spared to\nthis time next year, I\u2019ll meet ye again, and I\u2019ll be the death o\u2019 a\nmutchkin, but that ye tell me Tibby\u2019s a different woman\u2014your bairns\ndifferent\u2014your hale house different\u2014and your auld mither comfortable.\u201d\n\n\u201cO man, if it might be sae,\u201d said Patie; \u201cbut this very nicht, the\nmoment I get hame, I\u2019ll try it\u2014and, if I succeed, I\u2019ll try ye wi\u2019 a\nbottle o\u2019 wine, and I believe I never drank ane in my life.\u201d\n\n\u201cAgreed,\u201d said Robin; \u201cbut mind ye\u2019re no to do things by halves. Ye\u2019re\nno to be feared out o\u2019 your resolution because Tibby may fire and storm,\nand let drive the things in the house at ye\u2014nor even though she should\ngreet.\u201d\n\n\u201cI thoroughly understand ye,\u201d said Patie; \u201cmy resolution\u2019s ta\u2019en, and\nI\u2019ll stand by it.\u201d\n\n\u201cGie\u2019s your hand on\u2019t,\u201d said Robin; and Patie gave him his hand.\n\nNow, the two friends parted, and it is unnecessary for me either to\ndescribe their parting, or the reception which Patie, on his arriving at\nBirgham, met with from his spouse.\n\nTwelve months went round, Dunse fair came again, and after the fair was\nover, Patie Crichton once more went in quest of his old friend, Robin\nRoughead. He found him standing in the horse market, and\u2014\n\n\u201cHow\u2019s a\u2019 wi\u2019 ye, my freend?\u201d says Patie.\n\n\u201cOh, hearty, hearty,\u201d cries the other; \u201cbut how\u2019s a\u2019 wi\u2019 ye?\u2014how is yer\nfamily?\u201d\n\n\u201cCome and get the bottle o\u2019 wine that I\u2019ve to gie ye,\u201d said Patie, \u201cand\nI\u2019ll tell ye a\u2019 about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll do that,\u201d said Robin, \u201cfor my business is dune.\u201d\n\nSo they went into the same house in the Castle Wynd where they had been\ntwelve months before, and Patie called for a bottle of wine; but he\nfound that the house had not the wine license, and was therefore content\nwith a gill of whisky made into toddy.\n\n\u201cO, man,\u201d said he to Robin, \u201cI wad pay ye half-a-dizen bottles o\u2019 wine\nwi\u2019 as great cheerfulness as I raise this glass to my lips. It was a\ngrand advice that o\u2019 yours\u2014_stop the supplies_.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am glad to hear it,\u201d said Robin; \u201cI was sure it was the only thing\nthat would do.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe shall hear a\u2019 about it,\u201d said Patie. \u201cAfter parting wi\u2019 ye, I\ntrudged hame to Birgham, and when I got to my house\u2014before I had the\nsneck o\u2019 the door weel out o\u2019 my hand\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018What\u2019s stopped ye to this time o\u2019 nicht, ye fitless, feckless cratur,\nye?\u2019 cried Tibby\u2014\u2018whaur hae ye been? Gie an account o\u2019 yoursel.\u2019\n\n\u201cAn account o\u2019 mysel!\u2019 says I; and I gied the door a drive ahint me, as\nif I wad driven it aff the hinges\u2014\u2018for what should I gie an account o\u2019\nmysel?\u2014or wha should I gie it to? I suppose this house is my ain, and I\ncan come in and gang out when I like!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Yours!\u2019 cried she; \u2018is the _body_ drunk?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018No,\u2019 says I, \u2018I\u2019m no drunk, but I wad hae you to be decent. Where is\nmy supper?\u2014it is time that I had it.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ye micht hae come in in time to get it then,\u2019 said she; \u2018folk canna\nkeep suppers waitin\u2019 on you.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But I\u2019ll gang whar I can get it,\u2019 said I; and I offered to leave the\nhouse.\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019ll tak the life o\u2019 ye first,\u2019 said she. \u2018Gie me the siller. Ye had\nfive cogs, a dizen o\u2019 bickers, twa dizen o\u2019 piggins, three bowies, four\ncream dishes, and twa ladles, besides the wooden spoons that I packed up\nmysel. Gie me the siller\u2014and, you puir profligate, let me see what ye\nhae spent.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Gie you the siller!\u2019 says I; \u2018na, na, I\u2019ve dune that lang aneugh\u2014_I\nhae stopped the supplies_, my woman.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Stop your breath!\u2019 cried she; \u2018gie me the siller, every farthin\u2019, or\nwo betide ye!\u2019\n\n\u201cIt was needless for her to say _every farthin\u2019_; for, had I dune as I\nused to do, I kenned she wad search through every pocket o\u2019 my claes the\nmoment she thocht me asleep\u2014through every hole and corner o\u2019 them, to\nsee if I had cheated her out o\u2019 a single penny\u2014ay, and tak them up, and\nshake them, and shake them, after a\u2019 was dune. But I was determined to\nstand fast by your advice.\n\n\u201c\u2018Do as ye like,\u2019 says I; \u2018I\u2019ll bring ye to your senses\u2014_I\u2019ve stopped\nthe supplies_.\u2019\n\n\u201cShe saw that I wasna drunk, and my manner rather dumfoundered her a\nlittle. The bairns\u2014wha, as I have tauld you, she aye encouraged to mock\nme\u2014began to giggle at me, and to mak game o\u2019 me, as usual. I banged out\no\u2019 the house, and into the shop, and took down the belt o\u2019 the bit\nturning-lathe, and into the house I goes again wi\u2019 it in my hand.\n\n\u201c\u2018Wha maks a fule o\u2019 me now?\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd they a\u2019 laughed thegither, and I up wi\u2019 the belt, and loundered\nthem round the house and round the house, till ane screamed and anither\nscreamed, and even their mither got clouts in trying to run betwixt them\nand me; and it was wha to squeel loudest. Sae, after I had brocht them\na\u2019 to ken what I was, I awa yont to my mither\u2019s, and gaed her five\nshillin\u2019s, puir body; and after stoppin\u2019 an hour wi\u2019 her, I gaed back to\nthe house again. The bairns were a\u2019 abed, and some o\u2019 them were still\nsobbin\u2019, and Tibby was sittin\u2019 by the fire; but she didna venture to say\na word\u2014I had completely astonished her\u2014and as little said I.\n\n\u201cThere wasna a word passed between us for three days; I was beginning to\ncarry my head higher in the house; and on the fourth day I observed that\nshe had nae tea to her breakfast. A day or twa after, the auldest lassie\ncam to me ae morning about ten o\u2019clock, and says she\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Faither, I want siller for tea and sugar.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Gae back to them that sent ye,\u2019 says I, \u2018and tell them to fare as I\ndo, and they\u2019ll save the tea and sugar.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut it is of nae use dwellin\u2019 on the subject. I did stop the supplies\nmost effectually. I very soon brocht Tibby to ken wha was her\nbread-winner. An\u2019 when I saw that my object was accomplished, I showed\nmair kindness and affection to her than ever I had dune. The bairns\nbecam as obedient as lambs, and she soon cam to say\u2014\u2018Peter, should I do\nthis thing?\u2019\u2014or, \u2018Peter, should I do that thing?\u2019 So, when I had brocht\nher that far\u2014\u2018Tibby,\u2019 says I, \u2018we hae a but and a ben, and it\u2019s grievin\u2019\nme to see my auld mither starvin\u2019, and left by hersel wi\u2019 naebody to\nlook after her. I think I\u2019ll bring her hame the morn\u2014she\u2019ll aye be o\u2019\nuse about the house\u2014she\u2019ll can knit the bairns\u2019 stockin\u2019s, or darn them\nwhen they are out o\u2019 the heels.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Weel, Peter,\u2019 said Tibby, \u2018I\u2019m sure it\u2019s as little as a son can do,\nand I\u2019m perfectly agreeable.\u2019\n\n\u201cI banged up\u2014I flung my arms round Tibby\u2019s neck\u2014\u2018Oh! bless ye, my dear!\u2019\nsays I; \u2018bless ye for that!\u2014there\u2019s the key o\u2019 the kist and the\nsiller\u2014from this time henceforth do wi\u2019 it what ye like.\u2019\n\n\u201cTibby grat. My mother cam hame to my house the next day. Tibby did\neverything to mak her comfortable-a\u2019 the bairns ran at her biddin\u2019\u2014and,\nfrae that day to this, there isna a happier man on this wide world than\nPatie Crichton, the bicker-maker o\u2019 Birgham.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n DUNCAN CAMPBELL.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\nDuncan Campbell came from the Highlands, when six years of age, to live\nwith an old maiden aunt in Edinburgh, and attend the school. His mother\nwas dead; but his father had supplied her place by marrying his\nhousekeeper. Duncan did not trouble himself about these matters, nor,\nindeed, about any other matters, save a black foal of his father\u2019s and a\nlarge sagacious collie, named Oscar, which belonged to one of the\nshepherds. There being no other boy save Duncan about the house, Oscar\nand he were constant companions; with his garter tied round Oscar\u2019s\nneck, and a piece of deal tied to his big bushy tail, Duncan would often\nlead him about the green, pleased with the idea that he was conducting a\nhorse and cart. Oscar submitted to all this with great cheerfulness, but\nwhenever Duncan mounted to ride on him, he found means instantly to\nunhorse him, either by galloping, or rolling himself on the green. When\nDuncan threatened him, he looked submissive and licked his face and\nhands; when he corrected him with the whip, he cowered at his feet.\nMatters were soon made up. Oscar would lodge nowhere during the night\nbut at the door of the room where his young friend slept, and woe be to\nthe man or woman who ventured to enter it at untimely hours.\n\nWhen Duncan left his native home he thought not of his father, nor any\nof the servants. He was fond of the ride, and some supposed that he\nscarcely even thought of the black foal; but when he saw Oscar standing\nlooking him ruefully in the face, the tears immediately blinded both his\neyes. He caught him round the neck, hugged and kissed him\u2014\u201cGood-bye,\nOscar,\u201d said he, blubbering; \u201cgood-bye. God bless you, my dear Oscar.\u201d\nDuncan mounted before a servant, and rode away\u2014Oscar still followed at a\ndistance, until he reached the top of the hill\u2014he then sat down and\nhowled; Duncan cried till his little heart was like to burst.\n\n\u201cWhat ails you?\u201d said the servant.\n\n\u201cI will never see my poor honest Oscar again,\u201d said Duncan, \u201can\u2019 my\nheart canna bide it.\u201d\n\nDuncan stayed a year in Edinburgh, but he did not make great progress in\nlearning. He did not approve highly of attending the school, and his\naunt was too indulgent to compel his attendance. She grew extremely ill\none day\u2014the maids kept constantly by her, and never regarded Duncan. He\nwas an additional charge to them, and they never loved him, but used him\nharshly. It was now with great difficulty that he could obtain either\nmeat or drink. In a few days after his aunt was taken ill she died. All\nwas in confusion, and poor Duncan was like to perish with hunger. He\ncould find no person in the house; but hearing a noise in his aunt\u2019s\nchamber, he went in, and beheld them dressing the corpse of his kind\nrelation. It was enough. Duncan was horrified beyond what mortal breast\nwas able to endure; he hasted down the stair, and ran along the High\nStreet and South Bridge, as fast as his feet could carry him, crying\nincessantly all the way. He would not have entered that house again if\nthe world had been offered to him as a reward. Some people stopped him,\nin order to ask what was the matter; but he could only answer them by\nexclaiming, \u201cO! dear! O! dear!\u201d and struggling till he got free, held on\nhis course, careless whither he went, provided he got far enough from\nthe horrid scene he had so lately witnessed. Some have supposed, and I\nbelieve Duncan has been heard to confess, that he then imagined he was\nrunning for the Highlands, but mistook the direction. However that was,\nhe continued his course until he came to a place where two ways met, a\nlittle south of Grange Toll. Here he sat down, and his frenzied passion\nsubsided into a soft melancholy; he cried no more, but sobbed\nexcessively, fixed his eyes on the ground, and made some strokes in the\ndust with his finger.\n\nA sight just then appeared which somewhat cheered, or at least\ninterested his heavy and forlorn heart\u2014it was a large drove of Highland\ncattle. They were the only creatures like acquaintances that Duncan had\nseen for a twelvemonth, and a tender feeling of joy, mixed with regret,\nthrilled his heart at the sight of their white horns and broad dew-laps.\nAs the van passed him, he thought their looks were particularly gruff\nand sullen; he soon perceived the cause, they were all in the hands of\nEnglishmen;\u2014poor exiles like himself\u2014going far away to be killed and\neaten, and would never see the Highland hills again! When they were all\ngone by, Duncan looked after them and wept anew; but his attention was\nsuddenly called away to something that softly touched his feet; he\nlooked hastily about\u2014it was a poor, hungry, lame dog, squatted on the\nground, licking his feet, and manifesting the most extravagant joy.\nGracious heaven! it was his own beloved and faithful Oscar! starved,\nemaciated, and so crippled that he was scarcely able to walk. He was now\ndoomed to be the slave of a Yorkshire peasant (who, it seems, had either\nbought or stolen him at Falkirk), the generosity and benevolence of\nwhose feelings were as inferior to those of Oscar, as Oscar was inferior\nto him in strength and power. It is impossible to conceive a more tender\nmeeting than this was; but Duncan soon observed that hunger and misery\nwere painted in his friend\u2019s looks, which again pierced his heart with\nfeelings unfelt before. \u201cI have not a crumb to give you, my poor Oscar!\u201d\nsaid he\u2014\u201cI have not a crumb to eat myself, but I am not so ill as you\nare.\u201d The peasant whistled aloud. Oscar well knew the sound, and,\nclinging to the boy\u2019s bosom, leaned his head upon his thigh, and looked\nin his face, as if saying, \u201cO Duncan, protect me from yon ruffian.\u201d The\nwhistle was repeated, accompanied by a loud and surly call. Oscar\ntrembled, but, fearing to disobey, he limped away reluctantly after his\nunfeeling master, who, observing him to linger and look back, imagined\nhe wanted to effect his escape, and came running back to meet him. Oscar\ncowered to the earth in the most submissive and imploring manner, but\nthe peasant laid hold of him by the ear, and, uttering many\nimprecations, struck him with a thick staff till he lay senseless at his\nfeet.\n\nEvery possible circumstance seemed combined to wound the feelings of\npoor Duncan, but this unmerited barbarity shocked him most of all. He\nhasted to the scene of action, weeping bitterly, and telling the man\nthat he was a cruel brute, and that if ever he himself grew a big man he\nwould certainly kill him. He held up his favourite\u2019s head that he might\nrecover his breath, and the man, knowing that he could do little without\nhis dog, waited patiently to see what would be the issue. The animal\nrecovered, and staggered away at the heels of his tyrant without daring\nto look behind. Duncan stood still, but kept his eyes eagerly fixed upon\nOscar; and the farther he went from him, the more strong his desire grew\nto follow him. He looked the other way, but all there was to him a\nblank,\u2014he had no desire to stand where he was, so he followed Oscar and\nthe drove of cattle.\n\nThe cattle were weary and went slowly, and Duncan, getting a little goad\nin his hand, assisted the men greatly in driving them. One of the\ndrivers gave him a penny, and another gave him twopence; and the lad who\nhad charge of the drove, observing how active and pliable he was, and\nhow far he had accompanied him on the way, gave him sixpence. This was a\ntreasure to Duncan, who, being extremely hungry, bought three penny\nrolls as he passed through a town; one of these he ate himself, another\nhe gave to Oscar; and the third he carried below his arm in case of\nfurther necessity. He drove on all the day, and at night the cattle\nrested upon a height, which, by his description, seems to have been that\nbetween Gala Water and Middleton. Duncan went off at a side, in company\nwith Oscar, to eat his roll, and, taking shelter behind an old earthen\nwall, they shared their dry meal most lovingly between them. Ere it was\nquite finished, Duncan, being fatigued, dropped into a profound slumber,\nout of which he did not awake until the next morning was far advanced.\nEnglishmen, cattle, and Oscar, all were gone. Duncan found himself alone\non a wild height, in what country or kingdom he knew not. He sat for\nsome time in a callous stupor, rubbing his eyes and scratching his head,\nbut quite irresolute what was farther necessary for him to do, until he\nwas agreeably surprised by the arrival of Oscar, who (although he had\ngone at his master\u2019s call in the morning) had found means to escape and\nseek the retreat of his young friend and benefactor. Duncan, without\nreflecting on the consequences, rejoiced in the event, and thought of\nnothing else but furthering his escape from the ruthless tyrant who now\nclaimed him. For this purpose he thought it would be best to leave the\nroad, and accordingly he crossed it, in order to go over a waste moor to\nthe westward. He had not got forty paces from the road, until he beheld\nthe enraged Englishman running towards him without his coat, and having\nhis staff heaved over his shoulder. Duncan\u2019s heart fainted within him,\nknowing it was all over with Oscar, and most likely with himself. The\npeasant seemed not to have observed them, as he was running and rather\nlooking the other way; and as Duncan quickly lost sight of him in a\nhollow place that lay between them, he crept into a bush of heath, and\ntook Oscar in his bosom. The heath was so long that it almost closed\nabove them. The man had observed from whence the dog started in the\nmorning, and hasted to the place, expecting to find him sleeping beyond\nthe old earthen dyke; he found the nest, but the birds were flown;\u2014he\ncalled aloud; Oscar trembled and clung to Duncan\u2019s breast; Duncan peeped\nfrom his purple covert, like a heath-cock on his native waste, and again\nbeheld the ruffian coming straight towards them, with his staff still\nheaved, and fury in his looks. When he came within a few yards he stood\nstill, and bellowed out: \u201cOscar, yho, yho!\u201d Oscar quaked, and kept still\ncloser to Duncan\u2019s breast; Duncan almost sank in the earth. \u201cD\u2014\u2014n him,\u201d\nsaid the Englishman, \u201cif I had hold of him I should make both him and\nthe little thievish rascal dear at a small price; they cannot be far\ngone,\u2014I think I hear them.\u201d He then stood listening, but at that instant\na farmer came up on horseback, and having heard him call, asked him if\nhe had lost his dog? The peasant answered in the affirmative, and added,\nthat a blackguard boy had stolen him. The farmer said that he met a boy\nwith a dog about a mile forward. During this dialogue, the farmer\u2019s dog\ncame up to Duncan\u2019s den,\u2014smelled upon him, and then upon Oscar,\u2014cocked\nhis tail, walked round them growling, and then behaved in a very\nimproper and uncivil manner to Duncan, who took all patiently, uncertain\nwhether he was yet discovered. But so intent was the fellow upon the\nfarmer\u2019s intelligence, that he took no notice of the discovery made by\nthe dog, but ran off without looking over his shoulder.\n\nDuncan felt this a deliverance so great that all his other distresses\nvanished; and as soon as the man was out of his sight, he arose from his\ncovert, and ran over the moor, and ere long, came to a shepherd\u2019s house,\nwhere he got some whey and bread for his breakfast, which he thought the\nbest meat he had ever tasted, yet shared it with Oscar.\n\nThough I had his history from his own mouth, yet there is a space here\nwhich it is impossible to relate with any degree of distinctness or\ninterest. He was a vagabond boy, without any fixed habitation, and\nwandered about Heriot Moor, from one farmhouse to another, for the space\nof a year, staying from one to twenty nights in each house, according as\nhe found the people kind to him. He seldom resented any indignity\noffered to himself; but whoever insulted Oscar, or offered any\nobservations on the impropriety of their friendship, lost Duncan\u2019s\ncompany the next morning.\n\nHe stayed several months at a place called Dewar, which he said was\nhaunted by the ghost of a piper; that piper had been murdered there many\nyears before, in a manner somewhat mysterious, or at least\nunaccountable; and there was scarcely a night on which he was not\nsupposed either to be seen or heard about the house. Duncan slept in the\ncowhouse, and was terribly harassed by the piper; he often heard him\nscratching about the rafters, and sometimes he would groan like a man\ndying, or a cow that was choked in the band; but at length he saw him at\nhis side one night, which so discomposed him, that he was obliged to\nleave the place, after being ill for many days. I shall give this story\nin Duncan\u2019s own words, which I have often heard him repeat without any\nvariation.\n\n\u201cI had been driving some young cattle to the heights of Willenslee\u2014it\ngrew late before I got home\u2014I was thinking, and thinking, how cruel it\nwas to kill the poor piper! to cut out his tongue, and stab him in the\nback. I thought it was no wonder that his ghost took it extremely ill;\nwhen, all on a sudden, I perceived a light before me;\u2014I thought the wand\nin my hand was all on fire, and threw it away, but I perceived the light\nglide slowly by my right foot, and burn behind me;\u2014I was nothing afraid,\nand turned about to look at the light, and there I saw the piper, who\nwas standing hard at my back, and when I turned round, he looked me in\nthe face.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat was he like, Duncan?\u201d \u201cHe was like a dead body! but I got a short\nview of him; for that moment all around me grew dark as a pit!\u2014I tried\nto run, but sank powerless to the earth, and lay in a kind of dream, I\ndo not know how long. When I came to myself, I got up, and endeavoured\nto run, but fell to the ground every two steps. I was not a hundred\nyards from the house, and I am sure I fell upwards of a hundred times.\nNext day I was in a high fever; the servants made me a little bed in the\nkitchen, to which I was confined by illness many days, during which time\nI suffered the most dreadful agonies by night, always imagining the\npiper to be standing over me on the one side or the other. As soon as I\nwas able to walk, I left Dewar, and for a long time durst neither sleep\nalone during the night, nor stay by myself in the daytime.\u201d\n\nThe superstitious ideas impressed upon Duncan\u2019s mind by this unfortunate\nencounter with the ghost of the piper, seem never to have been\neradicated\u2014a strong instance of the power of early impressions, and a\nwarning how much caution is necessary in modelling the conceptions of\nthe young and tender mind, for, of all men I ever knew, he is the most\nafraid of meeting with apparitions. So deeply is his imagination tainted\nwith this startling illusion, that even the calm disquisitions of reason\nhave proved quite inadequate to the task of dispelling it. Whenever it\nwears late, he is always on the look-out for these ideal beings, keeping\na jealous eye upon every bush and brake, in case they should be lurking\nbehind them, ready to fly out and surprise him every moment; and the\napproach of a person in the dark, or any sudden noise, always deprives\nhim of the power of speech for some time.\n\nAfter leaving Dewar he again wandered about for a few weeks; and it\nappears that his youth, beauty, and peculiarly destitute situation,\ntogether with his friendship for his faithful Oscar, had interested the\nmost part of the country people in his behalf; for he was generally\ntreated with kindness. He knew his father\u2019s name, and the name of his\nhouse; but as none of the people he visited had ever before heard of\neither the one or the other, they gave themselves no trouble about the\nmatter.\n\nHe stayed nearly two years in a place called Cowhaur, until a wretch,\nwith whom he slept, struck and abused him one day. Duncan, in a rage,\nflew to the loft and cut all his Sunday hat, shoes, and coat in pieces;\nand, not daring to abide the consequences, decamped that night.\n\nHe wandered about for some time longer among the farmers of Tweed and\nYarrow; but this life was now become exceedingly disagreeable to him. He\ndurst not sleep by himself, and the servants did not always choose to\nallow a vagrant boy and his great dog to sleep with them.\n\nIt was on a rainy night, at the close of harvest, that Duncan came to my\nfather\u2019s house. I remember all the circumstances as well as the\ntransactions of yesterday. The whole of his clothing consisted only of a\nblack coat, which, having been made for a fullgrown man, hung fairly to\nhis heels; the hair of his head was rough, curly, and weather-beaten;\nbut his face was ruddy and beautiful, bespeaking a healthy body and a\nsensible, feeling heart. Oscar was still nearly as large as himself, and\nthe colour of a fox, having a white stripe down his face, with a ring of\nthe same colour round his neck, and was the most beautiful collie I have\never seen. My heart was knit to Duncan at the first sight, and I wept\nfor joy when I saw my parents so kind to him. My mother, in particular,\ncould scarcely do anything else than converse with Duncan for several\ndays. I was always of the party, and listened with wonder and\nadmiration; but often have these adventures been repeated to me. My\nparents, who soon seemed to feel the same concern for him as if he had\nbeen their own son, clothed him in blue drugget, and bought him a smart\nlittle Highland bonnet, in which dress he looked so charming that I\nwould not let them have peace until I got one of the same. Indeed, all\nthat Duncan said or did was to me a pattern; for I loved him as my own\nlife. At my own request, which he persuaded me to urge, I was permitted\nto be his bedfellow, and many a happy night and day did I spend with\nDuncan and Oscar.\n\nAs far as I remember, we felt no privation of any kind, and would have\nbeen completely happy if it had not been for the fear of spirits. When\nthe conversation chanced to turn upon the Piper of Dewar, the Maid of\nPlora, or the Pedlar of Thirlestane Mill, often have we lain with the\nbed-clothes drawn over our heads till nearly suffocated. We loved the\nfairies and the brownies, and even felt a little partiality for the\nmermaids, on account of their beauty and charming songs; but we were a\nlittle jealous of the water-kelpies, and always kept aloof from the\nfrightsome pools. We hated the devil most heartily, although we were not\nmuch afraid of him; but a ghost! oh, dreadful! the names, ghost, spirit,\nor apparition, sounded in our ears like the knell of destruction, and\nour hearts sank within us, as if pierced by the cold icy shaft of death.\nDuncan herded my father\u2019s cows all the summer\u2014so did I: we could not\nlive asunder. We grew such expert fishers, that the speckled trout, with\nall his art, could not elude our machinations; we forced him from his\nwatery cove, admired the beautiful shades and purple drops that were\npainted on his sleek sides, and forthwith added him to our number\nwithout reluctance. We assailed the habitation of the wild bee, and\nrifled her of all her accumulated sweets, though not without\nencountering the most determined resistance. My father\u2019s meadows\nabounded with hives; they were almost in every swath\u2014in every hillock.\nWhen the swarm was large, they would beat us off, day after day. In all\nthese desperate engagements Oscar came to our assistance, and, provided\nthat none of the enemy made a lodgment in his lower defiles, he was\nalways the last combatant of our party on the field. I do not remember\nof ever being so much diverted by any scene I ever witnessed, or\nlaughing as immoderately as I have done at seeing Oscar involved in a\nmoving cloud of wild bees, wheeling, snapping on all sides, and shaking\nhis ears incessantly.\n\nThe sagacity which this animal possessed is almost incredible, while his\nundaunted spirit and generosity would do honour to every servant of our\nown species to copy. Twice did he save his master\u2019s life; at one time\nwhen attacked by a furious bull, and at another time when he fell from\nbehind my father, off a horse in a flooded river. Oscar had just swimmed\nacross, but instantly plunged in a second time to his master\u2019s rescue.\nHe first got hold of his bonnet, but that coming off, he quitted it, and\nagain catching him by the coat, brought him to the side, where my father\nreached him. He waked Duncan at a certain hour every morning, and would\nfrequently turn the cows of his own will, when he observed them wrong.\nIf Duncan dropped his knife, or any other small article, he would fetch\nit along in his mouth; and if sent back for a lost thing, would\ninfallibly find it. When sixteen years of age, after being unwell for\nseveral days, he died one night below his master\u2019s bed. On the evening\nbefore, when Duncan came in from the plough, he came from his\nhiding-place, wagged his tail, licked Duncan\u2019s hand, and returned to his\ndeathbed. Duncan and I lamented him with unfeigned sorrow, buried him\nbelow the old rowan tree at the back of my father\u2019s garden, placing a\nsquare stone at his head, which was still standing the last time I was\nthere. With great labour, we composed an epitaph between us, which was\nonce carved on that stone; the metre was good, but the stone was so\nhard, and the engraving so faint, that the characters, like those of our\nearly joys, are long ago defaced and extinct.\n\nOften have I heard my mother relate with enthusiasm the manner in which\nshe and my father first discovered the dawnings of goodness and facility\nof conception in Duncan\u2019s mind, though, I confess, dearly as I loved\nhim, these circumstances escaped my observation. It was my father\u2019s\ninvariable custom to pray with the family every night before they\nretired to rest, to thank the Almighty for his kindness to them during\nthe bygone day, and to beg His protection through the dark and silent\nwatches of the night. I need not inform any of my readers that that\namiable (and now too much neglected and despised) duty consisted in\nsinging a few stanzas of a psalm, in which all the family joined their\nvoices with my father\u2019s, so that the double octaves of the various ages\nand sexes swelled the simple concert. He then read a chapter from the\nBible, going straight on from beginning to end of the Scriptures. The\nprayer concluded the devotions of each evening, in which the downfall of\nantichrist was always strenuously urged, the ministers of the gospel\nremembered, nor was any friend or neighbour in distress forgot.\n\nThe servants of a family have, in general, liberty either to wait the\nevening prayers, or retire to bed as they incline, but no consideration\nwhatever could induce Duncan to go one night to rest without the\nprayers, even though both wet and weary, and entreated by my parents to\nretire, for fear of catching cold. It seems that I had been of a more\ncomplaisant disposition; for I was never very hard to prevail with in\nthis respect; nay, my mother used to say, that I was extremely apt to\ntake a pain about my heart at that time of the night, and was, of\ncourse, frequently obliged to betake me to bed before the worship\ncommenced.\n\nIt might be owing to this that Duncan\u2019s emotions on these occasions\nescaped my notice. He sung a treble to the old church tunes most\nsweetly, for he had a melodious voice; and when my father read the\nchapter, if it was in any of the historical parts of Scripture, he would\nlean upon the table, and look him in the face, swallowing every sentence\nwith the utmost avidity. At one time, as my father read the 45th chapter\nof Genesis, he wept so bitterly, that at the end my father paused, and\nasked what ailed him? Duncan told him that he did not know. At another\ntime, the year following, my father, in the course of his evening\ndevotions, had reached the 19th chapter of the book of Judges; when he\nbegan reading it, Duncan was seated on the other side of the house, but\nere it was half done, he had stolen up close to my father\u2019s elbow.\n\u201cConsider of it, take advice, and speak your minds,\u201d said my father, and\nclosed the book. \u201cGo on, go on, if you please, Sir,\u201d said Duncan\u2014\u201cgo on,\nand let\u2019s hear what they said about it.\u201d My father looked sternly in\nDuncan\u2019s face, but seeing him abashed on account of his hasty breach of\ndecency, without uttering a word, he again opened the Bible, and read\nthe 20th chapter throughout, notwithstanding of its great length. Next\nday Duncan was walking about with the Bible below his arm, begging of\nevery one to read it to him again and again. This incident produced a\nconversation between my parents, on the expenses and utility of\neducation; the consequence of which was, that the week following, Duncan\nand I were sent to the parish school, and began at the same instant to\nthe study of that most important and fundamental branch of literature,\nthe A, B, C; but my sister Mary, who was older than I, was already an\naccurate and elegant reader.\n\nThis reminds me of another anecdote of Duncan, with regard to family\nworship, which I have often heard related, and which I myself may well\nremember. My father happening to be absent over night at a fair, when\nthe usual time of worship arrived, my mother desired a lad, one of the\nservants, to act as chaplain for that night; the lad declined it, and\nslunk away to his bed. My mother testified her regret that we should all\nbe obliged to go prayerless to our beds for that night, observing, that\nshe did not remember the time when it had so happened before. Duncan\nsaid he thought we might contrive to manage it amongst us, and instantly\nproposed to sing the psalm and pray, if Mary would read the chapter. To\nthis my mother, with some hesitation, agreed, remarking, that if he\nprayed as he could, with a pure heart, his prayer had as good a chance\nof being accepted as some others that were \u201cbetter worded.\u201d Duncan could\nnot then read, but having learned several psalms from Mary by rote, he\ncaused her to seek out the place, and sung the 23d Psalm from end to end\nwith great sweetness and decency. Mary read a chapter in the New\nTestament, and then (my mother having a child on her knee) we three\nkneeled in a row, while Duncan prayed thus:\u2014\u201cO Lord, be Thou our God,\nour guide, and our guard unto death, and through death,\u201d\u2014that was a\nsentence my father often used in prayer; Duncan had laid hold of it, and\nmy mother began to think that he had often prayed previous to that time.\n\u201cO Lord, Thou\u201d\u2014continued Duncan; but his matter was exhausted; a long\npause ensued, which I at length broke by bursting into a loud fit of\nlaughter. Duncan rose hastily, and without once lifting up his head,\nwent crying to his bed; and as I continued to indulge in laughter, my\nmother, for my irreverent behaviour, struck me across the shoulders with\nthe tongs. Our evening devotions terminated exceedingly ill; I went\ncrying to my bed after Duncan, even louder than he, and abusing him for\nhis \u201cuseless prayer,\u201d for which I had been nearly felled.\n\nBy the time that we were recalled from school to herd the cows, next\nsummer, we could both read the Bible with considerable facility, but\nDuncan far excelled me in perspicacity; and so fond was he of reading\nBible history that the reading of it was now our constant amusement.\nOften have Mary and he and I lain under the same plaid by the side of\nthe corn or meadow, and read chapter about in the Bible for hours\ntogether, weeping over the failings and fall of good men, and wondering\nat the inconceivable might of the heroes of antiquity. Never was man so\ndelighted as Duncan was when he came to the history of Samson, and\nafterwards of David and Goliath; he could not be satisfied until he had\nread it to every individual with whom he was acquainted, judging it to\nbe as new and as interesting to every one as it was to himself. I have\nseen him standing by the girls as they were milking the cows, reading to\nthem the feats of Samson; and, in short, harassing every man and woman\nabout the hamlet for audience. On Sundays, my parents accompanied us to\nthe fields, and joined in our delightful exercise.\n\nTime passed away, and so also did our youthful delights; but other cares\nand other pleasures awaited us. As we advanced in years and strength, we\nquitted the herding, and bore a hand in the labours of the farm. Mary,\ntoo, was often our assistant. She and Duncan were nearly of an age; he\nwas tall, comely, and affable; and if Mary was not the prettiest girl in\nthe parish, at least Duncan and I believed her to be so, which, with us,\namounted to the same thing. We often compared the other girls in the\nparish with one another, as to their beauty and accomplishments, but to\nthink of comparing any of them with Mary was entirely out of the\nquestion. She was, indeed, the emblem of truth, simplicity, and\ninnocence, and if there were few more beautiful, there were still fewer\nso good and amiable; but still, as she advanced in years, she grew\nfonder and fonder of being near Duncan; and by the time she was\nnineteen, was so deeply in love that it affected her manner, her\nspirits, and her health. At one time she was gay and frisky as a kitten;\nshe would dance, sing, and laugh violently at the most trivial\nincidents. At other times she was silent and sad, while a languishing\nsoftness overspread her features, and added greatly to her charms. The\npassion was undoubtedly mutual between them; but Duncan, either from a\nsense of honour, or some other cause, never declared himself farther on\nthe subject than by the most respectful attention and tender\nassiduities. Hope and fear thus alternately swayed the heart of poor\nMary, and produced in her deportment that variety of affections which\ncould not fail of rendering the sentiments of her artless bosom legible\nto the eye of experience.\n\nIn this state matters stood, when an incident occurred which deranged\nour happiness at once, and the time arrived when the kindest and most\naffectionate little social band of friends that ever panted to meet the\nwishes of each other were obliged to part.\n\nAbout forty years ago, the flocks of southern sheep, which have since\nthat period inundated the Highlands, had not found their way over the\nGrampian Mountains; and the native flocks of that sequestered country\nwere so scanty that it was found necessary to transport small quantities\nof wool annually to the north, to furnish materials for clothing the\ninhabitants. During two months of each summer, the hill countries of the\nLowlands were inundated by hundreds of women from the Highlands, who\nbartered small articles of dress, and of domestic import, for wool;\nthese were known by the appellation of \u201cnorlan\u2019 netties;\u201d and few nights\npassed, during the wool season, that some of them were not lodged at my\nfather\u2019s house. It was from two of these that Duncan learned one day who\nand what he was; that he was the Laird of Glenellich\u2019s only son and\nheir, and that a large sum had been offered to any person that could\ndiscover him. My parents certainly rejoiced in Duncan\u2019s good fortune,\nyet they were disconsolate at parting with him; for he had long ago\nbecome as a son of their own; and I seriously believe, that from the day\nthey first met, to that on which the two \u201cnorlan\u2019 netties\u201d came to our\nhouse, they never once entertained the idea of parting. For my part, I\nwished that the \u201cnetties\u201d had never been born, or that they had stayed\nat their own home; for the thought of being separated from my dear\nfriend made me sick at heart. All our feelings were, however, nothing\nwhen compared with those of my sister Mary. From the day that the two\nwomen left our house, she was no more seen to smile; she had never yet\ndivulged the sentiments of her heart to any one, and imagined her love\nfor Duncan a profound secret,\u2014no,\n\n She never told her love;\n But let concealment, like a worm i\u2019 the bud,\n Feed on her damask cheek;\u2014she pined in thought;\n And, with a green and yellow melancholy,\n She sat like patience on a monument,\n Smiling at grief.\n\nOur social glee and cheerfulness were now completely clouded; we sat\ndown to our meals, and rose from them in silence. Of the few\nobservations that passed, every one seemed the progeny of embarrassment\nand discontent, and our general remarks were strained and cold. One day\nat dinner-time, after a long and sullen pause, my father said, \u201cI hope\nyou do not intend to leave us very soon, Duncan?\u201d \u201cI am thinking of\ngoing away to-morrow, sir,\u201d said Duncan. The knife fell from my mother\u2019s\nhand; she looked him steadily in the face for the space of a minute.\n\u201cDuncan,\u201d said she, her voice faltering, and the tears dropping from her\neyes,\u2014\u201cDuncan, I never durst ask you before, but I hope you will not\nleave us altogether?\u201d Duncan thrust the plate from before him into the\nmiddle of the table\u2014took up a book that lay on the window, and looked\nover the pages. Mary left the room. No answer was returned, nor any\nfurther inquiry made; and our little party broke up in silence.\n\nWhen we met again in the evening, we were still all sullen. My mother\ntried to speak of indifferent things, but it was apparent that her\nthoughts had no share in the words that dropped from her tongue. My\nfather at last said, \u201cYou will soon forget us, Duncan; but there are\nsome among us who will not soon forget you.\u201d Mary again left the room,\nand silence ensued, until the family were called together for evening\nworship. There was one sentence in my father\u2019s prayer that night which I\nthink I yet remember, word for word. It may appear of little importance\nto those who are nowise interested, but it affected us deeply, and left\nnot a dry cheek in the family. It runs thus\u2014\u201cWe are an unworthy little\nflock Thou seest here kneeling before Thee, our God; but, few as we are,\nit is probable we shall never all kneel again together before Thee in\nthis world. We have long lived together in peace and happiness, and\nhoped to have lived so much longer; but since it is Thy will that we\npart, enable us to submit to that will with firmness; and though Thou\nscatter us to the four winds of heaven, may Thy almighty arm still be\nabout us for good, and grant that we may all meet hereafter in another\nand a better world.\u201d\n\nThe next morning, after a restless night, Duncan rose early, put on his\nbest suit, and packed up some little articles to carry with him. I lay\npanting and trembling, but pretended to be fast asleep. When he was\nready to depart, he took his bundle below his arm, came up to the side\nof the bed, and listened if I was sleeping. He then stood long\nhesitating, looking wistfully to the door, and then to me, alternately;\nand I saw him three or four times wipe his eyes. At length he shook me\ngently by the shoulder, and asked if I was awake. I feigned to start,\nand answered as if half asleep.\n\n\u201cI must bid you farewell,\u201d said he, groping to get hold of my hand.\n\n\u201cWill you not breakfast with us, Duncan?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said he, \u201cI am thinking that it is best to steal away, for it\nwould break my heart to take leave of your parents, and\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cWho, Duncan?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cAnd you,\u201d said he.\n\n\u201cIndeed, but it is not best, Duncan,\u201d said I; \u201cwe will all breakfast\ntogether for the last time, and then take a formal and kind leave of\neach other.\u201d\n\nWe did breakfast together, and as the conversation turned on former\ndays, it became highly interesting to us all. When my father had\nreturned thanks to Heaven for our meal, we knew what was coming, and\nbegan to look at each other. Duncan rose, and after we had all loaded\nhim with our blessings and warmest wishes, he embraced my parents and\nme. He turned about. His eyes said plainly, \u201cThere is somebody still\nwanting,\u201d but his heart was so full, he could not speak.\n\n\u201cWhat is become of Mary?\u201d said my father. Mary was gone. We searched the\nhouse, the garden, and the houses of all the cottagers, but she was\nnowhere to be found. Poor lovelorn, forsaken Mary! She had hid herself\nin the ancient yew that grows in front of the old ruin, that she might\nsee her lover depart, without herself being seen, and might indulge in\nall the luxury of woe. Poor Mary! how often have I heard her sigh, and\nseen her eyes red with weeping, while the smile that played on her\nlanguid features, when aught was mentioned in Duncan\u2019s commendation,\nwould have melted a heart of adamant.\n\nI must pass over Duncan\u2019s journey to the north Highlands; but on the\nevening of the sixth day after leaving my father\u2019s house, he reached the\nmansion-house of Glenellich, which stands in a little beautiful woody\nstrath, commanding a view of part of the Hebrides; every avenue, tree,\nand rock was yet familiar to Duncan\u2019s recollection; and the feelings of\nhis sensible heart, on approaching the abode of his father, whom he had\nlong scarcely thought of, can only be conceived by a heart like his own.\nHe had, without discovering himself, learned from a peasant that his\nfather was still alive, but that he had never overcome the loss of his\nson, for whom he lamented every day; that his wife and daughter lorded\nit over him, holding his pleasure at naught, and rendered his age\nextremely unhappy; that they had expelled all his old farmers and\nvassals, and introduced the lady\u2019s vulgar, presumptuous relations, who\nneither paid him rents, honour, nor obedience.\n\nOld Glenellich was taking his evening walk on the road by which Duncan\ndescended the strath to his dwelling. He was pondering on his own\nmisfortunes, and did not even deign to lift his eyes as the young\nstranger approached, but seemed counting the number of marks which the\nhorses\u2019 hoofs had made on the way.\n\n\u201cGood e\u2019en to you, sir,\u201d said Duncan. The old man started and stared him\nin the face, but with a look so unsteady and harassed, that he seemed\nincapable of distinguishing any lineament or feature of it.\n\n\u201cGood e\u2019en, good e\u2019en,\u201d said he, wiping his brow with his arm, and\npassing by.\n\nWhat there was in the voice that struck him so forcibly it is hard to\nsay. Nature is powerful. Duncan could not think of aught to detain him;\nand being desirous of seeing how matters went on about the house,\nthought it best to remain some days _incog._ He went into the\nfore-kitchen, conversed freely with the servants, and soon saw his\nstep-mother and sister appear. The former had all the insolence and\nignorant pride of vulgarity raised to wealth and eminence; the other\nseemed naturally of an amiable disposition, but was entirely ruled by\nher mother, who taught her to disdain her father, all his relations, and\nwhomsoever he loved. On that same evening he came into the kitchen,\nwhere she then was chatting with Duncan, to whom she seemed attached at\nfirst sight.\n\n\u201cLexy, my dear,\u201d said he, \u201cdid you see my spectacles?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said she; \u201cI think I saw them on your nose to-day at breakfast.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, but I have lost them since,\u201d said he.\n\n\u201cYou may take up the next you find then, sir,\u201d said she.\n\nThe servants laughed.\n\n\u201cI might well have known what information I would get of you,\u201d said he,\nregretfully.\n\n\u201cHow can you speak in such a style to your father, my dear lady?\u201d said\nDuncan. \u201cIf I were he I would place you where you should learn better\nmanners. It ill becomes so pretty a young lady to address an old father\nthus.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe!\u201d said she, \u201cwho minds him? He\u2019s a dotard, an old whining,\ncomplaining, superannuated being, worse than a child.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut consider his years,\u201d said Duncan; \u201cand, besides, he may have met\nwith crosses and losses sufficient to sour the temper of a younger man.\nYou should at all events pity and reverence, but never despise, your\nfather.\u201d\n\nThe old lady now joined them.\n\n\u201cYou have yet heard nothing, young man,\u201d said the old laird; \u201cif you saw\nhow my heart is sometimes wrung. Yes, I have had losses indeed.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou losses!\u201d said his spouse; \u201cno; you have never had any losses that\ndid not in the end turn out a vast profit.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you then account the loss of a loving wife and a son nothing?\u201d said\nhe.\n\n\u201cBut have you not got a loving wife and a daughter in their room?\u201d\nreturned she. \u201cThe one will not waste your fortune as a prodigal son\nwould have done, and the other will take care of both you and that, when\nyou can no longer do either. The loss of your son, indeed! It was the\ngreatest blessing you could have received!\u201d\n\n\u201cUnfeeling woman,\u201d said he; \u201cbut Heaven may yet restore that son to\nprotect the grey hairs of his old father, and lay his head in an\nhonoured grave.\u201d\n\nThe old man\u2019s spirits were quite gone; he cried like a child; his lady\nmimicked him, and at this his daughter and servants raised a laugh.\n\n\u201cInhuman wretches!\u201d said Duncan, starting up and pushing them aside,\n\u201cthus to mock the feelings of an old man, even although he were not the\nlord and master of you all. But, take notice, the individual among you\nall that dares to offer such another insult to him, I\u2019ll roast on that\nfire.\u201d\n\nThe old man clung to Duncan, and looked him ruefully in the face.\n\n\u201cYou impudent, beggarly vagabond!\u201d said the lady, \u201cdo you know to whom\nyou speak? Servants, turn that wretch out of the house, and hunt him\nwith all the dogs in the kennel.\u201d\n\n\u201cSoftly, softly, good lady,\u201d said Duncan, \u201ctake care that I do not turn\nyou out of the house.\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas, good youth!\u201d said the old laird; \u201cyou little know what you are\nabout; for mercy\u2019s sake, forbear. You are brewing vengeance both for\nyourself and me.\u201d\n\n\u201cFear not,\u201d said Duncan, \u201cI will protect you with my life.\u201d\n\n\u201cPray, may I ask you what is your name?\u201d said the old man, still looking\nearnestly at him.\n\n\u201cThat you may,\u201d replied Duncan; \u201cno man has so good a right to ask\nanything of me as you have\u2014I am Duncan Campbell, your own son.\u201d\n\n\u201cM-m-m-my son!\u201d exclaimed the old man, and sunk back on a seat with a\nconvulsive moan.\n\nDuncan held him in his arms; he soon recovered, and asked many\nincoherent questions; looked at the two moles on his right leg, kissed\nhim, and then wept on his bosom for joy.\n\n\u201cO God of heaven!\u201d said he, \u201cit is long since I could thank Thee\nheartily for anything; now, I do thank Thee, indeed, for I have found my\nson! my dear and only son!\u201d\n\nContrary to what might have been expected, Duncan\u2019s pretty, only sister,\nAlexia, rejoiced most of all in his discovery. She was almost wild with\njoy at finding such a brother. The old lady, her mother, was said to\nhave wept bitterly in private, but knowing that Duncan would be her\nmaster, she behaved to him with civility and respect. Everything was\ncommitted to his management, and he soon discovered that, besides a good\nclear estate, his father had personal funds to a great amount. The halls\nand cottages of Glenellich were filled with feasting, joy, and gladness.\n\nIt was not so at my father\u2019s house. Misfortunes seldom come singly.\nScarcely had our feelings overcome the shock which they received by the\nloss of our beloved Duncan, when a more terrible misfortune overtook us.\nMy father, by the monstrous ingratitude of a friend whom he trusted,\nlost at once the greater part of his hard-earned fortune. The blow came\nunexpectedly, and distracted his personal affairs to such a degree that\nan arrangement seemed almost totally impracticable. He struggled on with\nsecurities for several months; but perceiving that he was drawing his\nreal friends into danger by their signing of bonds which he might never\nbe able to redeem, he lost heart entirely, and yielded to the torrent.\nMary\u2019s mind seemed to gain fresh energy every day. The activity and\ndiligence which she evinced in managing the affairs of the farm, and\neven in giving advice with regard to other matters, is quite incredible.\nOften have I thought what a treasure that inestimable girl would have\nbeen to an industrious man whom she loved. All our efforts availed\nnothing; my father received letters of horning on bills to a large\namount, and we expected every day that he would be taken from us and\ndragged to a prison.\n\nWe were all sitting in our little room one day, consulting what was best\nto be done. We could decide upon nothing, for our case was desperate; we\nwere fallen into a kind of stupor, but the window being up, a sight\nappeared that quickly thrilled every heart with the keenest sensations\nof anguish. Two men came riding sharply up by the back of the old\nschool-house.\n\n\u201cYonder are the officers of justice now,\u201d said my mother; \u201cwhat shall we\ndo?\u201d\n\nWe hurried to the window, and all of us soon discerned that they were no\nother than some attorney, accompanied by a sheriff\u2019s officer. My mother\nentreated of my father to escape and hide himself until this first storm\nwas overblown, but he would in no wise consent, assuring us that he had\ndone nothing of which he was ashamed, and that he was determined to meet\nevery one face to face, and let them do their worst; so, finding all our\nentreaties vain, we could do nothing but sit down and weep. At length we\nheard the noise of their horses at the door.\n\n\u201cYou had better take the men\u2019s horses, James,\u201d said my father, \u201cas there\nis no other man at hand.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe will stay till they rap, if you please,\u201d said I.\n\nThe cautious officer did not, however, rap, but, afraid lest his debtor\nshould make his escape, he jumped lightly from his horse, and hasted\ninto the house. When we heard him open the outer door, and his footsteps\napproaching along the entry, our hearts fainted within us. He opened the\ndoor and stepped into the room\u2014it was Duncan! our own dearly beloved\nDuncan. The women uttered an involuntary scream of surprise, but my\nfather ran and got hold of one hand, and I of the other; my mother, too,\nsoon had him in her arms; but our embrace was short, for his eyes fixed\non Mary, who stood trembling with joy and wonder in a corner of the\nroom, changing her colour every moment. He snatched her up in his arms\nand kissed her lips, and ere ever she was aware, her arms had encircled\nhis neck.\n\n\u201cO my dear Mary,\u201d said he, \u201cmy heart has been ill at ease since I left\nyou, but I durst not then tell you a word of my mind, for I little knew\nhow I was to find affairs in the place where I was going; but ah! you\nlittle illusive rogue, you owe me another for the one you cheated me out\nof then;\u201d so saying, he pressed his lips again to her cheek, and then\nled her to a seat.\n\nDuncan then recounted all his adventures to us, with every circumstance\nof his good fortune. Our hearts were uplifted almost past bearing; all\nour cares and sorrows were now forgotten, and we were once more the\nhappiest little group that ever perhaps sat together. Before the cloth\nwas laid for dinner, Mary ran out to put on her white gown, and comb her\nyellow hair, but was surprised at meeting with a smart young gentleman\nin the kitchen with a scarlet neck on his coat and a gold-laced hat.\nMary, having never seen so fine a gentleman, made him a low courtesy,\nand offered to conduct him to the room; but he smiled, and told her he\nwas the squire\u2019s servant. We had all of us forgot to ask for the\ngentleman that came with Duncan.\n\nDuncan and Mary walked for two hours in the garden that evening. We did\nnot know what passed between them, but the next day he asked her in\nmarriage of my parents, and never shall I forget the supreme happiness\nand gratitude that beamed in every face on that happy occasion. I need\nnot tell my readers that my father\u2019s affairs were soon retrieved, or\nthat I accompanied my dear Mary a bride to the Highlands, and had the\nsatisfaction of saluting her as Mrs Campbell and Lady of Glenellich.\n\n\n\n\n THE LILY OF LIDDISDALE.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nThe country all around rang with the beauty of Amy Gordon; and, although\nit was not known who first bestowed upon her the appellation, yet now\nshe bore no other than the Lily of Liddisdale. She was the only child of\na shepherd, and herself a shepherdess. Never had she been out of the\nvalley in which she was born; but many had come from the neighbouring\ndistricts just to look upon her as she rested with her flock on the\nhill-side, as she issued smiling from her father\u2019s door, or sat in her\nserener loveliness in the kirk on Sabbath-day. Sometimes there are\nliving beings in nature as beautiful as in romance; reality surpasses\nimagination; and we see breathing, brightening, and moving before our\neyes, sights dearer to our hearts than any we ever beheld in the land of\nsleep.\n\nIt was thus that all felt who looked on the Lily of Liddisdale. She had\ngrown up under the dews, and breath, and light of heaven, among the\nsolitary hills; and now that she had attained to perfect womanhood,\nnature rejoiced in the beauty that gladdened the stillness of these\nundisturbed glens. Why should this one maiden have been created lovelier\nthan all others? In what did her surpassing loveliness consist? None\ncould tell; for had the most imaginative poet described this maiden,\nsomething that floated around her, an air of felt but unspeakable grace\nand lustre, would have been wanting in his picture. Her face was pale,\nyet tinged with such a faint and leaf-like crimson, that though she well\ndeserved the name of the Lily, yet was she at times also like unto the\nRose. When asleep, or in silent thought, she was like the fairest of all\nthe lilied brood; but, when gliding along the braes, or singing her\nsongs by the river-side, she might well remind one of that other\nbrighter and more dazzling flower. Amy Gordon knew that she was\nbeautiful. She knew it from the eyes that in delight met hers, from the\ntones of so many gentle voices, from words of affection from the old,\nand love from the young, from the sudden smile that met her when, in the\nmorning, she tied up at the little mirror her long raven hair, and from\nthe face and figure that looked up to her when she stooped to dip her\npitcher in the clear mountain-well. True that she was of lowly birth,\nand that her manners were formed in a shepherd\u2019s hut, and among\nshepherdesses on the hill. But one week passed in the halls of the\nhighly-born would have sufficed to hide the little graceful symptoms of\nher humble lineage, and to equal her in elegance with those whom in\nbeauty she had far excelled. The sun and the rain had indeed touched her\nhands, but nature had shaped them delicate and small. Light were her\nfootsteps upon the verdant turf, and through the birchwood glades and\ndown the rocky dells she glided or bounded along, with a beauty that\nseemed at once native and alien there, like some creature of another\nclime that still had kindred with this\u2014an Oriental antelope among the\nroes of a Scottish forest.\n\nAmy Gordon had reached her nineteenth summer, and as yet she knew of\nlove only as she had read of it in old Border songs and ballads. These\nancient ditties were her delight; and her silent soul was filled with\nwild and beautiful traditions. In them love seemed, for the most part,\nsomething sad, and, whether prosperous or unhappy, alike terminating in\ntears. In them the young maiden was spoken of as dying in her prime, of\nfever, consumption, or a pining heart; and her lover, a gallant warrior,\nor a peaceful shepherd, killed in battle, or perishing in some midnight\nstorm. In them, too, were sometimes heard blessed voices whispering\naffection beneath the greenwood tree, or among the shattered cliffs\novergrown with light-waving trees in some long, deep, solitary glen. To\nAmy Gordon, as she chanted to herself, in the blooming or verdant\ndesert, all these various traditionary lays, love seemed a kind of\nbeautiful superstition belonging to the memory of the dead. With such\ntales she felt a sad and pleasant sympathy; but it was as with something\nfar remote\u2014although at times the music of her own voice, as it gave an\naffecting expression to feelings embodied in such artless words, touched\na chord within her heart, that dimly told her that heart might one day\nhave its own peculiar and overwhelming love.\n\nThe summer that was now shining had been calm and sunny beyond the\nmemory of the oldest shepherd. Never had nature seemed so delightful to\nAmy\u2019s eyes and to Amy\u2019s heart; and never had she seemed so delightful to\nthe eyes and the hearts of all who beheld her with her flock. Often\nwould she wreathe the sprigs of heather round her raven ringlets, till\nher dark hair was brightened with a galaxy of richest blossoms. Or\ndishevelling her tresses, and letting fall from them that shower of\nglowing and balmy pearls, she would bind them up again in simpler\nbraiding, and fix on the silken folds two or three waterlilies, large,\nmassy, and whiter than the snow. Necklaces did she wear in her playful\nglee, of the purple fruit that feeds the small birds in the moors, and\nbeautiful was the gentle stain then visible over the blue veins of her\nmilk-white breast. So were floating by the days of her nineteenth summer\namong the hills. The evenings she spent by the side of her greyheaded\nfather\u2014and the old man was blessed. Her nights passed in a world of\ngentle dreams.\n\nBut, though Amy Gordon knew not yet what it was to love, she was herself\nthe object of as deep, true, tender, and passionate love, as ever\nswelled and kindled within a human breast. Her own cousin, Walter\nHarden, now lived and would have died for her, but had not hitherto\nventured to tell his passion. He was a few years older than her, and had\nlong loved her with the gentle purity of a brother\u2019s affection. Amy had\nno brother of her own, and always called Walter Harden by that endearing\nname. That very name of brother had probably so familiarised her heart\ntowards him, that never had she thought of him, even for a single\nmoment, in any other light. But, although he too called Amy sister, his\nheart burned with other feelings, and he must win her to be his bride,\nand possess her as his wife, or die. When she was a mere child he had\nled her by the hand\u2014when a fair girl he had in his arms lifted her\nacross the swollen burns, and over the snow-drifts\u2014now that she was a\nwoman he had looked on her in silence, but with a soul overcharged with\na thousand thoughts, hopes, and desires, which he feared to speak of to\nher ear; for he knew, and saw, and felt, in sorrow, that she loved him\nbut as a brother. He knew, however, that she loved none else; and in\nthat\u2014and that alone\u2014was his hope,\u2014so he at last determined to woo the\nLily of Liddisdale, and win her, in her beauty and fragrance, to bloom\nwithin his house.\n\nThe Lily was sitting alone in a deep hollow among the hills, with her\nsheep and lambs pasturing or playing around her, while over that little\nsecluded circle a single hawk was hanging far up in the sky. She was\nglad, but not surprised, to see her brother standing beside her; and\nwhen he sat down by her side, and took her hand into his, she looked\nupon him with a gentle smile, and asked if he was going upon business\nfurther on among the hills. Walter Harden instantly poured forth, in a\ntorrent, the passion of his soul, beseeched her not to shut up her sweet\nbosom against him, but to promise to become, before summer was over, his\nwedded wife. He spoke with fervour but trepidation; kissed her cheek;\nand then awaited, with a fast-throbbing and palpitating heart, his Amy\u2019s\nreply.\n\nThere was no guile, no art, no hypocrisy in the pure and happy heart of\nthe Lily of Liddisdale. She took not away her hand from that of him who\npressed it; she rose not up from the turf, although her gentle side just\ntouched his heart; she turned not away her face so beautiful, nor\nchanged the silvery sweetness of her speech. Walter Harden was such a\nman as in a war of freemen, defending their mountains against a tyrant,\nwould have advanced his plume in every scene of danger, and have been\nchosen a leader among his pastoral compeers. Amy turned her large\nbeaming hazel eyes upon his face, and saw that it was overshadowed.\nThere was something in its expression too sad and solemn, mingling with\nthe flush of hope and passion, to suffer her, with playful or careless\nwords, to turn away from herself the meaning of what she had heard. Her\nlover saw in her kind but unagitated silence, that to him she was but a\nsister; and, rising to go, he said, \u201cBlessed be thou all the days of thy\nlife; farewell, my sweet Amy, farewell!\u201d\n\nBut they did not thus part. They walked together on the lonely\nhill-side, down the banks of the little wimpling burn, and then out of\none small glen into another, and their talk was affectionate and kind.\nAmy heard him speak of feelings to her unknown, and almost wondered that\nshe could be so dear to him, so necessary to his life, as he\npassionately vowed. Nor could such vows be unpleasant to her ear,\nuttered by that manly voice, and enforced by the silent speech of those\nbold but gentle eyes. She concealed nothing from him, but frankly\nconfessed, that hitherto she had looked upon him even as her own\nfather\u2019s son. \u201cLet us be happy, Walter, as we have been so long. I\ncannot marry you\u2014oh\u2014no\u2014no; but since you say it would kill you if I\nmarried another, then I swear to you by all that is sacred\u2014yes, by the\nBible on which we have often read together, and by yonder sun setting\nover the Windhead, that you never will see that day.\u201d Walter Harden was\nsatisfied; he spoke of love and marriage no more; and in the sweet,\nfresh, airless, and dewy quiet of evening, they walked together down\ninto the inhabited vale, and parted, almost like brother and sister, as\nthey had been used to do for so many happy years.\n\nSoon after this, Amy was sent by her father to the Priory, the ancient\nseat of the Elliots, with some wicker-baskets which they had made for\nthe young ladies there. A small plantation of willows was in the corner\nof the meadow in which their cottage stood, and from them the old\nshepherd and his daughter formed many little articles of such elegance\nand ingenuity, that they did not seem out of place even in the splendid\nrooms of the Priory. Amy had slung some of these pieces of rural\nworkmanship round her waist, while some were hanging on her arms, and\nthus she was gliding along a footpath through the old elm-woods that\nshelter the Priory, when she met young George Elliot, the heir of that\nancient family, going out with his angle to the river-side. The youth,\nwho had but a short time before returned from England, where he had been\nfor several years, knew at the first glance that the fair creature\nbefore him could be no other than the Lily of Liddisdale. With the\nutmost gentleness and benignity he called her by that name, and after a\nfew words of courtesy, he smilingly asked her for one small\nflower-basket to keep for her sake. He unloosened one from her graceful\nwaist, and with that liberty which superior rank justified, but, at the\nsame time, with that tenderness which an amiable mind prompted, he\nkissed her fair forehead, and they parted\u2014she to the Priory, and he down\nto the linn at the Cushat-wood.\n\nNever had the boy beheld a creature so perfectly beautiful. The silence\nand the songs of morning were upon the dewy woods, when that vision rose\nbefore him; his soul was full of the joy of youth; and when Amy\ndisappeared, he wondered how he could have parted so soon\u2014in a few\nmoments\u2014from that bright and beaming Dryad. Smiles had been in her eyes\nand round her pearly teeth while they spoke together, and he remembered\nthe soft and fragrant lock of hair that touched his lips as he gently\nkissed her forehead. The beauty of that living creature sank into his\nsoul along with all the sweet influences of nature now rejoicing in the\nfull, ripe, rich spirit of summer, and in fancy he saw that Lily\nspringing up in every glade through which he was now roaming, and when\nhe had reached the linn, on the bank too of every romantic nook and bay\nwhere the clear waters eddied or slept. \u201cShe must recross the bridge on\nher way home,\u201d said the enamoured boy to himself; and, fearing that Amy\nGordon might already be returning from the Priory, he clambered up the\nface of the shrubby precipice, and, bounding over the large green mossy\nstones, and through the entangling briers and brushwood, he soon was at\nthe bridge, and sat down on a high bank, under a cliff, commanding a\nview of the path by which the fair maiden must approach on her homeward\njourney.\n\nThe heart of the innocent Amy had fluttered, too, as the tall, slim,\ngraceful stripling had kissed her brow. No rudeness, no insult, no\npride, no haughty freedom had been in his demeanour towards her; but she\nfelt gladly conscious in her mind, that he had been delighted with her\nlooks, and would, perhaps, think now and then afterwards, as he walked\nthrough the woods, of the shepherd\u2019s daughter, with whom he had not\ndisdained to speak. Amy thought, while she half looked back, as he\ndisappeared among the trees, that he was just such a youth as the old\nminstrels sang of in their war or love ballads, and that he was well\nworthy some rich and noble bride, whom he might bring to his hall on a\nsnow-white palfrey with silken reins, and silver bells on its mane. And\nshe began to recite to herself, as she walked along, one of those old\nBorder tales.\n\nAmy left her baskets at the Priory, and was near the bridge, on her\nreturn, when she beheld the young heir spring down from the bank before\nher, and come forward with a sparkling countenance. \u201cI must have that\nsweet tress that hangs over thy sweeter forehead,\u201d said he, with a low\nand eager voice; \u201cand I will keep it for the sake of the fairest Flower\nthat ever bloomed in my father\u2019s woods\u2014even the Lily of Liddisdale.\u201d The\nlock was given\u2014for how could it be refused? And the shepherdess saw the\nyoung and high-born heir of the Priory put it into his breast. She\nproceeded across the hill, down the long Falcon-glen, and through the\nWitch-wood\u2014and still he was by her side. There was a charm in his\nspeech, and in every word he said, and in his gentle demeanour, that\ntouched poor Amy\u2019s very heart; and as he gave her assistance, although\nall unneeded, over the uneven hollows, and the springs and marshes, she\nhad neither the courage, nor the wish, nor the power, to request him to\nturn back to the Priory. They entered a small quiet green circlet, bare\nof trees, in the bosom of a coppicewood; and the youth, taking her hand,\nmade her sit down on the mossy trunk of a fallen yew, and said\u2014\u201cAmy\u2014my\nfair Amy!\u2014before we part, will you sing me one of your old Border songs?\nand let it be one of love. Did not the sons of nobles, long ago, often\nlove the daughters of them that dwelt in huts?\u201d\n\nAmy Gordon sat there an hour with the loving, but honourable boy, and\nsang many a plaintive tune, and recited many a romantic story. She\nbelieved every word she uttered, whether of human lovers, or of the\naffection of fairies, the silent creatures of the woods and knowes,\ntowards our race. For herself, she felt a constant wild delight in\nfictions, which to her were all as truths; and she was glad and proud to\nsee how they held in silent attention him at whose request she recited\nor sang. But now she sprang to her feet, and, beseeching him to forgive\nthe freedom she had used in thus venturing to speak so long in such a\npresence, but at the same time remembering that a lock of her hair was\nnear his heart, and perceiving that the little basket she had let him\ntake was half filled with wild-flowers, the Lily of Liddisdale made a\ngraceful obeisance, and disappeared. Nor did the youth follow her\u2014they\nhad sat together for one delightful hour\u2014and he returned by himself to\nthe Priory.\n\nFrom this day the trouble of a new delight was in the heart of young\nElliot. The spirit of innocence was blended with that of beauty all over\nAmy, the shepherdess; and it was their perfect union that the noble boy\nso dearly loved. Yet what could she be to him more than a gleam of\nrainbow light\u2014a phantom of the woods\u2014an imagination that passed away\ninto the silence of the far-off green pastoral hills? She belonged\nalmost to another world\u2014another life. His dwelling, and that of his\nforefathers, was a princely hall. She, and all her nameless line, were\ndwellers in turf-built huts. \u201cIn other times,\u201d thought he, \u201cI might have\ntransplanted that Lily into mine own garden; but these are foolish\nfancies! Am I in love with poor Amy Gordon, the daughter of a shepherd?\u201d\nAs these thoughts were passing through his mind, he was bounding along a\nridge of hills, from which many a sweet vale was visible; and he formed\na sudden determination to visit the cottage of Amy\u2019s father, which he\nhad seen some years ago pointed out when he was with a gay party of\nlords and ladies, on a visit to the ruins of Hermitage Castle. He\nbounded like a deer along; and as he descended into a little vale, lo!\non a green mound, the Lily of Liddisdale herding her sheep!\n\nAmy was half terrified to see him standing in his graceful beauty before\nher in that solitary place. In a moment her soul was disquieted within\nher, and she felt that it indeed was love. She wished that she might\nsink into that verdant mound, from which she vainly strove to rise, as\nthe impassioned youth lay down on the turf at her side, and, telling her\nto fear nothing, called her by a thousand tender and endearing names.\nNever till he had seen Amy had he felt one tremor of love; but now his\nheart was kindled, and in that utter solitude, where all was so quiet\nand so peaceful, there seemed to him a preternatural charm over all her\ncharacter. He burst out into passionate vows and prayers, and called God\nto witness, that if she would love him, he would forget all distinction\nof rank, and marry his beautiful Amy, and she should live yet in his own\nhall. The words were uttered, and there was silence. Their echo sounded\nfor a moment strange to his own ears; but he fixed his soul upon her\ncountenance, and repeated them over and over again with wilder emphasis,\nand more impassioned utterance. Amy was confounded with fear and\nperplexity; but when she saw him kneeling before her, the meek,\ninnocent, humble girl could not endure the sight, and said, \u201cSir, behold\nin me one willing to be your servant. Yes, willing is poor Amy Gordon to\nkiss your feet. I am a poor man\u2019s daughter. Oh, sir! you surely came not\nhither for evil? No\u2014no, evil dwells not in such a shape. Away then\u2014away\nthen, my noble master; for if Walter Harden were to see you!\u2014if my old\nfather knew this, his heart would break!\u201d\n\nOnce more they parted. Amy returned home in the evening at the usual\nhour; but there was no peace now for her soul. Such intense and\npassionate love had been vowed to her\u2014such winning and delightful\nexpressions whispered into her heart by one so far above her in all\nthings, but who felt no degradation in equalling her to him in the\nwarmth and depth of his affection, that she sometimes strove to think it\nall but one of her wild dreams awakened by some verse or incident in\nsome old ballad. But she had felt his kisses on her cheek; his thrilling\nvoice was in her soul; and she was oppressed with a passion, pure, it is\ntrue, and most innocently humble, but a passion that seemed to be like\nlife itself, never to be overcome, and that could cease only when the\nheart he had deluded\u2014for what else than delusion could it be?\u2014ceased to\nbeat. Thus agitated, she had directed her way homewards with hurried and\nheedless steps. She minded not the miry pits\u2014the quivering marshes\u2014and\nthe wet rushy moors. Instead of crossing the little sinuous moorland\nstreams at their narrow places, where her light feet used to bound\nacross them, she waded through them in her feverish anxiety, and\nsometimes, after hurrying along the braes, she sat suddenly down,\nbreathless, weak, and exhausted, and retraced in weeping bewilderment\nall the scene of fear, joy, endearments, caresses, and wild persuasions,\nfrom which she had torn herself away, and escaped. On reaching home, she\nwent to her bed trembling, and shivering, and drowned in tears; and\ncould scarcely dare, much as she needed comfort, even to say her\nprayers. Amy was in a high fever; during the night she became delirious;\nand her old father sat by her bedside till morning, fearing that he was\ngoing to lose his child.\n\nThere was grief over the great strath and all its glens when the rumour\nspread over them that Amy Gordon was dying. Her wonderful beauty had but\ngiven a tenderer and brighter character to the love which her unsullied\ninnocence and simple goodness had universally inspired; and it was felt,\neven among the sobbings of a natural affection, that if the Lily of\nLiddisdale should die, something would be taken away of which they were\nall proud, and from whose lustre there was a diffusion over their own\nlives. Many a gentle hand touched the closed door of her cottage, and\nmany a low voice inquired how God was dealing with her; but where now\nwas Walter Harden when his Lily was like to fade? He was at her bed\u2019s\nfoot, as her father was at its head. Was she not his sister, although\nshe would not be his bride? And when he beheld her glazed eyes wandering\nunconsciously in delirium, and felt her blood throbbing so rapidly in\nher beautiful transparent veins, he prayed to God that Amy might\nrecover, even although her heart were never to be his, even although it\nwere to fly to the bosom of him whose name she constantly kept repeating\nin her wandering fantasies. For Amy, although she sometimes kindly\nwhispered the name of Walter Harden, and asked why her brother came not\nto see her on her deathbed, yet far oftener spake beseechingly and\npassionately as if to that other youth, and implored him to break not\nthe heart of a poor simple shepherdess who was willing to kiss his feet.\n\nNeither the father of poor Amy nor Walter Harden had known before that\nshe had ever seen young George Elliot\u2014but they soon understood, from the\ninnocent distraction of her speech, that the noble boy had left pure the\nLily he loved, and Walter said that it belonged not to that line ever to\nenjure the helpless. Many a pang it gave him, no doubt, to think that\nhis Amy\u2019s heart, which all his life-long tenderness could not win, had\nyielded itself up in tumultuous joy to one\u2014two\u2014three meetings of an\nhour, or perhaps only a few minutes, with one removed so high and so far\nfrom her humble life and all its concerns. These were cold, sickening\npangs of humiliation and jealousy, that might, in a less generous\nnature, have crushed all love. But it was not so with him; and\ncheerfully would Walter Harden have taken the burning fever into his own\nveins, so that it could have been removed from hers\u2014cheerfully would he\nhave laid down his own manly head on that pillow, so that Amy could have\nlifted up her long raven tresses, now often miserably dishevelled in her\nraving, and, braiding them once more, walk out well and happy into the\nsunshine of the beautiful day, rendered more beautiful still by her\npresence. Hard would it have been to have resigned her bosom to any\nhuman touch; but hideous seemed it beyond all thought to resign it to\nthe touch of death. Let heaven but avert that doom, and his affectionate\nsoul felt that it could be satisfied.\n\nOut of a long deep trance-like sleep Amy at last awoke, and her eyes\nfell upon the face of Walter Harden. She regarded long and earnestly its\npitying and solemn expression, then pressed her hand to her forehead and\nwept. \u201cIs my father dead and buried\u2014and did he die of grief and shame\nfor his Amy? Oh! that needed not have been, for I am innocent. Neither,\nWalter, have I broken, nor will I ever break, my promise unto thee. I\nremember it well\u2014by the Bible\u2014and yon setting sun. But I am weak and\nfaint. Oh! tell me, Walter! all that has happened! Have I been ill\u2014for\nhours\u2014or for days\u2014or weeks\u2014or months? For that I know not,\u2014so wild and\nso strange, so sad and so sorrowful, so miserable and so wretched, have\nbeen my many thousand dreams!\u201d\n\nThere was no concealment and no disguise. Amy was kindly and tenderly\ntold by her father and her brother all that she had uttered, as far as\nthey understood it, during her illness. Nor had the innocent creature\nanything more to tell. Her soul was after the fever calm, quiet, and\nhappy. The form, voice, and shape of that beautiful youth were to her\nlittle more now than the words and the sights of a dream. Sickness and\ndecay had brought her spirit back to all the humble and tranquil\nthoughts and feelings of her lowly life. In the woods, and among the\nhills, that bright and noble being had for a time touched her senses,\nher heart, her soul, and her imagination. All was new, strange,\nstirring, overwhelming, irresistible, and paradise to her spirit. But it\nwas gone; and might it stay away for ever: so she prayed, as her kind\nbrother lifted up her head with his gentle hand, and laid it down as\ngently on the pillow he had smoothed. \u201cWalter! I will be your wife! for\nthee my affection is calm and deep,\u2014but that other\u2014oh! that was only a\npassing dream!\u201d Walter leaned over her, and kissed her pale lips. \u201cYes!\nWalter,\u201d she continued, \u201cI once promised to marry none other, but now I\npromise to marry thee; if indeed God will forgive me for such words,\nlying as I am, perhaps, on my deathbed. I utter them to make you happy.\nIf I live, life will be dear to me only for thy sake; if I die, walk\nthou along with my father at the coffin\u2019s head, and lay thine Amy in the\nmould. I am the Lily of Liddisdale,\u2014you know that was once the vain\ncreature\u2019s name!\u2014and white, pale, and withered enough indeed is, I trow,\nthe poor Lily now!\u201d\n\nWalter Harden heard her affectionate words with a deep delight, but he\ndetermined in his soul not to bind Amy down to these promises, sacred\nand fervent as they were, if, on her complete recovery, he discovered\nthat they originated in gratitude, and not in love. From pure and\ndisinterested devotion of spirit did he watch the progress of her\nrecovery, nor did he ever allude to young Elliot but in terms of respect\nand admiration. Amy had expressed her surprise that he had never come to\ninquire how she was during her illness, and added with a sigh, \u201cLove at\nfirst sight cannot be thought to last long. Yet surely he would have\nwept to hear that I was dead.\u201d Walter then told her that he had been\nhurried away to France the very day after she had seen him, to attend\nthe deathbed of his father, and had not yet returned to Scotland; but\nthat the ladies of the Priory had sent a messenger to know how she was\nevery day, and that to their kindness were owing many of the\nconveniences she had enjoyed. Poor Amy was glad to hear that she had no\nreason to think the noble boy would have neglected her in her illness;\nand she could not but look with pride upon her lover, who was not afraid\nto vindicate the character of one who, she had confessed, had been but\ntoo dear to her only a few weeks ago. This generosity and manly\nconfidence on the part of her cousin quite won and subdued her heart,\nand Walter Harden never approached her now without awakening in her\nbosom something of that delightful agitation and troubled joy which her\nsimple heart had first suffered in the presence of her young, noble\nlover. Amy was in love with Walter almost as much as he was with her,\nand the names of brother and sister, pleasant as they had ever been,\nwere now laid aside.\n\nAmy Gordon rose from her sickbed, and even as the flower whose name she\nbore, did she again lift up her drooping head beneath the dews and the\nsunshine. Again did she go to the hillside, and sit and sing beside her\nflock. But Walter Harden was oftener with her than before, and ere the\nharvest moon should hang her mild, clear, unhaloed orb over the late\nreapers on the upland grain-fields, had Amy promised that she would\nbecome his wife. She saw him now in his own natural light\u2014the best, the\nmost intelligent, the most industrious, and the handsomest shepherd over\nall the hills; and when it was known that there was to be a marriage\nbetween Walter Harden and Amy Gordon, none felt surprised, although\nsome, sighing, said it was seldom, indeed, that fortune so allowed those\nto wed whom nature had united.\n\nThe Lily of Liddisdale was now bright and beautiful as ever, and was\nreturning homewards by herself from the far-off hills during one rich\ngolden sunset, when, in a dark hollow, she heard the sound of horses\u2019\nfeet, and in an instant young George Elliot was at her side. Amy\u2019s dream\nwas over\u2014and she looked on the beautiful youth with an unquaking heart.\n\u201cI have been far away, Amy,\u2014across the seas. My father\u2014you may have\nheard of it\u2014was ill, and I attended his bed. I loved him, Amy\u2014I loved my\nfather\u2014but he is dead!\u201d and here the noble youth\u2019s tears fell fast.\n\u201cNothing now but the world\u2019s laugh prevents me making you my wife\u2014yes,\nmy wife, sweetest Lily; and what care I for the world? for thou art both\nearth and heaven to me.\n\nThe impetuous, ardent, and impassioned boy scarcely looked in Amy\u2019s\nface; he remembered her confusion, her fears, her sighs, her tears, his\nhalf-permitted kisses, his faintly repelled embraces, and all his\nsuffered endearments of brow, lip, and cheek, in that solitary dell; so\nwith a powerful arm he lifted her upon another steed, which, till now,\nshe had scarcely observed; other horsemen seemed to the frightened, and\nspeechless, and motionless maiden to be near; and away they went over\nthe smooth turf like the wind, till her eyes were blind with the rapid\nflight, and her head dizzy. She heard kind words whispering in her ear;\nbut Amy, since that fever, had never been so strong as before, and her\nhigh-blooded palfrey was now carrying her fleetly away over hill and\nhollow in a swoon.\n\nAt last she seemed to be falling down from a height, but softly, as if\nborne on the wings of the air; and as her feet touched the ground, she\nknew that young Elliot had taken her from that fleet courser, and,\nlooking up, she saw that she was in a wood of old shadowy trees of\ngigantic size, perfectly still, and far away from all known dwellings\nboth on hill and plain. But a cottage was before her, and she and young\nElliot were on the green in its front. It was thickly covered with\nhoneysuckle and moss-roses that hung their beautiful full-blown shining\nlamps high as the thatched roof; and Amy\u2019s soul sickened at the still,\nsecluded, lovely, and lonely sight. \u201cThis shall be our bridal abode,\u201d\nwhispered her lover into her ear, with panting breath. \u201cFear me\nnot\u2014distrust me not; I am not base, but my love to thee is tender and\ntrue. Soon shall we be married\u2014ay, this very evening must thou be mine;\nand may the hand that now clasps thy sweet waist wither, and the tongue\nthat woos thee be palsied, if ever I cease to love thee as my Amy\u2014my\nLily\u2014my wedded wife!\u201d\n\nThe wearied and half-fainting maiden could as yet make no reply. The\ndream that she had believed was gone for ever now brightened upon her in\nthe intense light of reality, and it was in her power to become the wife\nof him for whom she had, in the innocence and simplicity of her nature,\nonce felt a consuming passion that had brought her to the brink of the\ngrave. His warm breath was on her bosom; words charged with bewitching\npersuasion went thrilling through her heartstrings; and if she had any\npride (and what human heart has it not?) it might well mingle now with\nlove, and impel her into the embrace that was now open to clasp her\nclose to a burning heart.\n\nA stately and beautiful lady came smiling from the cottage door, and Amy\nknew that it was the sister of Elliot, and kneeled down before her. Last\ntime the shepherdess had seen that lady, it was when, with a fearful\nstep, she took her baskets into the hall, and blushing, scarcely lifted\nup her eyes, when she and her high-born sisters deigned to commend her\nworkmanship, and whisper to each other that the Lily of Liddisdale\ndeserved her name. \u201cAmy,\u201d said she, with a gentle voice, as she took her\nhand, \u201cAmy Gordon! my brother loves you; and he has won me to\nacknowledge you as my sister. I can deny my brother nothing; and his\ngrief has brought low the pride\u2014perhaps the foolish pride\u2014of my heart.\nWill you marry him, Amy? Will you, the daughter of a poor shepherd,\nmarry the young heir of the Priory, and the descendant, Amy, of a noble\nrace? Amy, I see that thou art beautiful; I know that thou art good; may\nGod and my mother forgive me this, but my sister must thou be; behold my\nbrother is at his shepherdess\u2019s feet!\u201d\n\nAmy Gordon had now nothing to fear. That sweet, young, pure, noble lady\nwas her friend; and she felt persuaded now that in good truth young\nElliot wished to make her his wife. Might she indeed live the Lady of\nthe Priory\u2014be a sister to these beautiful creatures\u2014dwell among those\nancient woods, and all those spacious lawns and richest gardens; and\nmight she be, not in a dream, but in living reality, the wife of him on\nwhose bosom her heart had died with joy in that lonely dell, and love\nhim and yield him her love even unto the very hour till she was dead?\nSuch changes of estate had been long ago, and sung of in many a ballad;\nand was she to be the one maiden of millions, the one born in hundreds\nof years, to whom this blessed lot was to befall? But these thoughts\npassed on and away like sun-rays upon a stream; the cloud, not a dark\none, of reality returned over her. She thought of Walter Harden, and in\nan instant her soul was fixed; nor from that instant could it be shaken\nby terror or by love, by the countenance of death, or the countenance,\nfar more powerful than of death\u2014that of the youth before her, pale and\nflushed alternately with the fluctuations of many passions.\n\nAmy felt in her soul the collected voice, as it were, of many happy and\nhumble years among her hills, and that told her not to forsake her own\nnatural life. The flower that lived happily and beautifully in its own\nsecluded nook, by the side of the lonely tarn or torrent, might lose\nmuch both of its fragrance and its lustre, when transplanted into a\nricher soil and more sheltered bed. Could she forget for ever her\nfather\u2019s ingle\u2014the earthen floor\u2014its simple furniture of day and night?\nCould she forget all the familiar places round about the hut where she\nwas born? And if she left them all, and was taken up even in the arms of\nlove into another sphere of life, would not that be the same, or worse\nthan to forget them, and would it not be sacrilege to the holiness of\nthe many Sabbath nights on which she had sat at her widowed father\u2019s\nknees? Yet might such thoughts have been destroyed in her beating heart\nby the whispered music of young Elliot\u2019s eloquent and impassioned voice.\nBut Walter Harden, though ignorant of her present jeopardy, seemed to\nstand before her, and she remembered his face when he sat beside her\ndying bed, his prayers over her when he thought she slept, and their\noaths of fidelity mutually sworn before the great God.\n\n\u201cWill you, my noble and honoured master, suffer me, all unworthy as I am\nto be yours, to leave your bosom? Sir, I am too miserable about you, to\npretend to feel any offence, because you will not let me go. I might\nwell be proud of your love, since, indeed, it happens so that you do\nlove me; but let me kneel down at your beautiful sister\u2019s feet, for to\nher I may be able to speak\u2014to you I feel that it may not be, for humble\nam I, although unfortunately I have found favour in your eyes.\u201d\n\nThe agitated youth released Amy from his arms, and she flung herself\ndown upon her knees before that lovely lady.\n\n\u201cLady! hear me speak\u2014a simple uneducated girl of the hills, and tell me\nif you would wish to hear me break an oath sworn upon the Bible, and so\nto lose my immortal soul? So have I sworn to be the wife of Walter\nHarden\u2014the wife of a poor shepherd; and, lady, may I be on the left hand\nof God at the great judgment-day, if ever I be forsworn. I love Walter\nHarden. Do you counsel me to break his kind, faithful heart? Oh, sir\u2014my\nnoble young master! how dare a creature such as I speak so freely to\nyour beautiful sister? how dare I keep my eyes open when you are at your\nservant\u2019s feet? Oh, sir, had I been born a lady, I would have lived\u2014died\nfor you\u2014gone with you all over the world\u2014all over the sea, and all the\nislands of the sea. I would have sighed, wept, and pined away, till I\nhad won your love, for your love would have been a blessed thing\u2014that do\nI well know, from the few moments you stooped to let your heart beat\nagainst the bosom of a low-born shepherdess. Even now, dearly as I love\nWalter Harden, fain would I lay me down and die upon this daisied green,\nand be buried beneath it, rather than that poor Amy Gordon should affect\nthe soul of her young master thus; for never saw I, and never can I\nagain see, a youth so beautiful, so winning, so overwhelming to a\nmaiden\u2019s heart, as he before whom I now implore permission to grovel in\nthe dust. Send me away\u2014spurn me from you\u2014let me crawl away out of your\npresence\u2014I can find my way back to my father\u2019s house.\u201d\n\nIt might have been a trying thing to the pride of this high-minded and\nhigh-born youth, to be refused in marriage by the daughter of one of his\npoorest shepherds; so would it have been had he loved less; but all\npride was extinguished, and so seemed for ever and ever the light of\nthis world\u2019s happiness. To plead further he felt was in vain. Her soul\nhad been given to another, and the seal of an oath set upon it, never to\nbe broken but by the hand of death. So he lifted her up in his arms,\nkissed her madly a hundred times, cheek, brow, neck, and bosom, and then\nrushed into the woods. Amy followed him with her streaming eyes, and\nthen turned again towards the beautiful lady, who was sobbing audibly\nfor her brother\u2019s sake.\n\n\u201cOh! weep not, lady! that I, poor Amy Gordon, have refused to become the\nwife of your noble brother. The time will come, and soon too, when he\nand you, and your fair sisters and your stately mother, will all be\nthankful that I yielded not to entreaties that would then have brought\ndisgrace upon your house! Never\u2014never would your mother have forgiven\nyou; and as for me, would not she have wished me dead and buried rather\nthan the bride of her only and darling son? You know that, simple and\ninnocent as I am, I now speak but the truth; and how, then, could your\nnoble brother have continued to love me, who had brought dishonour, and\ndisagreement, and distraction, among those who are now all so dear to\none another? O yes\u2014yes, he would soon have hated poor Amy Gordon, and,\nwithout any blame, perhaps broken my heart, or sent me away from the\nPriory back to my father\u2019s hut. Blessed be God, that all this evil has\nnot been wrought by me! All\u2014all will soon be as before.\u201d\n\nShe to whom Amy thus fervently spoke felt that her words were not wholly\nwithout truth. Nor could she help admiring the noble, heroic, and\nvirtuous conduct of this poor shepherdess, whom all this world\u2019s\ntemptations would have failed to lure from the right path. Before this\nmeeting she had thought of Amy as far her inferior indeed, and it was\nlong before her proper pride had yielded to the love of her brother,\nwhose passion she feared might otherwise have led to some horrible\ncatastrophe. Now that he had fled from them in distraction, this terror\nagain possessed her, and she whispered it to the pale, trembling\nshepherdess.\n\n\u201cFollow him\u2014follow him, gentle lady, into the wood; lose not a moment;\ncall upon him by name, and that sweet voice must bring him back. But\nfear not, he is too good to do evil; fear not, receive my blessing, and\nlet me return to my father\u2019s hut; it is but a few miles, and that\ndistance is nothing to one who has lived all her life among the hills.\nMy poor father will think I have died in some solitary place.\u201d\n\nThe lady wept to think that she, whom she had been willing to receive as\nher sister, should return all by herself so many miles at night to a\nlonely hut. But her soul was sick with fear for her brother; so she took\nfrom her shoulders a long rich Indian silk scarf of gorgeous colours,\nand throwing it over Amy\u2019s figure, said, \u201cFair creature and good, keep\nthis for my sake; and now, farewell!\u201d She gazed on the Lily for a moment\nin delighted wonder at her graceful beauty, as she bent on one knee,\nenrobed in that unwonted garb, and then, rising up, gathered the flowing\ndrapery around her, and disappeared.\n\n\u201cGod, in His infinite mercy, be praised!\u201d cried Walter Harden, as he and\nthe old man, who had been seeking Amy for hours all over the hills, saw\nthe Lily gliding towards them up a little narrow dell, covered from head\nto foot with the splendid raiment that shone in a soft shower of\nmoonlight. Joy and astonishment for a while held them speechless, but\nthey soon knew all that had happened; and Walter Harden lifted her up in\nhis arms and carried her home, exhausted now and faint with fatigue and\ntrepidation, as if she were but a lamb rescued from a snow-wreath.\n\nNext moon was that which the reapers love, and before it had waned Amy\nslept in the bosom of her husband, Walter Harden. Years passed on, and\nother flowers beside the Lily of Liddisdale were blooming in his house.\nOne summer evening, when the shepherd, his fair wife, and their children\nwere sitting together on the green before the door, enjoying probably\nthe sight and the noise of the imps much more then the murmurs of the\nsylvan Liddal, which perhaps they did not hear, a gay cavalcade rode up\nto the cottage, and a noble-looking young man, dismounting from his\nhorse, and gently assisting a beautiful lady to do the same, walked up\nto her whom he had known only by a name now almost forgotten, and with a\nbeaming smile said, \u201cFair Lily of Liddisdale, this is my wife, the lady\nof the Priory; come\u2014it is hard to say which of you should bear off the\nbell.\u201d Amy rose from her seat with an air graceful as ever, but\nsomething more matronly than that of Elliot\u2019s younger bride; and while\nthese two fair creatures beheld each other with mutual admiration, their\nhusbands stood there equally happy, and equally proud\u2014George Elliot of\nthe Priory, and Walter Harden of the Glenfoot.\n\n\n\n\n THE UNLUCKY PRESENT.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\nA Lanarkshire minister (who died within the present century) was one of\nthose unhappy persons who, to use the words of a well-known Scottish\nadage, \u201ccan never see any green cheese but their een reels.\u201d He was\n_extremely covetous_, and that not only of nice articles of food, but of\nmany other things which do not generally excite the cupidity of the\nhuman heart. The following story is in corroboration of this assertion.\nBeing on a visit one day at the house of one of his parishioners, a\npoor, lonely widow, living in a moorland part of the parish, Mr L\u2014\u2014\nbecame fascinated by the charms of a little cast-iron pot, which\nhappened at the time to be lying on the hearth, full of potatoes for the\npoor woman\u2019s dinner, and that of her children. He had never in his life\nseen such a nice little pot. It was a perfect conceit of a thing. It was\na gem. No pot on earth could match it in symmetry. It was an object\naltogether perfectly lovely.\n\n\u201cDear sake! minister,\u201d said the widow, quite overpowered by the reverend\nman\u2019s commendations of her pot; \u201cif ye like the pot sae weel as a\u2019 that,\nI beg ye\u2019ll let me send it to the manse. It\u2019s a kind o\u2019 orra pot wi\u2019 us;\nfor we\u2019ve a bigger ane, that we use oftener, and that\u2019s mair convenient\nevery way for us. Sae ye\u2019ll just tak a present o\u2019t. I\u2019ll send it ower\nthe morn wi\u2019 Jamie, when he gangs to the schule.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh,\u201d said the minister, \u201cI can by no means permit you to be at so much\ntrouble. Since you are so good as to give me the pot, I\u2019ll just carry it\nhome with me in my hand. I\u2019m so much taken with it, indeed, that I would\nreally prefer carrying it myself.\u201d\n\nAfter much altercation between the minister and the widow, on this\ndelicate point of politeness, it was agreed that he should carry home\nthe pot himself.\n\nOff, then, he trudged, bearing this curious little culinary article\nalternately in his hand and under his arm, as seemed most convenient to\nhim. Unfortunately, the day was warm, the way long, and the minister\nfat; so that he became heartily tired of his burden before he had got\nhalf-way home. Under these distressing circumstances, it struck him that\nif, instead of carrying the pot awkwardly at one side of his person, he\nwere to carry it on his head, the burden would be greatly lightened; the\nprinciples of natural philosophy, which he had learned at college,\ninforming him, that when a load presses directly and immediately upon\nany object, it is far less onerous than when it hangs at the remote end\nof a lever. Accordingly, doffing his hat, which he resolved to carry\nhome in his hand, and having applied his handkerchief to his brow, he\nclapped the pot in inverted fashion upon his head, where, as the reader\nmay suppose, it figured much like Mambrino\u2019s helmet upon the crazed\ncapital of Don Quixote, only a great deal more magnificent in shape and\ndimensions. There was at first much relief and much comfort in this new\nmode of carrying the pot; but mark the result. The unfortunate minister\nhaving taken a by-path to escape observation, found himself, when still\na good way from home, under the necessity of leaping over a ditch, which\nintercepted him in passing from one field to another. He jumped; but\nsurely no jump was ever taken so completely _in_, or, at least, _into_,\nthe dark as this. The concussion given to his person in descending,\ncaused the helmet to become a hood: the pot slipped down over his face,\nand resting with its rim upon his neck, stuck fast there; enclosing his\nwhole head as completely as ever that of a new-born child was enclosed\nby the filmy bag with which nature, as an indication of future good\nfortune, sometimes invests the noddles of her favourite offspring. What\nwas worst of all, the nose, which had permitted the pot to slip down\nover it, withstood every desperate attempt on the part of its proprietor\nto make it slip back again; the contracted part or neck of the _patera_\nbeing of such a peculiar formation as to cling fast to the base of the\nnose, although it found no difficulty in gliding along its hypothenuse.\nWas ever minister in a worse plight? Was there ever _contretemps_ so\nunlucky? Did ever any man\u2014did ever any minister\u2014so effectually hoodwink\nhimself, or so thoroughly shut his eyes to the plain light of nature?\nWhat was to be done? The place was lonely; the way difficult and\ndangerous; human relief was remote, almost beyond reach. It was\nimpossible even to cry for help. Or, if a cry could be uttered, it might\nreach in deafening reverberation the ear of the utterer; but it would\nnot travel twelve inches farther in any direction. To add to the\ndistresses of the case, the unhappy sufferer soon found great difficulty\nin breathing. What with the heat occasioned by the beating of the sun on\nthe metal, and what with the frequent return of the same heated air to\nhis lungs, he was in the utmost danger of suffocation. Everything\nconsidered, it seemed likely that, if he did not chance to be relieved\nby some accidental wayfarer, there would soon be _Death in the Pot_.\n\nThe instinctive love of life, however, is omni-prevalent: and even very\nstupid people have been found when put to the push by strong and\nimminent peril, to exhibit a degree of presence of mind, and exert a\ndegree of energy, far above what might have been expected from them, or\nwhat they have ever been known to exhibit or exert under ordinary\ncircumstances. So it was with the pot-ensconced minister of C\u2014\u2014. Pressed\nby the urgency of his distresses, he fortunately recollected that there\nwas a smith\u2019s shop at the distance of about a mile across the fields,\nwhere, if he could reach it before the period of suffocation, he might\npossibly find relief. Deprived of his eyesight, he could act only as a\nman of feeling, and went on as cautiously as he could, with his hat in\nhis hand. Half crawling, half sliding, over ridge and furrow, ditch and\nhedge, somewhat like Satan floundering over chaos, the unhappy minister\ntravelled, with all possible speed, as nearly as he could guess in the\ndirection of the place of refuge. I leave it to the reader to conceive\nthe surprise, the mirth, the infinite amusement of the smith and all the\nhangers-on of the \u201csmiddy,\u201d when, at length, torn and worn, faint and\nexhausted, blind and breathless, the unfortunate man arrived at the\nplace, and let them know (rather by signs than by words) the\ncircumstances of his case. In the words of an old Scottish song,\n\n Out cam the gudeman, and high he shouted;\n Out cam the gudewife, and low she louted;\n And a\u2019 the town-neighbours were gathered about it;\n And there was he, I trow!\n\nThe merriment of the company, however, soon gave way to considerations\nof humanity. Ludicrous as was the minister, with such an object where\nhis head should have been, and with the feet of the pot pointing upwards\nlike the horns of the great Enemy, it was, nevertheless, necessary that\nhe should be speedily restored to his ordinary condition, if it were for\nno other reason than that he might continue to live. He was accordingly,\nat his own request, led into the smithy, multitudes flocking around to\ntender him their kindest offices, or to witness the process of his\nrelease; and having laid down his head upon the anvil, the smith lost no\ntime in seizing and poising his goodly forehammer.\n\n\u201cWill I come sair on, minister?\u201d exclaimed the considerate man of iron\nin at the brink of the pot.\n\n\u201cAs sair as ye like,\u201d was the minister\u2019s answer; \u201cbetter a chap i\u2019 the\nchafts than dying for want of breath.\u201d\n\nThus permitted, the man let fall a hard blow, which fortunately broke\nthe pot in pieces without hurting the head which it enclosed, as the\ncook-maid breaks the shell of the lobster without bruising the delicate\nfood within. A few minutes of the clear air, and a glass from the\ngudewife\u2019s bottle, restored the unfortunate man of prayer; but assuredly\nthe incident is one which will long live in the memory of the\nparishioners.\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Journal._\n\n\n\n\n THE SUTOR OF SELKIRK:\n _A REMARKABLY TRUE STORY_.\n\n BY ONE OF THE AUTHORS OF \u201cTHE ODD VOLUME.\u201d\n\n\nOnce upon a time, there lived in Selkirk a shoemaker, by name Rabbie\nHeckspeckle, who was celebrated both for dexterity in his trade, and for\nsome other qualifications of a less profitable nature. Rabbie was a\nthin, meagre-looking personage, with lank black hair, a cadaverous\ncountenance, and a long, flexible, secret-smelling nose. In short, he\nwas the Paul Pry of the town. Not an old wife in the parish could buy a\nnew scarlet rokelay without Rabbie knowing within a groat of the cost;\nthe doctor could not dine with the minister but Rabbie could tell\nwhether sheep\u2019s-head or haggis formed the staple commodity of the\nrepast; and it was even said that he was acquainted with the grunt of\nevery sow, and the cackle of every individual hen, in his neighbourhood;\nbut this wants confirmation. His wife, Bridget, endeavoured to confine\nhis excursive fancy, and to chain him down to his awl, reminding him it\nwas _all_ they had to depend on; but her interference met with exactly\nthat degree of attention which husbands usually bestow on the advice\ntendered by their better halves\u2014that is to say, Rabbie informed her that\nshe knew nothing of the matter, that her understanding required\nstretching, and finally, that if she presumed to meddle in his affairs,\nhe would be under the disagreeable necessity of giving her a\ntopdressing.\n\nTo secure the necessary leisure for his researches, Rabbie was in the\nhabit of rising to his work long before the dawn; and he was one morning\nbusily engaged putting the finishing stitches to a pair of shoes for the\nexciseman, when the door of his dwelling, which he thought was carefully\nfastened, was suddenly opened, and a tall figure, enveloped in a large\nblack cloak, and with a broad-brimmed hat drawn over his brows, stalked\ninto the shop. Rabbie stared at his visitor, wondering what could have\noccasioned this early call, and wondering still more that a stranger\nshould have arrived in the town without his knowledge.\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re early afoot, sir,\u201d quoth Rabbie. \u201cLucky Wakerife\u2019s cock will no\ncraw for a good half hour yet.\u201d\n\nThe stranger vouchsafed no reply; but taking up one of the shoes Rabbie\nhad just finished, deliberately put it on, and took a turn through the\nroom to ascertain that it did not pinch his extremities. During these\noperations, Rabbie kept a watchful eye on his customer.\n\n\u201cHe smells awfully o\u2019 yird,\u201d muttered Rabbie to himself; \u201cane would be\nready to swear he had just cam frae the plough-tail.\u201d\n\nThe stranger, who appeared to be satisfied with the effect of the\nexperiment, motioned to Rabbie for the other shoe, and pulled out a\npurse for the purpose of paying for his purchase; but Rabbie\u2019s surprise\nmay be conceived, when, on looking at the purse, he perceived it to be\nspotted with a kind of earthy mould.\n\n\u201cGudesake,\u201d thought Rabbie, \u201cthis queer man maun hae howkit that purse\nout o\u2019 the ground. I wonder where he got it. Some folk say there are\ndags o\u2019 siller buried near this town.\u201d\n\nBy this time the stranger had opened the purse, and as he did so, a toad\nand a beetle fell on the ground, and a large worm crawling out wound\nitself round his finger. Rabbie\u2019s eyes widened; but the stranger, with\nan air of nonchalance, tendered him a piece of gold, and made signs for\nthe other shoe.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a thing morally impossible,\u201d responded Rabbie to this mute\nproposal. \u201cMair by token, that I hae as good as sworn to the exciseman\nto hae them ready by daylight, which will no be long o\u2019 coming\u201d (the\nstranger here looked anxiously towards the window); \u201cand better, I tell\nyou, to affront the king himsel, than the exciseman.\u201d\n\nThe stranger gave a loud stamp with his shod foot, but Rabbie stuck to\nhis point, offering, however, to have a pair ready for his new customer\nin twenty-four hours; and, as the stranger, justly enough perhaps,\nreasoned that half a pair of shoes was of as little use as half a pair\nof scissors, he found himself obliged to come to terms, and seating\nhimself on Rabbie\u2019s three-legged stool, held out his leg to the Sutor,\nwho, kneeling down, took the foot of his taciturn customer on his knee,\nand proceeded to measure it.\n\n\u201cSomething o\u2019 the splay, I think, sir,\u201d said Rabbie, with a knowing air.\n\nNo answer.\n\n\u201cWhere will I bring the shoon to when they\u2019re done?\u201d asked Rabbie,\nanxious to find out the domicile of his visitor.\n\n\u201cI will call for them myself before cock crowing,\u201d responded the\nstranger in a very uncommon and indescribable tone of voice.\n\n\u201cHout, sir,\u201d quoth Rabbie, \u201cI canna let you hae the trouble o\u2019 coming\nfor them yoursel; it will just be a pleasure for me to call with them at\nyour house.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have my doubts of that,\u201d replied the stranger, in the same peculiar\nmanner; \u201cand at all events, my house would not hold us both.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt maun be a dooms sma\u2019 biggin,\u201d answered Rabbie; \u201cbut noo that I hae\nta\u2019en your honour\u2019s measure\u2014\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cTake your own!\u201d retorted the stranger, and giving Rabbie a touch with\nhis foot that laid him prostrate, walked coolly out of the house.\n\nThis sudden overturn of himself and his plans for a few moments\ndiscomfited the Sutor; but quickly gathering up his legs, he rushed to\nthe door, which he reached just as Lucky Wakerife\u2019s cock proclaimed the\ndawn. Rabbie flew down the street, but all was still; then ran up the\nstreet, which was terminated by the churchyard, but saw only the\nmoveless tombs looking cold and chill under the grey light of a winter\nmorn. Rabbie hitched his red nightcap off his brow, and scratched his\nhead with an air of perplexity.\n\n\u201cWeel,\u201d he muttered, as he retraced his steps homewards, \u201che has warred\nme this time, but sorrow take me if I\u2019m no up wi\u2019 him the morn.\u201d\n\nAll day Rabbie, to the inexpressible surprise of his wife, remained as\nconstantly on his three-legged stool as if he had been \u201cyirked\u201d there by\nsome brother of the craft. For the space of twenty-four hours, his long\nnose was never seen to throw its shadow across the threshold of the\ndoor; and so extraordinary did this event appear, that the neighbours,\none and all, agreed that it predicted some prodigy; but whether it was\nto take the shape of a comet, which would deluge them all with its fiery\ntail, or whether they were to be swallowed up by an earthquake, could by\nno means be settled to the satisfaction of the parties concerned.\n\nMeanwhile, Rabbie diligently pursued his employment, unheeding the\nconcerns of his neighbours. What mattered it to him, that Jenny\nThrifty\u2019s cow had calved, that the minister\u2019s servant, with something in\nher apron, had been seen to go in twice to Lucky Wakerife\u2019s, that the\nlaird\u2019s dairy-maid had been observed stealing up the red loan in the\ngloaming, that the drum had gone through the town announcing that a\nsheep was to be killed on Friday?\u2014The stranger alone swam before his\neyes; and cow, dairymaid, and drum kicked the beam. It was late in the\nnight when Rabbie had accomplished his task, and then placing the shoes\nat his bedside, he lay down in his clothes, and fell asleep; but the\nfear of not being sufficiently alert for his new customer, induced him\nto rise a considerable time before daybreak. He opened the door and\nlooked into the street, but it was still so dark he could scarcely see a\nyard before his nose; he therefore returned into the house, muttering to\nhimself\u2014\u201cWhat the sorrow can keep him?\u201d when a voice at his elbow\nsuddenly said\u2014\n\n\u201cWhere are my shoes?\u201d\n\n\u201cHere, sir,\u201d said Rabbie, quite transported with joy; \u201chere they are,\nright and tight, and mickle joy may ye hae in wearing them, for it\u2019s\nbetter to wear shoon than sheets, as the auld saying gangs.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps I may wear both,\u201d answered the stranger.\n\n\u201cGude save us,\u201d quoth Rabbie, \u201cdo ye sleep in your shoon?\u201d\n\nThe stranger made no answer; but, laying a piece of gold on the table\nand taking up the shoes, walked out of the house.\n\n\u201cNow\u2019s my time,\u201d thought Rabbie to himself, as he slipped after him.\n\nThe stranger paced slowly on, and Rabbie carefully followed him; the\nstranger turned up the street, and the Sutor kept close to his heels.\n\u201c\u2019Odsake, where can he be gaun?\u201d thought Rabbie, as he saw the stranger\nturn into the churchyard; \u201che\u2019s making to that grave in the corner; now\nhe\u2019s standing still; now he\u2019s sitting down. Gudesake! what\u2019s come o\u2019\nhim?\u201d Rabbie rubbed his eyes, looked round in all directions, but, lo\nand behold! the stranger had vanished. \u201cThere\u2019s something no canny about\nthis,\u201d thought the Sutor; \u201cbut I\u2019ll mark the place at ony rate;\u201d and\nRabbie, after thrusting his awl into the grave, hastily returned home.\n\nThe news soon spread from house to house, and by the time the red-faced\nsun stared down on the town, the whole inhabitants were in commotion;\nand, after having held sundry consultations, it was resolved, _nem.\ncon._, to proceed in a body to the churchyard, and open the grave which\nwas suspected of being suspicious. The whole population of the Kirk Wynd\nturned out on this service. Sutors, wives, children, all hurried\npell-mell after Rabbie, who led his myrmidons straight to the grave at\nwhich his mysterious customer had disappeared, and where he found his\nawl still sticking in the place where he had left it. Immediately all\nhands went to work; the grave was opened; the lid was forced off the\ncoffin; and a corpse was discovered dressed in the vestments of the\ntomb, but with a pair of perfectly new shoes upon its long bony feet. At\nthis dreadful sight the multitude fled in every direction, Lucky\nWakerife leading the van, leaving Rabbie and a few bold brothers of the\ncraft to arrange matters as they pleased with the peripatetic skeleton.\nA council was held, and it was agreed that the coffin should be firmly\nnailed up and committed to the earth. Before doing so, however, Rabbie\nproposed denuding his customer of his shoes, remarking that he had no\nmore need for them than a cart had for three wheels. No objections were\nmade to this proposal, and Rabbie, therefore, quickly coming to\nextremities, whipped them off in a trice. They then drove half a hundred\ntenpenny nails into the lid of the coffin, and having taken care to\ncover the grave with pretty thick divots, the party returned to their\nseparate places of abode.\n\nCertain qualms of conscience, however, now arose in Rabbie\u2019s mind as to\nthe propriety of depriving the corpse of what had been honestly bought\nand paid for. He could not help allowing, that if the ghost were\ntroubled with cold feet, a circumstance by no means improbable, he might\nnaturally wish to remedy the evil. But, at the same time, considering\nthat the fact of his having made a pair of shoes for a defunct man would\nbe an everlasting blot on the Heckspeckle escutcheon, and reflecting\nalso that his customer, being dead in law, could not apply to any court\nfor redress, our Sutor manfully resolved to abide by the consequences of\nhis deed.\n\nNext morning, according to custom, he rose long before day, and fell to\nhis work, shouting the old song of the \u201cSutors of Selkirk\u201d at the very\ntop of his voice. A short time, however, before the dawn, his wife, who\nwas in bed in the back room, remarked, that in the very middle of his\nfavourite verse, his voice fell into a quaver; then broke out into a\nyell of terror; and then she heard a noise, as of persons struggling;\nand then all was quiet as the grave. The good dame immediately huddled\non her clothes, and ran into the shop, where she found the three-legged\nstool broken in pieces, the floor strewed with bristles, the door wide\nopen, and Rabbie away! Bridget rushed to the door, and there she\nimmediately discovered the marks of footsteps deeply printed on the\nground. Anxiously tracing them, on\u2014and on\u2014and on\u2014what was her horror to\nfind that they terminated in the churchyard, at the grave of Rabbie\u2019s\ncustomer! The earth round the grave bore traces of having been the scene\nof some fearful struggle, and several locks of lank black hair were\nscattered on the grass. Half distracted, she rushed through the town to\ncommunicate the dreadful intelligence. A crowd collected, and a cry\nspeedily arose to open the grave. Spades, pickaxes, and mattocks, were\nquickly put in requisition; the divots were removed; the lid of the\ncoffin was once more torn off, and there lay its ghastly tenant, with\nhis shoes replaced on his feet, and Rabbie\u2019s red night-cap clutched in\nhis right hand!\n\nThe people, in consternation, fled from the churchyard; and nothing\nfurther has ever transpired to throw any additional light upon the\nmelancholy fate of the Sutor of Selkirk.\n\n\n\n\n ELSIE MORRICE.\n\n FROM THE \u201cABERDEEN CENSOR.\u201d\n\n Oh, wert thou of the golden-wing\u00e8d host,\n Who, having clad thyself in human weed,\n To earth, from thy prefix\u00e8d seat didst post,\n And, after short abode, fly back with speed,\n As if to show what creatures Heav\u2019n doth breed,\n Thereby to set the hearts of men on fire,\n To scorn the sordid world, and unto Heav\u2019n aspire?\u2014_Milton._\n\n\nIn the neighbourhood of the pleasant village of \u2014\u2014, on the east coast of\nScotland, lived Janet Morrice and her grand-daughter Elsie. A small\ncottage, overlaid with woodbine on the exterior, and neat and clean in\nthe interior, contained this couple; and a small farm attached to it\nserved to supply all their humble desires. The place was no doubt\nagreeable to look on; but it was a pair of bright blue eyes, some light\nbrown locks, and a sweet and modest face, that drew all the male\nvisitors to the house of Janet Morrice. Elsie Morrice, her grandchild,\nhad been left a young orphan to her charge. She was the only child of an\nonly son, and thus came with a double call on the feelings of her old\ngrandmother. Dearly was she loved by her, and well did she deserve it;\nfor a better and a kindlier girl was not in all the country round. Out\nof the many young men that paid their attentions to Elsie, it was soon\nevident that her favourite was William Gordon. In his person he had\nnothing particular to recommend him above his companions; but there was\nin him that respectful demeanour, that eagerness to please, and that\nhappiness in serving the object of his affections, which the eyes of a\nyoung woman can so soon perceive, and her heart so readily appreciate.\nIn their dispositions, though not similar, they were drawn to each\nother. She was timid, loving, enthusiastic\u2014in every respect a woman. He\nwas gifted with those firmer qualities which bespeak a manly mind, but\nhe had a heart that could love deeply and feel acutely;\n\n And, if sometimes, a sigh should intervene,\n Or down his cheek a tear of pity roll,\n A sigh, a tear so sweet, he wished not to control.\n\nThere was also some resemblance in their situations; for William\u2019s\nmother was dead, and though he still had a father, yet this parent had\nnever seen him, and took no concern about him; so that he was entirely\ndependent upon his maternal uncle. To his uncle\u2019s farm he was to\nsucceed; and William Gordon and Elsie Morrice were considered by all the\nneighbours as soon to be man and wife.\n\nWilliam was seated one evening in the public-house of the village,\nreading the newspaper, when a party of sailors entered, and, calling for\nsome drink, casually asked if there were any seamen in the village. The\nlandlady civilly replied in the negative; but William, looking up,\nremarked, without noticing the winks of the landlord, that he had seen\nTom Sangster arrive that morning.\n\n\u201cAnd where lives Tom Sangster, my hearty cock?\u201d said the principal of\nthe party, slapping him on the back, while the rest got betwixt the\nlandlady and the door. He immediately informed them; and, drinking off\ntheir liquor quickly, they left the house.\n\n\u201cWillie,\u201d cried the landlady, \u201cwhat hae ye done? It\u2019s the press-gang,\nand Tam Sangster \u2019ll be torn frae his wife and bairns!\u201d\n\nIn a moment William was past her, and, running with full speed, by a\nnearer cut, he arrived before the gang at the house. He had just time to\nmake the seaman strip his jacket, and put on his coat, and jump out at\nthe back window, when the gang entered. William, without turning round,\nknocked out the lamp, when a struggle ensued, which he contrived to keep\nup so long as that Tom Sangster might be out of the way. He was at last\noverpowered and carried aboard the tender, when they discovered they had\nlost the regular sailor; but the one they had got was too likely a young\nman to be suffered to depart. The consciousness of having remedied an\nerror he had committed, even though in ignorance, partly consoled\nWilliam for parting with his beloved Elsie for a little. It was at the\ntime when the news of the glorious victory of the Nile had arrived, and\nmany a young and aspiring bosom burned to be under the command of so\ngallant an admiral. William\u2019s father belonged to the navy; he knew that\nhe fought under Nelson; and the thought that he might be able to combat\nby his side, and under the eye of the hero who was his country\u2019s boast,\nsomewhat palliated the idea of leaving his love. Besides, he would soon\nreturn laden with honours and riches, and Elsie would share both.\n\n Auspicious hope! in thy sweet garden grow\n Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe.\n\nAnd thus he consoled himself with a flattering vision in circumstances\nthat he could not alter. As for poor Elsie, her timid mind had never\ncontemplated bloodshed and war. She loved, fervently loved, and her life\nhad been one scene of pleasure. She was a dreamer that all the night\nlong had quaffed the brimful cup of happiness, and in the morning waked\nto wretchedness. To lamentations, however, succeeded some consultation\nfor a remedy; and she was advised, by her sorrowing neighbours, to apply\nto the laird for his interest. Loose, unprincipled, and broken down in\nfortune, he had returned, from the fashionable life he could no longer\nsupport, to live on his estate; and he was not beloved by his tenants.\nBut when a woman loves, and the object of her affection is in danger,\nwhere is the obstacle that can oppose her? Elsie exerted herself to call\non him.\n\nThe poet has beautifully said,\n\n Ah, too convincing, dangerously dear,\n In woman\u2019s eye th\u2019 unanswerable tear,\n The weapon of her weakness she can wield\n To save, subdue\u2014at once her spear and shield.\n\nBut there are some men that can look on woman\u2019s grief, and yet coolly\ncalculate on turning it to their own purposes; and so it was in the\npresent case. Elsie Morrice was lovely, and that was enough for him. He\npromised everything, and her heart overflowed with gratitude. He not\nonly promised this, but he requested her grandmother\u2019s lease, to draw it\nout anew in her name. Elsie ran home, and, in a few minutes, without\nconsulting her grandmother, the lease was in his hands: for who could\ndoubt the intentions of him who had pledged his word that William Gordon\nshould be put ashore? This was no sooner done, than came the sneer at\nher lover, the information that his Majesty\u2019s navy must be manned, the\nhint at the injury to the landlord in old leases, and the proposal of\nthe remedy that was to remove all these evils. The colour fled from\nElsie\u2019s face. She stood the picture of complete despair, and, for a\nlittle time, reason had to dispute for her sovereignty in her mind. She\nrushed from his presence, and, in her way back to Sunnybrae, saw,\nwithout shedding one tear, the vessel that contained her lover spread\nher broad sails to the wind and depart. Janet Morrice reproached her not\nwhen she told her what she had done, but, taking her in her arms, said,\n\u201cCome, my Elsie, we maunna bide to be putten out. I\u2019ve sitten here, and\nmy fathers afore me, an\u2019 I\u2019m wae to leave it; but age and innocence will\nfind a shelter somewhere else.\u201d Next day they removed to a cottage on a\nneighbouring estate. A verbal message was all that William could send\nher; but it was the assurance he would be soon back to her. Elsie seemed\nnow to live in another state of existence. She toiled in the fields, and\nseemed anxious to make up to her grandmother the effects of her\nimprudence. Time passed on, and no letter arrived from William, and\nElsie grew sorrowful and melancholy. Grief and labour bore down a\nconstitution naturally delicate, and she drooped.\n\nThere is something to my mind particularly holy and heavenly in the\ndeath-bed of a lovely woman. When I look on the pale cheek, which now\nand then regains more than its former colour in some feverish flush\u2014on\nthe sunk eye which occasionally beams with a short and transient hope\u2014on\nthe pale lips which utter low sounds of comfort to those around\u2014and,\nmore especially, on that whole countenance and appearance which bespeak\npatient resignation and a trust in that Word which has said there is\nanother and a better world\u2014I cannot help thinking that the being, even\nin her mortality, is already a deserving inmate of that place where all\nis immortality. I have stood at the grave while some of my earliest\nfriends have been lowered into the ground, and I have wept to think that\nthe bright hopes of youth were for ever fled\u2014that the fair promises of\nyouthful genius were wrapt within the clay-cold tomb\u2014and that all the\nanticipations of the world\u2019s applause had ended in the one formal bow of\na few friends over mouldering ashes; but I confess I have sorrowed more\nat the grave of a young and lovely woman who had nothing to excite my\ncompassion but her beauty and her helplessness; and often have the lines\nof that poet, who could be pathetic as well as sublime, come to my\nlips,\u2014\n\n Yet can I not persuade me thou art dead,\n Or that thy corpse corrupts in earth\u2019s dark womb,\n Or that thy beauties lie in wormy bed,\n Hid from the world in a low-delv\u00e8d tomb.\n\nIt was on a lovely morning in the month of May that a sad and sorrowful\ncompany assembled to accompany the remains of poor Elsie Morrice to her\nlast cold dwelling-place. According to that old-fashioned and most\nbecoming custom, she was borne on the bier, and carried, as is the\npractice in that part of the country, for some way by the young maidens\ndressed in white. No mother had she to weep for her, no relation to bear\nher head to the grave; but her old grandmother followed her corpse to\nthe door\u2014farther she could not; and, when it was placed on the bier, she\nattempted not to speak or to moan, but she leaned her palsied hands on\nher staff, and followed the coffin with her eyes, while down her\nfurrowed cheeks rolled two big tears that told too well her inward\ngrief. Elsie\u2019s young companion, May Leslie, who was to have been her\nbestmaid at the marriage, who had promised to assist at her marriage\ndress, and make her marriage bed, had, in sorrow and in grief, fashioned\nthat last dress in which beauty is offered, not to the arms of a lover,\nbut to the crawling worm, now supported her head for a few steps to that\nbed from which there is no rising till the last dread trumpet shall\nsound. The females then gave the corpse to the young men, and I could\nperceive, as they returned, that many a handkerchief was soaked in briny\ntears, and many a head turned to take a last look at the departure of\nher who had been their companion and their pride. We moved on, and,\nafter an hour\u2019s walking, arrived at the old churchyard of \u2014\u2014. It is\nsituated on the front of a bleak and barren hill, with neither tree nor\nshrub for some way around it; and a few moss-covered tombstones alone\ntold us that it was the resting place for the dead. The church had been\nrebuilt in a more convenient place; but, like the sojourner in distant\nlands, who sighs for his native soil, however barren, there are some\nthat still cling to the spot which is the grave of their fathers. Though\nit may betray some weakness in reason, still I hope it is an excusable\nfailing, in feeling minds, that they desire to mingle in their ashes\nwith their friends. Here we deposited the remains of Elsie Morrice, and,\nwhen the grave had been closed over, the company departed in groups,\nchiefly engaged in talking over her unfortunate love.\n\nThe heather sods had long become fast, and the hare-bell had blossomed\nand withered for some summers on the grave of Elsie Morrice, when one\nday a seaman, singing a merry sea-song to himself, tript up the pathway\nleading to Sunnybrae. It was William Gordon. The joy he had felt on\nagain entering amongst scenes so well known to him, sent itself forth in\na song; but, as he approached the house, it died away, and gave place to\nfar different feelings. He had never heard from Elsie; but, while aboard\nof ship, he had hushed any fears that arose, by ascribing this to the\nletters miscarrying from the ever changing station of a sailor. Still he\nwas not well at ease; and as he came in front of the house, and saw the\nwoodbine torn from the walls, the windows here and there broken and\ncovered with paper, and the pretty flower-garden of Elsie turned into a\nkail-yard, the most fearful forebodings arose in his breast, and with a\ntrembling and hurried hand he lifted the latch. He started back on\nperceiving some children playing on the floor, but again advanced when\nhe saw a middle-aged woman nursing a child, and asked, in the best way\nhe was able, if she could tell him where Janet Morrice lived? She gave\nhim a direction, and, without taking one other look at the cottage he\nhad so often visited, he made his way to the new dwelling, and on\nentering, addressed her in the usual salutation, \u201cHow are you, Granny,\nand how is Elsie?\u201d\n\nThe old woman was seated with her face to the hearth, and perceived not\nhis entrance; but on hearing his voice, without starting or moving, she\nimmediately answered, \u201cAn\u2019 ye\u2019re come back, Willie Gordon; an\u2019 sae ye\u2019re\ncome back! I kent a\u2019 this. I kent, when the house and the ha\u2019 o\u2019 the\nstranger would be closed against ye, ye would come back to your ain\ncountry. I saw her yestreen, as I hae seen her ilka night, and she tauld\nme ye would come. But this fire\u2019s out,\u201d continued she, stirring about\nthe embers with her stick; \u201cI tried to blaw that peat, but I wasna able\nto raise the low: an\u2019 when she comes and seats hersel on that stool, it\n\u2019ill be sae cauld, an\u2019 she winna complain o\u2019t, but her bonny face \u2019ill\nbe sae wan, and her braw white gown \u2019ill be sae damp and dewy. Ye\u2019ll see\nher, Willie, ye\u2019ll see her wi\u2019 the bonny new mutch on that May Leslie\nmade wi\u2019 her ain hand. An\u2019 I\u2019ll shiver and tremble in my cauld bed, and\nshe winna lie down wi\u2019 me, but she\u2019ll sit by the fire an\u2019 aye deck\nhersel wi\u2019 the black kerchief that Willie Gordon tied roun\u2019 her neck\nlang afore he gaed awa.\u201d\n\nWilliam, who had stood riveted to the earth all this time, now exerted\nhimself, and, seizing her arm, asked loudly, \u201cWhere is Elsie Morrice?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhaur is Elsie Morrice?\u2014and wha speirs that question? They took her awa\nfrae me lang ago, dressed in white, like a bride, and mony ane gaed wi\u2019\nher, but I wasna able, though they dressed me fine in my braw\nSunday-claithes.\u201d\n\n\u201cGranny, ye knew me already,\u201d said he; \u201cfor God\u2019s sake, tell me what has\nbecome of Elsie?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere were twa bonny voices ca\u2019d me granny, and I liket to hear them;\nbut the little feathered flock picks the craw-berries, an\u2019 the bee sooks\nthe honey frae the heather on the grave o\u2019 the ane, and the ither is a\nfaithless love, and broke the heart o\u2019 the leal young bairn that lay in\nmy bosom.\u201d\n\nWilliam now knew the worst. He threw himself in agony on the dais, and\nwept and cursed his hard lot. Elsie Morrice was dead, and dead, as\nappeared, through his neglect. When his grief had found some vent, he\nagain asked the old woman if they had received no letters from him?\n\nShe raised her shaking hand, and tracing every feature of his face,\nsaid, \u201cThough I canna see sae weel that face, I ken ye\u2019re Willie Gordon;\nbut oh, Willie, Willie, ye hae come when the flame ye should hae\nnourished has been quenched. We never got ony letters, or else Elsie\nwould hae tried to live.\u201d\n\nIt was with great exertion that he was able to gather from her\ndisjointed sentences, that the laird had turned them out of Sunnybrae,\nand continued to annoy them, and that Elsie had broken her heart when he\nleft them and sent no letters. Many a kind letter had William written,\nbut they were directed, for security\u2019s sake, to the care of the laird,\nand the mystery of his never receiving any answer was now cleared away.\n\u201cBut the laird shall answer for this!\u201d said he, stepping to the door.\n\u201cNa, Willie Gordon,\u201d said she, taking hold of him, \u201che manna answer\nfor\u2019t to you. There is Anither that will judge him for abusing the widow\nand the orphan. Ay, he is already cursed for it,\u201d continued she,\nstretching out her lean and shrivelled arm, and raising herself like a\nSibyl; \u201chis lang list of ancestors is at end in him. He walks the world\nthe last of his proud race. A few years, and yon lordly house will be\nthe dwalling o\u2019 the hoodie-craw and the rook; an\u2019 the present proud man\nwill be lying in his leaden coffin, wi\u2019 the worms o\u2019 his ain body\ndevouring him, and the winds o\u2019 heaven will dash his lie-telling\ntombstone to pieces, an\u2019 the beasts will tread on his grave, an\u2019 the\nrains level it, an\u2019 none will repair it, for his name shall be forgotten\nfor ever. But whisht, Willie, I canna greet wi\u2019 you. Ye\u2019ll see her, when\nthe hen has been lang on the roost, an\u2019 the tod has left his hole to\nworry the puir beasty, an we\u2019ll get May Leslie, an\u2019 we\u2019ll hae a blazing\nfire, an\u2019 we\u2019ll be merry again in Sunnybrae.\u201d A shrill and unearthly\nlaugh followed, and she sank again into her former querulous muttering.\n\nWilliam suddenly left the house and was never more seen; but some weeks\nafter, the grave of Elsie Morrice was found finely dressed, and a stone,\nwith her name and age carved on it by the hand of no regular sculptor,\nat the head of it. And every spring the greedy moss was found cleaned\naway from the stone, and the grave trimmed. While Janet Morrice lived,\nher garden was delved, and money deposited on her table, by the same\ninvisible hand. No one knew what became of William Gordon; but\noccasionally, in the gray of a May morning, as the shepherd was merrily\ndriving his flocks with the sun to the pasture, he saw the dark figure\nof a man chiselling at the stone, or stretched on the grave of Elsie\nMorrice. About three years ago a shepherd\u2019s dog, one day, prowling about\nthe old churchyard, returned, and, by his howling, urged his master to\nthe spot, where he found the dead body of a seaman. The letters W. G.\nand an anchor on his forearm, and W. S. and E. M., with a heart between\nthem, and the Saviour on the cross above, on his left breast, done with\nChina ink or gunpowder, after that fashion which sailors have in order\nthat their bodies may be known, if picked up after shipwreck, told too\nwell who had chosen this place for his death-bed. Sufficient money was\nfound on him to pay the expenses of his burial, and he was laid in the\ngrave he had died upon. Last summer I visited the spot. The grave was\nrunning into wildness; but, in a state of mind pleasing yet sad, I spent\nhalf a day in dressing the resting-place of this unfortunate pair.\n\n\n\n\n HOW I WON THE LAIRD\u2019S DAUGHTER.\n\n BY DANIEL GORRIE.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nSoon after I had obtained my diploma, and was dubbed M.D., an opening\nfor a medical practitioner occurred in the pleasant village of St\nDunstan, situated on the beautiful banks of the Tweed. Knowing well that\nI might be forestalled by a day\u2019s delay, I bundled up my testimonials\nand letters of recommendation, and departed at once for the scene of\naction. The shadows of a calm October evening were drooping over the\nEildon Hills, and the Tweed was murmuring peacefully along its winding\ncourse, when I entered the principal street of the village, and took up\nmy quarters at the inn. After refreshing myself with such entertainment\nas the house afforded, I called in the landlord, told him the object of\nmy visit, and inquired if any other medical gentlemen had yet made their\nappearance. Mine host was a canny, cautious Scotsman, and manifested due\ndeliberation in a matter of so much moment. He surveyed me quietly for a\nshort time, and did not reply until he seemed satisfied with his\nscrutiny.\n\n\u201cNa, sir,\u201d he said at length; \u201cye\u2019re the first that\u2019s come to the toun\nyet, and a\u2019 the folk are wearying for anither doctor. Ye see, we canna\ntell what may happen. The shoemaker\u2019s wife took unco onweel last nicht,\nand, frail as he is himsel, puir man, he had to gang a\u2019 the way to\nMelrose for medical advice. Ye look young like, sir; hae ye been in ony\nplace afore?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d I replied; \u201cit is not very long since I passed.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, weel, that\u2019s no sae gude; we rather like a skeely man here. Dr\nSommerville had a great deal o\u2019 experience, and we were a\u2019 sorry when he\nleft for Glasgow.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am glad that the good people of St Dunstan liked their last doctor so\nwell,\u201d I rejoined, somewhat nettled at the plain-spokenness of the\nworthy landlord of the Cross-Keys. \u201cBut although my youth may be against\nme,\u201d I continued, \u201chere are some testimonials which I hope may prove\nsatisfactory, and I have several letters of recommendation besides to\ngentlemen in the village and neighbourhood.\u201d\n\nThe landlord was a person whom I saw that it was necessary to gain over.\nHe was vastly pleased when I recognised his importance by producing my\ntestimonials for his inspection. It was amusing to observe the gravity\nand dignity with which he adjusted his spectacles across the bridge of\nhis nose, and proceeded to carefully inspect the documents. At intervals\nas he read he gave such running comments as \u201cgude\u201d\u2014\u201cvery\ngude\u201d\u2014\u201cexcellent\u201d\u2014\u201ccapital sir, capital!\u201d I was glad to see the\nbarometer rising so rapidly. After mine host had finished the perusal of\nthe papers, he shook me heartily by the hand, and said, \u201cYou\u2019re the very\nman we want, sir; ye hae first-rate certificats.\u201d\n\nSo far, so good. It was a great thing to have gained the confidence and\ngoodwill of one important personage, and I felt desirous to make further\nconquests that evening.\n\n\u201cDo you think I might venture to call to-night upon any of the parties\nin the village to whom I have letters of recommendation?\u201d I inquired.\n\n\u201cSurely, surely,\u201d responded the landlord; \u201cthe sooner the better. Just\nread me ower their names, sir, and I\u2019ll tak ye round to their houses. We\nhae a better chance o\u2019 gettin\u2019 them in at nicht than through the day.\u201d\n\nAccompanied by the lord of the Cross-Keys, I accordingly visited the\nleading inhabitants of the village, and made what an expectant member of\nParliament would consider a very satisfactory canvass. I was received\nwith much courtesy and civility; and the minister of the parish, to whom\nI had a letter of introduction from a brother clergyman in Edinburgh,\npaid me the most flattering attentions, and pressed me to take up my\nabode immediately at St Dunstan. The ladies, married and unmarried, with\nwhom I entered into conversation, were all unanimous in expressing their\ndesire that I should remain in their midst. Indeed, I have observed that\nthe female sex invariably take the greatest interest in the settlement\nof ministers and doctors. I could easily understand why the unmarried\nladies should prefer a single gentleman like myself; but I could not\ncomprehend at the time why their mothers seemed to take so much interest\nin a newly-fledged M.D. It struck me that the landlord of the inn must\nhave committed a great mistake in describing Dr Sommerville as the\nfavourite of all classes.\n\nFrom many of the people upon whom we called I received kind invitations\nto spend the night in their houses, and I could have slept in a dozen\ndifferent beds if I had felt so inclined; but I preferred returning to\nthe Cross-Keys, that, like the Apostle, I might be burdensome to none.\nIt is a piece of worldly prudence to give as little trouble as possible\nto strangers; and medical practitioners, of all men in the world,\nrequire to be wary in their ways, and circumspect in their actions.\n\nOn our return to the inn, the landlord appeared to regard my settlement\nin St Dunstan as a certainty.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ve got on grandly the nicht, Dr Wilson,\u201d he said, dropping the \u201csir\u201d\nwhen he considered me almost installed in office. \u201cYe\u2019ve carried\neverything afore ye\u2014I never saw the like o\u2019t. Ye hae got the promise o\u2019\npractice frae the hale lot o\u2019 them\u2014that\u2019s to say, when they need the\nattendance o\u2019 a medical man; and, \u2019od, doctor, but the womenkind are\naften complainin\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, Mr Barlas,\u201d I said (such was the landlord\u2019s name), \u201cI have\nexperienced much kindness and civility, and in the course of a few hours\nI have far outstripped my expectations. If I only succeed as well with\nthe ladies and gentlemen in the neighbourhood, I will not hesitate for a\nmoment in settling down in the midst of you.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s nae danger o\u2019 that, doctor. What\u2019s sauce or senna for the goose\nis sauce or senna for the gander. I\u2019ve seen aften eneuch that the grit\nfolk are no sae ill to please as the sma\u2019. If ye get ower the Laird,\u2014an\u2019\nI think ye\u2019ve as gude a chance as ony ither body,\u2014ye needna fear muckle\nfor the rest.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd who is the Laird, Mr Barlas?\u201d I asked.\n\n\u201cOh, just the Laird, ye ken\u2014Laird Ramsay o\u2019 the Haugh; ye\u2019ll surely hae\nheard o\u2019 him afore you cam south?\u201d\n\n\u201cRamsay,\u201d I said; \u201cRamsay\u2014oh, yes,\u2014I have a letter of introduction to a\ngentleman of that name from a professor in Edinburgh. Does he rule the\nroast in this neighbourhood?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll tell you aboot him i\u2019 the noo; but wait a wee, doctor, till I\nbring ye something warm.\u201d\n\nI did not disapprove of the medicine proposed by the host of the\nCross-Keys of St Dunstan, as I was anxious to know as much as possible\nabout the place and people; and the influence of hot punch in making\neven silent persons communicative is quite proverbial. Mr Barlas, after\na brief absence, returned to the snug little parlour, bearing his own\nprivate blue bottle, capable, I should think, of holding a good\nhalf-gallon of Islay or Glenlivet; and we were soon sitting comfortably,\nwith steaming tumblers before us, beside a blazing fire.\n\n\u201cThis is something social like, noo, doctor,\u201d said the composed and\nconsiderate landlord. \u201cYe were wantin\u2019 to hear aboot the Laird. Weel,\nI\u2019ll tell ye what sort o\u2019 a being he is, that ye may be on your guard\nwhen ye gang to the Haugh the morn. Laird Ramsay has mair gear, doctor,\nthan ony half-dozen o\u2019 his neighbours for mony miles roond, and he\u2019s a\nqueer character wi\u2019d a\u2019. He\u2019s unco auld-fashioned for a man in his\nstation, an\u2019 speaks muckle sic like as ye hear me speakin\u2019 i\u2019 the noo.\nHe gets the name o\u2019 haudin\u2019 a gude grip o\u2019 his siller; but I\u2019ve nae\nreason to compleen, as he spends freely eneuch when he comes to the\nCross-Keys, no forgettin\u2019 the servant-lass and the ostler; an\u2019 I ken for\na fac\u2019 that he slips a canny shillin\u2019 noo and again into the loofs o\u2019\nthe puir folk o\u2019 St Dunstan. He\u2019s unco douce and proud,\u2014ye micht maist\nsay saucy,\u2014until ye get the richt side o\u2019 him, an\u2019 then he\u2019s the best o\u2019\nfreends; an\u2019 nane better than the Laird at a twa-handed crack.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd how do you get to the right side of him, Mr Barlas?\u201d I interjected.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s the very thing I was gaun to tell ye, doctor. Lay on the butter\nweel. Butter him on baith sides, an\u2019 then ye easy get to the richt side.\nPraise his land, his craps, his nowte, his house, his garden, his\nGlenlivet, his everything; but tak care what ye say o\u2019 his dochter to\nhis face.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Laird has got a daughter, then, it seems?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, that he has, an\u2019 a comely quean she is; but he\u2019ll be a clever man\nwha can rin awa wi\u2019 her frae the Haugh. The Laird just dotes upon her,\nan\u2019 he wouldna pairt wi\u2019 her for love or siller. If she has a\nsweetheart, I\u2019m thinkin\u2019 he\u2019ll need to sook his thoomb, an\u2019 bide a wee.\u201d\n\nIn answer to my inquiries the landlord informed me that Miss Jessie\nRamsay was the Laird\u2019s only daughter, and that her mother had been dead\nfor several years. His information and anecdotes regarding the eccentric\ncharacter of the old-fashioned proprietor of the Haugh, excited my\ncuriosity so much that I resolved to pay him an early visit on the\nfollowing day. After sitting for an hour or two, during which time Mr\nBarlas became more and more loquacious, I seized the first favourable\nopportunity to propose an adjournment, and receiving the reluctant\nassent of mine host, I retired to rest, and slept soundly in spite of\nall the crowing cocks of St Dunstan.\n\nIn the morning the tidings were through the whole village that a new\ndoctor had come, and several people became suddenly unwell, for the\nexpress purpose, I presume, of testing my skill. Three urgent cases I\nfound to be ordinary headache, and, fearing lest my trip to the Haugh\nmight be delayed for two weeks, I hired the best hack the Cross-Keys\ncould afford, and made off for the domicile of the eccentric Laird. The\nowner of the hack was very anxious to accompany me, but I preferred\nmaking the excursion alone. The weather was mild and delightful; the\ntrees seemed lovelier in decay than in the fulness of summer life; and\nthe Tweed flowed and murmured softly as the waters of Siloah.\nHalf-an-hour\u2019s riding brought me to the Haugh\u2014an ancient edifice\nembosomed among trees. In the prime of its youth it would doubtless be\nconsidered a splendid mansion; but in its old age it had an ungainly\nappearance, although not altogether destitute of a certain picturesque\nair. After disposing of my hack to a little Jack-of-all-work urchin, who\nwas looking about for some work to do, or meditating mischief, I knocked\nat the door, and was ushered, by an old serving-woman, into a quaint\napartment, crammed with antique furniture. The mantelpiece absolutely\ngroaned under its load of ornaments, while a great spreading plume of\npeacock\u2019s feathers waved triumphantly over all. This must be the Laird\u2019s\nfancy, I thought, and not the taste of Miss Jessie. Several pictures\nillustrative of fox-hunting, and two portraits, adorned the walls. None\nof them could be considered as belonging to any particular school, or as\nmasterpieces in art. On the window-blinds a besieging force was\nrepresented as assaulting a not very formidable castle.\n\nWhile I sat amusing myself with the oddities of the apartment, the door\nopened, and the Laird entered. He was a gray-haired, ruddy-faced,\nshrewd-looking man of fifty or thereabouts. I was rather taken with his\ndress. He wore a blue coat of antique cut, knee breeches, long brown\ngaiters with metal buttons, and his vest was beautified with\nperpendicular yellow stripes. There was an air of dignity about him when\nhe entered as though he were conscious that he was Laird of the Haugh,\nand that I had come to consult him about some important business. Being\na Justice of the Peace, as I afterwards learned, he probably wished to\nimpress a stranger with a sense of his official greatness. I did not\nknow very well whether to address him as Mr Ramsay or the \u201cLaird;\u201d but\nhe relieved me of the difficulty by saying in broad Scotch, \u201cThis is a\ngrand day, sir; hae ye ridden far?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d I replied, \u201conly from St Dunstan.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust that\u2014just that,\u201d said the Laird, with a peculiar tone. \u201cI thocht\nas much when I met the callant leadin\u2019 awa the Cross-Key\u2019s charger,\u2014puir\nbeast!\u201d\n\nI handed the Laird the letter of introduction which I had received from\none of the medical professors in Edinburgh. He read it very slowly, as\nthough he were spelling and weighing every word, and he had perused it\ntwice from beginning to end before he rose and welcomed me to the Haugh.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s a clever man, that professor,\u201d quoth Laird Ramsay; \u201can\u2019 he speaks\no\u2019 ye, doctor, in a flattering way; but the proof o\u2019 the puddin\u2019 is the\npreein\u2019 o\u2019t, ye ken. Ye\u2019ve shown some spunk in comin\u2019 sae quick to St\nDunstan; but ye\u2019re young eneuch to be on your ain coat-tail yet.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe must begin somewhere and sometime, Mr Ramsay,\u201d I rejoined.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re richt there,\u201d answered the Laird; and then added with a chuckle,\n\u201cbut patients dinna like to be made victims o\u2019. However, we\u2019ll think\naboot that. Ye\u2019ll be nane the worse o\u2019 something to eat and drink, I\u2019m\nthinkin\u2019; an\u2019 to tell the truth, I want to weet my ain whistle.\u201d\n\nSo saying, the Laird o\u2019 the Haugh rose and rang the bell, and told the\nold serving-woman, the handmaiden of the household, to bid Jessie speak\nto him. In a short time Jessie, a tall, handsome, hearty,\nfresh-coloured, black-haired beauty, came tripping into the room. The\nLaird was not very ceremonious so far as the matter of introduction was\nconcerned, but Jessie was one of those frank girls who can introduce\nthemselves, and make you feel perfectly at home at once. The father and\ndaughter were evidently strongly attached to each other.\n\n\u201cBring us some wine first, like a gude lass,\u201d said the Laird, \u201can\u2019 then\nwe\u2019ll tak something mair substantial when ye\u2019re ready.\u201d\n\nJessie, like a dutiful daughter, placed the decanters and glasses on the\ntable. There was an elasticity in her step, a grace in her every motion,\nand an irresistible charm in her frank and affectionate smile. The Laird\ndid not seem altogether to relish the manner in which my eyes\ninvoluntarily followed her movements; and remembering what mine host of\nthe Cross-Keys had told me on the previous night, I resolved to be as\ncircumspect as possible, both in look and word. The Laird o\u2019 the Haugh\npledged the young doctor, and the young doctor pledged the Laird.\nMeanwhile, Jessie had disappeared to look after the substantials. A\nglass or two of his capital wine warmed Laird Ramsay into a fine\nconversational mood, and we got on famously together. After dinner, when\nthe punch was produced, our intimacy increased, and I began to love the\neccentric Laird for the sake of his beautiful and accomplished daughter.\nI discovered that he had a hearty relish for humorous stories and\nanecdotes, and I plied him with them in thick succession, until the\nfountain of laughter ran over in tears. I was determined to take the old\ngentleman by storm, and Miss Jessie, with quick feminine instinct,\nappeared to be more than half aware of my object. However, I carefully\nabstained from exciting his suspicion by conversing directly with\nJessie, even when he appeared to be in the most genial and pleasant\nmood.\n\nThe evening was pretty far advanced when I left his hospitable board.\n\u201cMind, you\u2019re to be the doctor o\u2019 St Dunstan,\u201d he said, as I mounted the\nCross-Key\u2019s charger. \u201cWe\u2019ll hae naebody but yoursel, an\u2019 ye mun be sure\nan\u2019 come back soon again to the Haugh.\u201d I rode home to mine inn fully\nresolved to locate myself in the village, and firmly persuaded that if I\nhad not captivated the Laird\u2019s daughter, I had at least conquered the\nLaird himself.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\u201cWeel, doctor, is it a\u2019 richt wi\u2019 the Laird?\u201d inquired Mr Barlas when I\nreturned to the Cross-Keys.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d I rejoined, \u201cit\u2019s all right. Laird Ramsay is now my warmest and\nstaunchest supporter, and a most companionable old gentleman he is.\u201d\n\n\u201cI never heard the like o\u2019 that,\u201d said the landlord, lifting up his\neyebrows in astonishment. \u201c\u2019Od, doctor, ye\u2019re jist like that auld Roman\nreiver, C\u00e6sar, wha gaed aboot seein\u2019 and conquerin\u2019. Ye hae a clear\ncoast noo, when ye hae gotten the gudewill o\u2019 the Laird and the\nminister. An\u2019 what think ye o\u2019 the dochter? Isna she a comely lass, Miss\nRamsay?\u201d\n\n\u201cShe is, indeed, Mr Barlas,\u201d I replied. \u201cThe young lady seems to do her\nbest to make her father feel happy and comfortable, and I have no doubt\nthat many \u2018braw wooers\u2019 will frequently find their way to the Haugh.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, doctor, na. As I tell\u2019t ye afore, the Laird is unco fond o\u2019 Miss\nJessie, an\u2019 I dinna believe he would pairt wi\u2019 her to the best man i\u2019\nthe kintra-side. But ye hae sic an uncommon power o\u2019 comin\u2019 roond folk\nthat I wouldna wonner to see ye tryin\u2019t yersel.\u201d\n\n\u201cStranger things have happened, Mr Barlas,\u201d I rejoined. \u201cMeantime, my\nmind is made up to settle down in St Dunstan. I like the place and the\npeople, the Eildon Hills, the Tweed, and Laird Ramsay.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo to speak o\u2019 his dochter,\u201d interjected mine host with a knowing look.\n\n\u201cBut where,\u201d I continued, \u201cam I to take up my quarters?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe needna put yersel in a peck o\u2019 troubles aboot that, doctor. There\u2019s\nDr Sommerville\u2019s cottage just waitin\u2019 for ye alang the road a bit. It\u2019s\na commodious hoose, wi\u2019 trees roond it an\u2019 a bonny garden at the back,\nslopin\u2019 to the south. Dr Sommerville was fond o\u2019 flowers, an\u2019 I never\nsaw a pleasanter place than it was in simmer. But the fac\u2019 is, ye\u2019ll hae\nto tak it, doctor, because there\u2019s no anither hoose to let in the hale\ntoun.\u201d\n\n\u201cSuch being the case, Mr Barlas, there is no choice, and the matter is\nsettled.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust that\u2014just that,\u201d responded the worthy landlord, and then added,\nwith an eye to business, \u201cYe can mak the Cross-Keys yer hame till ye get\nthe cottage a\u2019 painted an\u2019 furnished to your mind.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo be it, Mr Barlas; and now that the house is settled, what about a\nhousekeeper? Was Dr Sommerville married?\u201d\n\n\u201cMarried? of course, he was married, an\u2019 had lots o\u2019 weans to the\nbargain. But just try yer hand wi\u2019 Miss Ramsay. I would like grand to\nsee ye at that game, doctor.\u201d\n\n\u201cNonsense,\u201d I rejoined. \u201cI do not want to steal the Laird\u2019s ewe-lamb,\nand break with him at the very commencement of my course. Is there no\nquiet, decent, honest body about St Dunstan who would make a good and\nactive housekeeper?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re a\u2019 honest an\u2019 decent thegither, except it be twa or three o\u2019\nthe canglin\u2019 mugger folk wha mend auld pans and break ane anither\u2019s\nheads. Let me see\u2014stop a wee\u2014ou, ay\u2014I have ye noo, doctor; there\u2019s Mrs\nJohnston\u2014a clean, thrifty, tidy woman o\u2019 forty or thereabouts; she\u2019ll\nfit ye to a T, an\u2019 keep yer hoose like a new leek. Her gudeman was an\nelder; but he took an inward trouble aboot a year syne, an\u2019 a\u2019 the skill\no\u2019 Doctor Sommerville couldna keep his life in when his time was come.\nI\u2019ll speak to Mrs Johnston the morn, so ye can keep yer mind easy aboot\na housekeeper.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re getting on famously, Mr Barlas. The house and housekeeper are\nboth disposed of. What next?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat next, doctor? The next thing, I\u2019m thinkin\u2019, \u2019ill be a horse. Folk\nwill be sendin\u2019 for ye post-haste to gang sax or seven miles awa, an\u2019 ye\ncanna get on without a beast. Are ye onything skeely in horseflesh?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d I replied, \u201cnot particularly. I would require to purchase a horse\nby proxy.\u201d\n\nThis reply appeared to give mine host considerable satisfaction. After a\nbrief pause he said, \u201cWeel, doctor, what think ye o\u2019 the beastie that\ntook ye to the Haugh the day? It\u2019s fine an\u2019 canny, an\u2019 free frae a\u2019 kind\no\u2019 pranks. It would never fling ye aff an\u2019 break your banes when ye were\ngaun to mend ither folk\u2019s bodies. It\u2019ll no cost ye muckle siller, and\nye\u2019ll get a capital bargain wi\u2019 the beast.\u201d\n\nI could not help smiling when the landlord detailed the excellent\nqualities of the Rosinante of the Cross-Keys\u2014the superb steed which\nexcited the compassion of Laird Ramsay.\n\n\u201cIt is an admirable animal, Mr Barlas,\u201d I replied, always careful to\navoid giving offence; \u201cbut the truth is, there is a friend of mine in\nEdinburgh who is great in horses, and who would never forgive me if I\ndid not permit him to make the selection and the purchase.\u201d\n\n\u201cVera weel, doctor\u2014vera well,\u201d rejoined the landlord, professing\ncontentment, although apparently somewhat chagrined. \u201cYe may get a\nstronger and mair speerity beast; but, tak my word for\u2019t, ye\u2019ll no get\nane to answer yer purpose better. It\u2019s an extraordinar\u2019 sensible animal,\nan\u2019 kens a\u2019 the roads aboot the kintra-side. In the darkest winter nicht\nye micht fling the bridle on its neck, and it would bring ye hame to St\nDunstan safe an\u2019 soond. Ye can tak anither thocht about it, doctor, an\u2019\nI mun awa an\u2019 gie the beast its supper.\u201d\n\nA few weeks after the above confab with the sagacious landlord of the\nCross-Keys, I was quietly domiciled in Oakbank Cottage, on the outskirts\nof St Dunstan, and had commenced the routine work of a medical\npractitioner. Mrs Johnston was duly installed as housekeeper; and a\ncapital riding-horse, which Mr Barlas was compelled to allow \u201cmicht do,\u201d\narrived from the metropolis. I liked my cottage very much. It stood\napart from the public road, and was quiet and secluded. Rows of poplar\ntrees surrounded the green, and flower pots in front, and a tall\nbeechen-hedge girdled on all sides the sloping garden in the rear. The\nhigh banks of the Tweed, adorned with many-tinted foliage, swept along\nclose at hand, and the strong deep gush of that noble river was borne\nabroad on every swell of wind. Oakbank Cottage was, in my estimation,\nthe sweetest residence in and around St Dunstan; and as I, like my\npredecessor, was fond of floriculture, I resolved to make the place look\nlike a little paradise when the spring and summer months came round\nagain. I was not long in getting into a good practice. There was not\nmuch opposition from other gentlemen in the district, and many miles I\nrode both by night and by day. It always vexed the heart of my worthy\nhousekeeper, Mrs Johnston, when a special messenger called me away to a\ndistance after nightfall, and there was no end to the instructions she\ngave me\u2014M.D. though I was\u2014about the best means of preventing sore\nthroats and rheumatisms. Mrs Johnston had never listened to the learned\nprelections of medical professors at any of our universities;\nnevertheless, like many other sensible and sedate women, in her own\nsphere of life, she had managed to pick up no inconsiderable amount of\nsound medical knowledge.\n\nI was soon on the best of terms with all the people of the village, for\nit will generally be found that while a clergyman has admirers and\ndetractors among his own hearers, a doctor who is gifted with a modicum\nof amiability can easily make himself a favourite with all classes. Of\ncourse, when any person dies, the friends of the deceased will not\nunfrequently declaim against the imperfection of the medical treatment;\nbut grumblings such as these are natural and pardonable, and fail to\nshake the general esteem in which the practitioner is held. The minister\nof the parish was a frequent visitor at Oakbank, and in order to\nstrengthen our good fellowship, I became a member of his congregation.\nHe was an upright and honest-hearted man, although somewhat too\npolemical for my taste. I used to think that he was in the habit of\nairing his argumentative speeches in my presence before he delivered\nhimself of them at Presbytery meetings.\n\nNone of the people in the district seemed better satisfied than Laird\nRamsay o\u2019 the Haugh that I had located myself in St Dunstan. He called\none day at Oakbank, soon after my settlement, just as I was preparing to\nset out on a rural ride. The Laird was attired in the ordinary dress\nwhich he wore at the Haugh. The brown hat, the blue antique coat, the\nknee-breeches, the long gaiters, and the yellow-striped vest, seemed to\nform a part of his eccentric character.\n\n\u201cGude day t\u2019ye, Dr Wilson\u2014gude day,\u201d said the Laird, as he shook me by\nthe hand. \u201cWhat way hae ye been sae lang in comin\u2019 ower my way? I\u2019m\nwearyin\u2019 sair to get anither firlot o\u2019 yon queer humoursome stories oot\no\u2019 ye. Can ye come ower to the Haugh the morn, and tak a bit check o\u2019\ndinner wi\u2019 some freends that I\u2019m just on the road to inveet to meet you,\ndoctor?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt will afford me much pleasure, Mr Ramsay.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s richt\u2014that\u2019s richt. Gie a\u2019 yer patients a double dram o\u2019\nmedicine the day, an\u2019 that\u2019ll save ye trouble the morn. I\u2019ll no deteen\nye langer i\u2019 the noo, since I see ye\u2019re for takin\u2019 the road. Man,\ndoctor, that\u2019s a capital horse ye\u2019ve gotten. I\u2019ll try ye a steeplechase\nsome day, auld as I am.\u201d\n\nNext day I did not forget to mount my horse, which I had christened\nPrince Charlie, and ride over to the Haugh. It was more the desire to\nmeet again the handsome and black-haired Jessie, than the expectation of\na good dinner,\u2014in which the laird was said to excel,\u2014that made me keep\nmy appointment with scrupulous care, although two or three of my distant\npatients thereby missed an expected visit. I found a goodly company\nassembled in the Laird\u2019s old-fashioned mansion. Several neighbouring\nlairds with their wives were present, my excellent friend the minister\nof the parish, and some of the \u201cchief men\u201d of St Dunstan. A few young\nladies graced the company; but it struck me as something singular that I\nwas the only young gentleman who had been honoured with an invitation.\nDoes the Laird really think, I asked myself, that he will keep away the\ndangerous disease of love from his charming daughter\u2019s heart by\nexcluding chivalrous youths from his dinner-table? What intense\nselfishness there may be in the warmest paternal affection! Nor was\nselfishness altogether absent from my own heart. I began to feel a kind\nof secret satisfaction that the coast was clear, and that undivided\nattentions could be given and received. Jessie was all smiles, grace,\nand beauty; and before dinner was finished, I was more than charmed\u2014I\nwas bewitched with her manners and conversation. When the ladies retired\nfrom table I endeavoured, as on the former occasion, to keep the Laird\no\u2019 the Haugh in good humour, being now determined, for a particular\nreason, to rise rather than fall in his estimation. When the minister\nintroduced polemics I flung out a shower of puns; when oxen became the\ntopic I spiced the talk with some racy stories. The ruse succeeded.\nBetween the strong waters and the stories, Laird Ramsay was elevated\ninto a hilarious region, and he would have forgiven his worst enemy on\nthe spot. He was not aware that I was playing with him and upon him for\na purpose. When my stock was getting exhausted I started the minister on\nhis everlasting expedition to Rome, and managed, at the commencement of\nhis narrative, to escape from table unperceived. I was not particularly\nanxious to \u201cjoin the ladies;\u201d but I was excessively desirous to have, if\npossible, some private conversation with Jessie Ramsay. There could be\nno denying the fact that I\u2014the young medical practitioner of St\nDunstan\u2014had fallen in love, how or why it boots not to inquire, with the\nbeautiful daughter of the Laird o\u2019 the Haugh. I felt it through every\nvein of my body, and every fibre of my heart, and I fondly imagined from\nsundry stealthy glances and sweet suggestive smiles that the dear\ncreature had perceived and reciprocated my attachment. The golden\nsilence of love is the highest eloquence, and the most entrancing song.\nAs good luck and favouring fortune would have it, I had no sooner left\nthe dining-hall than the object of my adoration came tripping down\nstairs alone. In looking over the drawing-room window a rich flower from\nher lustrous hair had fallen to the ground, and the lovely creature was\nnow hastening to secure the lost treasure. Here was an opportunity\nlittle anticipated, but long remembered. It was impossible that I could\nbe so ungallant as allow her to search for the fallen flower by herself,\nand we therefore went out into the open air together. There was no moon,\nbut the stars were shining full and brilliant in the firmament. Tall\nholly bushes and other shrubs surrounded the house within the outer\ncircle of trees. The only two sounds I distinctly heard were the beating\nof my heart, and the humming sound of the minister\u2019s voice as he\nnarrated the incidents of his pilgrimage to the Eternal City. I blessed\nthe good man for his unconscious kindness in granting me this\nopportunity. Jessie and I proceeded to the place where the flower was\nsupposed to be. I saw it at once, and she saw it at once; but both of us\npretended that we had not seen it, and so the sweet search continued.\nNeed I describe, O amiable reader! how in searching and stooping I felt\nthe touch of her ringleted hair, the warmth of her breath, the delicate\nsoftness of her cheek, and imbibed the honey-balm of her lips? At last\nthe flower was found,\u2014I blessed it unaware,\u2014and, under the starlight,\nreplaced it on that lovely head from which it had not been untimely\nplucked, but had most opportunely fallen.\n\nWe returned to the house undiscovered. The Laird, I knew, was in that\npleased and placid state when he could have listened for many hours to\nthe Man of the Moon describing the incidents of his celestial travels\nand the wonders he had seen from his specular tower. I parted with\nJessie at the foot of the staircase, pressed her soft warm hand, and\nre-entered the room which I had rather unceremoniously left. The\nminister had got upon the Pope, and all the symptoms of \u201ctired nature\u201d\nwere apparent on the faces of most of the listeners. They had the look\nof a congregation when the thirteenth \u201chead\u201d is being propounded with\ndue deliberation from the pulpit. The Laird had not seen me depart, but\nhe saw me enter. He evidently placed in me the most implicit reliance,\nand there was no suspicion in his look.\n\n\u201cHae ye been snuffin\u2019 the caller air, doctor?\u201d he inquired.\n\nI answered in the affirmative with a look of perfect innocence, and then\nthe Laird added, wishing apparently to cut short the minister\u2019s\nharangue, \u201cAy, weel, let\u2019s join the leddies noo.\u201d\n\nAfter that evening I was a frequent and welcome visitor at the Haugh.\nPrince Charlie soon knew the way to his own stall in the Laird\u2019s\nstables. Some golden opportunities occurred when the Laird was absent\nfor interviews and conversations with Jessie. We plighted our mutual\ntroth, and were devoted to each other heart and soul. The one grand\ndifficulty in the way of our happiness was the removal of the Laird\u2019s\nscruples with regard to the marriage of his daughter. At last, when\njogging leisurely homeward to Oakbank one evening, I hit upon a scheme\nwhich ultimately resulted in complete success, and gave me possession of\nthe being whom I loved dearer than life.\n\nA wealthy and winsome widow lady resided in the neighbourhood of St\nDunstan, and the project entered my brain to make her believe that Laird\nRamsay had some notions of her, and also to make him believe that she\nhad a warm side of her heart to him. If I could only get the Laird to\nmarry the widow, I knew that Jessie would soon thereafter be mine. The\nLaird was open to flattery; he was fond of what Mr Barlas called\n\u201cbutter;\u201d and I did not despair of being able to make him renew his\nyouth. Tact was required in such a delicate undertaking, and I resolved\nto do my spiriting gently. I began with the Laird first one evening when\nhe was in his mellow after-dinner state. I praised the graces and\nwinsome ways of Mrs Mackinlay, and drew from the Laird the confession\nthat he thought her a \u201cvery gude and sociable-like leddy.\u201d I then tried\na few dexterous passes before hinting that she had a warm side to the\nLaird o\u2019 the Haugh.\n\n\u201cYe dinna mean to say that Mrs Mackinlay is castin\u2019 a sheep\u2019s e\u2019e at me,\ndo ye, doctor?\u201d\n\n\u201cI can assure you, Mr Ramsay,\u201d I rejoined, \u201cthat she speaks of you\nalways with great respect, and seems to wonder why you do not honour her\nwith a visit occasionally.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, doctor, it\u2019s queer what way I never thocht o\u2019 that. She\u2019s a\nsensible leddy after a\u2019, Mrs Mackinlay. I think I could do worse than\nlook ower at her hoose some o\u2019 these days.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s the very thing you ought to do, Mr Ramsay,\u201d I replied. \u201cYou will\nfind her company highly entertaining. She has an accumulated fund of\nstories and anecdotes.\u201d\n\n\u201cHas she, doctor?\u2014has she? Weel, I\u2019ll gang; but what would Jessie say, I\nwunner?\u201d\n\nI had now put the Laird on the right scent, and I tried my best also\nwith Mrs Mackinlay. I made her aware of the Laird\u2019s intended visit, and\nhinted tenderly its probable object. After a lengthened conversation, in\nwhich I exercised all the ingenuity I possessed, I left her with the\nimpression on my mind that Laird Ramsay\u2019s addresses when he called would\nbe met half-way. The meeting did take place\u2014it was followed by another\nand another\u2014and the upshot of the matter was that the eccentric Laird\nand the wealthy widow were duly wedded, to the astonishment of the whole\ndistrict. I allowed six months of their wedded bliss to slip past before\nI asked the Laird\u2019s consent to have Jessie removed from the Haugh to\nOakbank. A sort of dim suspicion of the whole affair seemed to cross the\nLaird\u2019s mind when I addressed him. A pawky twinkle lit up his eye as he\nreplied, \u201cAh, ye rogue!\u2014tak her, an\u2019 my blessin\u2019 alang wi\u2019 her. Ye ken\nwhaur to look for a gude wife, an\u2019 I daursay ye\u2019ll no mak the warst o\u2019\ngudemen.\u201d Thus I won the Laird\u2019s daughter, and the paradise of Oakbank,\nin the village of St Dunstan, was complete in happiness.\n\n\n\n\n MOSS-SIDE.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nGilbert Ainslie was a poor man; and he had been a poor man all the days\nof his life, which were not few, for his thin hair was now waxing gray.\nHe had been born and bred on the small moorland farm which he now\noccupied; and he hoped to die there, as his father and grandfather had\ndone before him, leaving a family just above the more bitter wants of\nthis world. Labour, hard and unremitting, had been his lot in life; but,\nalthough sometimes severely tried, he had never repined; and through all\nthe mist and gloom, and even the storms that had assailed him, he had\nlived on from year to year in that calm and resigned contentment which\nunconsciously cheers the hearthstone of the blameless poor. With his own\nhands he had ploughed, sowed, and reaped his often scanty harvest,\nassisted, as they grew up, by three sons, who, even in boyhood, were\nhappy to work along with their father in the fields. Out of doors or in,\nGilbert Ainslie was never idle. The spade, the shears, the ploughshaft,\nthe sickle, and the flail, all came readily to hands that grasped them\nwell; and not a morsel of food was eaten under his roof, or a garment\nworn there, that was not honestly, severely, nobly earned. Gilbert\nAinslie was a slave, but it was for them he loved with a sober and deep\naffection. The thraldom under which he lived God had imposed, and it\nonly served to give his character a shade of silent gravity, but not\naustere; to make his smiles fewer, but more heartfelt; to calm his soul\nat grace before and after meals, and to kindle it in morning and evening\nprayer.\n\nThere is no need to tell the character of the wife of such a man. Meek\nand thoughtful, yet gladsome and gay withal, her heaven was in her\nhouse; and her gentler and weaker hands helped to bar the door against\nwant. Of ten children that had been born to them, they had lost three;\nand as they had fed, clothed, and educated them respectably, so did they\ngive them who died a respectable funeral. The living did not grudge to\ngive up, for a while, some of their daily comforts for the sake of the\ndead; and bought, with the little sums which their industry had saved,\ndecent mournings, worn on Sabbath, and then carefully laid by. Of the\nseven that survived, two sons and a daughter were farm-servants in the\nneighbourhood, while two daughters and two sons remained at home,\ngrowing, or grown up, a small, happy, hard-working household.\n\nMany cottages are there in Scotland like Moss-side, and many such humble\nand virtuous cottagers as were now beneath its roof of straw. The eye of\nthe passing traveller may mark them, or mark them not, but they stand\npeacefully in thousands over all the land; and most beautiful do they\nmake it, through all its wide valleys and narrow glens\u2014its low holms,\nencircled by the rocky walls of some bonny burn\u2014its green mounts, elated\nwith their little crowning groves of plane-trees\u2014its yellow\ncorn-fields\u2014its bare pastoral hill-sides, and all its heathy moors, on\nwhose black bosom lie shining or concealed glades of excessive verdure,\ninhabited by flowers, and visited only by the farflying bees. Moss-side\nwas not beautiful to a careless or hasty eye; but, when looked on and\nsurveyed, it seemed a pleasant dwelling. Its roof, overgrown with grass\nand moss, was almost as green as the ground out of which its\nweather-stained walls appeared to grow. The moss behind it was separated\nfrom a little garden, by a narrow slip of arable land, the dark colour\nof which showed that it had been won from the wild by patient industry,\nand by patient industry retained. It required a bright sunny day to make\nMoss-side fair, but then it was fair indeed; and when the little brown\nmoorland birds were singing their short songs among the rushes and the\nheather, or a lark, perhaps lured thither by some green barley-field for\nits undisturbed nest, rose ringing all over the enlivened solitude, the\nlittle bleak farm smiled like the paradise of poverty, sad and affecting\nin its lone and extreme simplicity. The boys and girls had made some\nplots of flowers among the vegetables that the little garden supplied\nfor their homely meals; pinks and carnations, brought from walled\ngardens of rich men farther down in the cultivated strath, grew here\nwith somewhat diminished lustre; a bright show of tulips had a strange\nbeauty in the midst of that moorland; and the smell of roses mixed well\nwith that of the clover, the beautiful fair clover that loves the soil\nand the air of Scotland, and gives the rich and balmy milk to the poor\nman\u2019s lips.\n\nIn this cottage, Gilbert\u2019s youngest child, a girl about nine years of\nage, had been lying for a week in a fever. It was now Saturday evening,\nand the ninth day of the disease. Was she to live or die? It seemed as\nif a very few hours were between the innocent creature and heaven. All\nthe symptoms were those of approaching death. The parents knew well the\nchange that comes over the human face, whether it be in infancy, youth,\nor prime, just before the departure of the spirit; and as they stood\ntogether by Margaret\u2019s bed, it seemed to them that the fatal shadow had\nfallen upon her features. The surgeon of the parish lived some miles\ndistant, but they expected him now every moment, and many a wistful look\nwas directed by tearful eyes along the moor. The daughter who was out at\nservice came anxiously home on this night, the only one that could be\nallowed her; for the poor must work in their grief, and servants must do\ntheir duty to those whose bread they eat, even when nature is sick\u2014sick\nat heart. Another of the daughters came in from the potato-field beyond\nthe brae, with what was to be their frugal supper. The calm, noiseless\nspirit of life was in and around the house, while death seemed dealing\nwith one who, a few days ago, was like light upon the floor, and the\nsound of music, that always breathed up when most wanted; glad and\njoyous in common talk\u2014sweet, silvery, and mournful, when it joined in\nhymn or psalm. One after the other, they all continued going up to the\nbedside, and then coming away sobbing or silent, to see their merry\nlittle sister, who used to keep dancing all day like a butterfly in a\nmeadowfield, or, like a butterfly with shut wings on a flower, trifling\nfor a while in the silence of her joy, now tossing restlessly on her\nbed, and scarcely sensible to the words of endearment whispered around\nher, or the kisses dropped with tears, in spite of themselves, on her\nburning forehead.\n\nUtter poverty often kills the affections; but a deep, constant, and\ncommon feeling of this world\u2019s hardships, and an equal participation in\nall those struggles by which they may be softened, unite husband and\nwife, parents and children, brothers and sisters, in thoughtful and\nsubdued tenderness, making them happy indeed, while the circle round the\nfire is unbroken, and yet preparing them every day to bear the\nseparation, when some one or other is taken slowly or suddenly away.\nTheir souls are not moved by fits and starts, although, indeed, nature\nsometimes will wrestle with necessity; and there is a wise moderation\nboth in the joy and the grief of the intelligent poor, which keeps\nlasting trouble away from their earthly lot, and prepares them silently\nand unconsciously for heaven.\n\n\u201cDo you think the child is dying?\u201d said Gilbert, with a calm voice, to\nthe surgeon, who, on his wearied horse, had just arrived from another\nsick-bed, over the misty range of hills, and had been looking\nsteadfastly for some minutes on the little patient. The humane man knew\nthe family well, in the midst of whom he was standing, and replied,\n\u201cWhile there is life there is hope; but my pretty little Margaret is, I\nfear, in the last extremity.\u201d There was no loud lamentation at these\nwords; all had before known, though they would not confess it to\nthemselves, what they now were told; and though the certainty that was\nin the words of the skilful man made their hearts beat for a little with\nsicker throbbings, made their pale faces paler, and brought out from\nsome eyes a greater gush of tears, yet death had been before in this\nhouse, and in this case he came, as he always does, in awe, but not in\nterror. There were wandering and wavering and dreamy delirious fantasies\nin the brain of the innocent child; but the few words she indistinctly\nuttered were affecting, not rending to the heart, for it was plain that\nshe thought herself herding her sheep in the green silent pastures, and\nsitting wrapped in her plaid upon the lown and sunny side of the\nBirk-knowe. She was too much exhausted\u2014there was too little life, too\nlittle breath in her heart\u2014to frame a tune; but some of her words seemed\nto be from favourite old songs; and at last her mother wept, and turned\naside her face, when the child, whose blue eyes were shut, and her lips\nalmost still, breathed out these lines of the beautiful twenty-third\nPsalm:\u2014\n\n The Lord\u2019s my shepherd, I\u2019ll not want.\n He makes me down to lie\n In pastures green: He leadeth me\n The quiet waters by.\n\nThe child was now left with none but her mother by the bedside, for it\nwas said to be best so; and Gilbert and his family sat down round the\nkitchen fire, for a while, in silence. In about a quarter of an hour,\nthey began to rise calmly, and to go each to his allotted work. One of\nthe daughters went forth with the pail to milk the cow, and another\nbegan to set out the table in the middle of the floor for supper,\ncovering it with a white cloth. Gilbert viewed the usual household\narrangements with a solemn and untroubled eye; and there was almost the\nfaint light of a grateful smile on his cheek, as he said to the worthy\nsurgeon, \u201cYou will partake of our fare, after your day\u2019s travel and toil\nof humanity?\u201d In a short silent half-hour, the potatoes and oat-cakes,\nbutter and milk, were on the board; and Gilbert, lifting up his\ntoil-hardened but manly hand, with a slow motion, at which the room was\nas hushed as if it had been empty, closed his eyes in reverence, and\nasked a blessing. There was a little stool, on which no one sat, by the\nold man\u2019s side. It had been put there unwittingly, when the other seats\nwere all placed in their usual order; but the golden head that was wont\nto rise at that part of the table was now wanting. There was silence\u2014not\na word was said\u2014their meal was before them\u2014God had been thanked, and\nthey began to eat.\n\nWhile they were at their silent meal a horseman came galloping to the\ndoor, and, with a loud voice, called out that he had been sent express\nwith a letter to Gilbert Ainslie; at the same time rudely, and with an\noath, demanding a dram for his trouble. The eldest son, a lad of\neighteen, fiercely seized the bridle of his horse, and turned its head\naway from the door. The rider, somewhat alarmed at the flushed face of\nthe powerful stripling, threw down the letter and rode off. Gilbert took\nthe letter from his son\u2019s hand, casting, at the same time, a\nhalf-upbraiding look on his face, that was returning to its former\ncolour. \u201cI feared,\u201d\u2014said the youth, with a tear in his eye,\u2014\u201cI feared\nthat the brute\u2019s voice, and the trampling of the horse\u2019s feet, would\nhave disturbed her.\u201d Gilbert held the letter hesitatingly in his hand,\nas if afraid at that moment to read it; at length he said aloud to the\nsurgeon:\u2014\u201cYou know that I am a poor man, and debt, if justly incurred,\nand punctually paid when due, is no dishonour.\u201d Both his hand and his\nvoice shook slightly as he spoke; but he opened the letter from the\nlawyer, and read it in silence. At this moment his wife came from her\nchild\u2019s bedside, and, looking anxiously at her husband, told him \u201cnot to\nmind about the money, that no man who knew him would arrest his goods,\nor put him into prison. Though, dear me, it is cruel to be put to thus,\nwhen our bairn is dying, and when, if so it be the Lord\u2019s will, she\nshould have a decent burial, poor innocent, like them that went before\nher.\u201d Gilbert continued reading the letter with a face on which no\nemotion could be discovered; and then, folding it up, he gave it to his\nwife, told her she might read it if she chose, and then put it into his\ndesk in the room, beside the poor dear bairn. She took it from him,\nwithout reading it, and crushed it into her bosom: for she turned her\near towards her child, and thinking she heard it stir, ran out hastily\nto its bedside.\n\nAnother hour of trial passed, and the child was still swimming for its\nlife. The very dogs knew there was grief in the house, and lay without\nstirring, as if hiding themselves, below the long table at the window.\nOne sister sat with an unfinished gown on her knees, that she had been\nsewing for the dear child, and still continued at the hopeless work, she\nscarcely knew why; and often, often putting up her hand to wipe away a\ntear. \u201cWhat is that?\u201d said the old man to his eldest daughter. \u201cWhat is\nthat you are laying on the shelf?\u201d She could scarcely reply that it was\na riband and an ivory comb that she had brought for little Margaret,\nagainst the night of the dancing-school ball. And at these words the\nfather could not restrain a long, deep, and bitter groan; at which the\nboy, nearest in age to his dying sister, looked up weeping in his face;\nand, letting the tattered book of old ballads, which he had been poring\non, but not reading, fall out of his hands, he rose from his seat, and,\ngoing into his father\u2019s bosom, kissed him, and asked God to bless him:\nfor the holy heart of the boy was moved within him; and the old man, as\nhe embraced him, felt that, in his innocence and simplicity, he was\nindeed a comforter. \u201cThe Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away,\u201d said\nthe old man; \u201cblessed be the name of the Lord!\u201d\n\nThe outer door gently opened, and he whose presence had in former years\nbrought peace and resignation hither, when their hearts had been tried\neven as they now were tried, stood before them. On the night before the\nSabbath, the minister of Auchindown never left his manse, except, as\nnow, to visit the sick or dying bed. Scarcely could Gilbert reply to his\nfirst question about his child, when the surgeon came from the bedroom,\nand said\u2014\u201cMargaret seems lifted up by God\u2019s hand above death and the\ngrave: I think she will recover. She has fallen asleep; and, when she\nwakes, I hope\u2014I\u2014believe\u2014that the danger will be past, and that your\nchild will live.\u201d\n\nThey were all prepared for death; but now they were found unprepared for\nlife. One wept that had till then locked up all her tears within her\nheart; another gave a short palpitating shriek; and the tender-hearted\nIsobel, who had nursed the child when it was a baby, fainted away. The\nyoungest brother gave way to gladsome smiles; and calling out his dog\nHector, who used to sport with him and his little sister on the moor, he\ntold the tidings to the dumb irrational creature, whose eyes, it is\ncertain, sparkled with a sort of joy. The clock for some days had been\nprevented from striking the hours; but the silent fingers pointed to the\nhour of nine; and that, in the cottage of Gilbert Ainslie, was the\nstated hour of family worship. His own honoured minister took the Book,\u2014\n\n He waled a portion with judicious care,\n And, \u201cLet us worship God,\u201d he said, with solemn air.\n\nA chapter was read\u2014a prayer said; and so, too, was sung a psalm; but it\nwas sung low, and with suppressed voices, lest the child\u2019s saving sleep\nmight be broken; and now and then the female voices trembled, or some\none of them ceased altogether; for there had been tribulation and\nanguish, and now hope and faith were tried in the joy of thanksgiving.\n\nThe child still slept; and its sleep seemed more sound and deep. It\nappeared almost certain that the crisis was over, and that the flower\nwas not to fade. \u201cChildren,\u201d said Gilbert, \u201cour happiness is in the love\nwe bear to one another; and our duty is in submitting to and serving\nGod. Gracious, indeed, has He been unto us. Is not the recovery of our\nlittle darling, dancing, singing Margaret, worth all the gold that ever\nwas mined? If we had had thousands of thousands, would we not have\nfilled up her grave with the worthless dross of gold, rather than that\nshe should have gone down there with her sweet face and all her rosy\nsmiles?\u201d There was no reply, but a joyful sobbing all over the room.\n\n\u201cNever mind the letter, nor the debt, father,\u201d said the eldest daughter.\n\u201cWe have all some little thing of our own,\u2014a few pounds,\u2014and we shall be\nable to raise as much as will keep arrest and prison at a distance. Or\nif they do take our furniture out of the house, all except Margaret\u2019s\nbed, who cares? We will sleep on the floor; and there are potatoes in\nthe field, and clear water in the spring. We need fear nothing, want\nnothing; blessed be God for all His mercies!\u201d\n\nGilbert went into the sick-room, and got the letter from his wife, who\nwas sitting at the head of the bed, watching, with a heart blessed\nbeyond all bliss, the calm and regular breathings of her child. \u201cThis\nletter,\u201d said he, mildly, \u201cis not from a hard creditor. Come with me\nwhile I read it aloud to our children.\u201d The letter was read aloud, and\nit was well fitted to diffuse pleasure and satisfaction through the\ndwelling of poverty. It was from an executor to the will of a distant\nrelative, who had left Gilbert Ainslie \u00a31500.\n\n\u201cThe sum,\u201d said Gilbert, \u201cis a large one to folks like us, but not, I\nhope, large enough to turn our heads, or make us think ourselves all\nlords and ladies. It will do more, far more, than put me fairly above\nthe world at last. I believe that, with it, I may buy this very farm, on\nwhich my forefathers have toiled. But God, whose providence has sent\nthis temporal blessing, may He send us wisdom and prudence how to use\nit, and humble and grateful hearts to us all.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou will be able to send me to school all the year round now, father,\u201d\nsaid the youngest boy. \u201cAnd you may leave the flail to your sons, now,\nfather,\u201d said the eldest. \u201cYou may hold the plough still, for you draw a\nstraighter furrow than any of us; but hard work for young sinews; and\nyou may sit now oftener in your arm-chair by the ingle. You will not\nneed to rise now in the dark, cold, and snowy winter mornings, and keep\nthreshing corn in the barn for hours by candlelight, before the late\ndawning.\u201d\n\nThere was silence, gladness, and sorrow, and but little sleep in\nMoss-side, between the rising and the setting of the stars, that were\nnow out in thousands, clear, bright, and sparkling over the unclouded\nsky. Those who had lain down for an hour or two in bed could scarcely be\nsaid to have slept; and when about morning little Margaret awoke, an\naltered creature, pale, languid, and unable to turn herself on her lowly\nbed, but with meaning in her eyes, memory in her mind, affection in her\nheart, and coolness in all her veins, a happy group were watching the\nfirst faint smile that broke over her features; and never did one who\nstood there forget that Sabbath morning on which she seemed to look\nround upon them all with a gaze of fair and sweet bewilderment, like one\nhalf conscious of having been rescued from the power of the grave.\n\n\n\n\n MY FIRST FEE.\n\n A CHAPTER FROM THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN ADVOCATE.\n\n \u201cFee him, father, fee him.\u201d\n\n\nSeven long yearning years had elapsed since, with the budding\nanticipation of youthful hope, I had assumed the lugubrious insignia of\nthe bar. During that dreadful time, each morn, as old St Giles told the\nhour of nine, might I be seen insinuating my emaciated figure within the\npenetralia of the Parliament House, where, begowned and bewigged, and\nwith the zeal of a Powell or a Barclay, I paced about till two. These\nperipatetic practices had well-nigh ruined me in Wellingtons, and\nlatterly in shoes. My little Erskine was in pawn; while my tailor and my\nlandlady threw out unmistakable and ominous hints regarding their long\nbills and longer credit. I dared not understand them, but consoled\nmyself with the thought, that the day would come when my tailor would\ncease his dunning, and my landlady her clamour.\n\nI had gone the different circuits, worn and torn my gown, seated myself\nin awful contemplation on the side benches, maintained angry argument on\nlegal points with some more favoured brother, within earshot of a wily\nwriter. In fine, I had resorted to every means that fancy could suggest,\nor experience dictate; but as yet my eyes had not seen, nor my pocket\nfelt\u2014a Fee. Alas! this was denied. I might be said to be, as yet, no\nbarrister: for what is a lawyer without a fee? A nonentity! a shadow! To\nmy grief, I seemed to be fast verging to the latter; and I doubt much\nwhether the \u201cAnatomie vivant\u201d could have stood the comparison\u2014so much\nhad my feeless fast fed on my flesh!\n\nI cannot divine the reason for this neglect of my legal services. In my\nown heart, I had vainly imagined the sufficiency of my tact and subtlety\nin unravelling a nice point; neither had I been wanting in attention to\nmy studies; for Heaven and my landlady can bear witness, that my\nconsumption of coal and candle would have sufficed any two ordinary\nreaders. There was not a book or treatise on law which I had not dived\ninto. I was insatiable in literature; but the world and the writers\nseemed ignorant of my brain be-labouring system, and sedulously\ndetermined that my _fee-ling_ propensities should not be gratified.\n\nNever did I meet an agent either in or out of Court, but my heart and\nhand felt a pleasing glow of hope and of joy at the prospect of\npocketing a fee; but how often have they turned their backs without even\nthe mortifying allusion to such a catastrophe! How often have I turned\nround in whirling ecstacy as I felt some seemingly patronising palm tap\ngently on my shoulders with such a tap as writers\u2019 clerks are wont to\nuse; but oh, ye gods! a grinning wretch merely asked me how I did, and\npassed on!\n\nNor were my non-legal friends more kind. There was an old gentleman,\nwho, I knew (for I made it my business to enquire), had some thoughts of\na law-plea. From him I received an invitation to dinner. Joyfully, as at\nall times, but more so on this occasion, was the summons obeyed. I had\nlaid a train to introduce the subject of his wrongs at a time which\nmight _suit_ best, and with this plan I commenced my machinations. The\nold fox was too cunning even for me; he too had his plot, and had hit\nupon the expedient of obtaining my opinion without a fee\u2014the skinflint!\nLong and doubtful was the contest; hint succeeded hint, question after\nquestion was put, till at last my entertainer was victorious, and I\nretired crestfallen and feeless from the field! By the soul of Erskine,\nhad it not been for his dinners, I should have cut him for ever! Still I\ngrubbed with this one, cultivated an acquaintance with that, but all to\nno purpose; no one pitied my position. My torments were those of the\nlost! Hope (not the President) alone buoyed me up; visions of future\nsovereigns, numerous as those which appeared to Banquo of old, but of a\nbetter and more useful kind, flitted before my charmed imagination.\nPride, poverty, and starvation pushed me on. What! said I, shall it be\nhinted that I am likely neither to have a fee nor a feed? Tell it not in\nthe First Division; publish it not in the Outer House! All my thoughts\nwere riveted to one object\u2014to one object all my endeavours were bent,\nand to accomplish this seemed the ultimatum of bliss.\n\nOften have I looked with envy upon the more favoured candidates for\njudicial fame\u2014those who never return to their domicile or their dinner,\nbut to find their tables groaning with briefs! How different from my\ncase! My case? What case? I have no case! Not one fee to work its own\ndesolateness! Months and months passed on, still success came not! The\nhoped-for event came not; resolution died within me; I formed serious\nintentions of being even with the profession. As the profession had cut\nme, I intended to have cut the profession. In my wants, I would have\nrobbed, but my hand was withheld by the thought that the jesters of the\nstove might taunt me thus: \u201cHe could not live, so he died, by the law.\u201d\nI have often thought that there is a great similarity between the\nhangman and the want of a fee; the one is the finisher of the law, the\nother of lawyers!\n\nPondering on my griefs, with my feet on the expiring embers of a seacoal\nfire, the chair in that swinging position so much practised and approved\nin Yankee-land,\u2014the seat destined for a clerk occupied by my cat, for I\nlove everything of the _fe-line_ species,\u2014my cogitations were disturbed\nby an application for admittance at the outer door. It was not the\nrat-tat of the postman, nor the rising and falling attack of the man of\nfashion, but a compound of both, which evidently bespoke the knockee\nunaccustomed to town. I am somewhat curious in knocks; I admire the true\nprinciples of the art, by which one may distinguish the peer from the\npostman\u2014the dun from the dilettante\u2014the footman from the furnisher. But\nthere was something in this knock which baffled all my skill; yet sweet\nwithal, thrilling through my heart with a joy unfelt before. Some spirit\nmust have presided in the sound, for it seemed to me the music of the\nspheres.\n\nA short time elapsed, and my landlady \u201copened wide the infernal doors.\u201d\nNow hope cut capers\u2014(Lazenby, thou wert not to blame, for of thy\ndelicacies I dared not even dream!)\u2014now hope cut capers within me! Heavy\nfootsteps were heard in the passage, and one of the lords of the\ncreation marched his calves into the apartment. With alacrity, I\nconveyed my _corpus juris_ to meet him, and, with all civility, I\nrequested him to be seated. My landlady with her apron dusted the\narm-chair (I purchased it at a sale of Lord M\u2014\u2014\u2019s _effects_, not\n_causes_,\u2014expecting to catch inspiration). In this said chair my man\nensconced his clay.\n\nI had commenced my survey of his person, when my eyes were attracted by\na basilisk-like bunch of papers which the good soul held in his hand. In\necstasy I gazed\u2014characters were marked on them which could not be\nmistaken; a less keen glance than mine might have discovered their\nimport. My joy was now beyond all bounds, testifying itself by sundry\nkickings and contortions of the body. I began to fear the worthy man\nmight think me mad, and repent him of his errand; I calmed myself, and\nsat down. My guest thrust into my hands the papers, and then proceeded\nto issue letters of open doors against his dexter pocket. His intentions\nwere evident; with difficulty could I restrain myself. For some minutes\nhe \u201cgroped about the vast abyss,\u201d during which time my agitation\nincreased so much that I could not have answered one question, even out\nof that favourite chapter of one of our institutional writers, \u201cOn the\nInstitution of Fees.\u201d But let me describe the man to whom I owe so much.\n\nHe was a short, squat, farmer-looking being, who might have rented some\nfifty acres or so. Though stinted in his growth upwards, Dame Nature\nseemed determined to make him amends by an increase of dimension in\nevery other direction. His nose and face spoke volumes\u2014ay, libraries\u2014of\npunch and ale; these potations had also made themselves manifested lower\ndown, by the magnitude of the _belli-gerent_ powers. There was in his\nface a cunning leer, in his figure a knowing _tournure_, which was still\nfurther heightened by his dress; this consisted of a green coat, which\ngave evident signs of its utter incapability of ever being identified\nwith Stultz; cords and continuations encased the lower parts of his\ncarcase; a belcher his throat; while the whole was surmounted by a\ncastor of the most preposterous breadth of brim, and shallow capacity.\nBut in this man\u2019s appearance there was something that pleased me;\nsomething of a nature superior to other mortals. I might have been\nprejudiced, but his face and figure seemed to me more beautiful than\nmorning.\n\nNever did I gaze with a more complacent benevolence on a\nbreeches-pocket. At last he succeeded in dragging from its depths a huge\nold stocking, through which \u201cthe yellow-lettered Geordie\u2019s keeked.\u201d With\nwhat raptures did I look on that old stocking, the produce, I presumed,\nof the stocking of his farm. It seemed to possess the power of\nfascination, for my eyes could not quit it. Even when my client (for now\nI calculated upon him) began to speak, my attention still wandered to\nthe stocking. He told me of a dispute with his landlord about some\nmatters relating to his farm, that he was wronged, and would have the\nlaw of the laird, though he should spend his last shilling (here I\nlooked with increased raptures at the stocking). On the recommendation\nof the minister (good man!), he had sought me for advice. He then opened\nwide the jaws of his homely purse\u2014he inserted his paw\u2014now my heart\nbeat\u2014he made a jingling noise\u2014my heart beat quicker still\u2014he pulled\nforth his two interesting fingers\u2014oh, ecstasy! he pressed five guineas\ninto my extended hand\u2014they touched the virgin palm, and oh, ye gods! I\nwas FEE\u2019D!!!\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Journal._\n\n\n\n\n THE KIRK OF TULLIBODY.\n\n\nThe parish of Tullibody, in Clackmannanshire, now united with Alloa,\nwas, before the Reformation, an independent ecclesiastical district. The\nmanner in which it lost its separate character is curious. In the year\n1559, when Monsieur D\u2019Oysel commanded the French troops on the coast of\nFife, they were alarmed by the arrival of the English fleet, and thought\nof nothing but a hasty retreat. It was in the month of January, and at\nthe breaking of a great storm. William Kirkaldy of Grange, commander of\nthe congregational forces, attentive to the circumstances in which his\nenemies were caught, took advantage of this situation, and marched with\ngreat expedition towards Stirling, and cut the bridge of Tullibody,\nwhich was over the Devon, to prevent their retreat. By this man\u0153uvre,\nthe French found themselves completely enclosed. They were driven to an\nextremity which obliged them to resort to an extraordinary expedient to\neffect their escape. They lifted the roof off the church of Tullibody,\nand laid it along the broken part of the bridge, by which means they\neffected a safe retreat to Stirling.\n\nSuch a dilapidation of the church caused the Tullibodians to proceed to\nthe adjacent kirk of Alloa, and in a short time the parish ceased to be\nindependent. The burying-ground round the ancient place of worship, now\nrepaired, still remains; and on the north side of it, where there had\nbeen formerly an entry, there is a stone coffin, with a niche for the\nhead, and two for the arms, covered with a thick hollowed lid like a\ntureen. The lid is a good deal broken, but a curious tradition is\npreserved of the coffin. It is related that in early times a young lady\nof the neighbourhood had declared her affection for the minister, who,\neither from his station or want of inclination, made no returns. So\nvexed was the lady on perceiving his indifference, that, in a short\nwhile, she sickened, and at last died of grief. While on her deathbed,\nshe left it as her last request, that she should not be buried in the\nearth, but that her body should be placed in a stone coffin, and laid at\nthe entry to the church; which was done, and to this day, the stone\nretains the name of the \u201cMaiden\u2019s Stone.\u201d\u2014_Chambers\u2019 Edinburgh Journal_,\n1832.\n\n\n\n\n THE PROGRESS OF INCONSTANCY;\n _OR_, _THE SCOTS TUTOR_.\n\n \u201cSweet, tender sex! with snares encompassed round,\n On others hang thy comforts and thy rest.\u201d\u2014HOGG.\n\n\nNature has made woman weak, that she might receive with gratitude the\nprotection of man. Yet how often is this appointment perverted! How\noften does her protector become her oppressor! Even custom seems leagued\nagainst her. Born with the tenderest feelings, her whole life is\ncommonly a struggle to suppress them. Placed in the most favourable\ncircumstances, her choice is confined to a few objects; and unless where\nsingularly fortunate, her fondest partialities are only a modification\nof gratitude. She may reject, but cannot invite: may tell what would\nmake her wretched, but dare not even whisper what would make her happy;\nand, in a word, exercises merely a negative influence upon the most\nimportant event of her life. Man has leisure to look around him, and may\nmarry at any age, with almost equal advantage; but woman must improve\nthe fleeting moment, and determine quickly, at the hazard of determining\nrashly. The spring-time of her beauty will not last; its wane will be\nthe signal for the flight of her lovers; and if the present opportunity\nis neglected, she may be left to experience the only species of\nmisfortune for which the world evinces no sympathy. How cruel, then, to\nincrease the misery of her natural dependence! How ungenerous to add\ntreachery to strength, and deceive or disappoint those whose highest\nambition is our favour, and whose only safety is our honesty!\n\nWilliam Arbuthnot was born in a remote county of Scotland, where his\nfather rented a few acres of land, which his own industry had reclaimed\nfrom the greatest wildness to a state of considerable fertility. Having\ngiven, even in his first attempts at learning, those indications of a\nretentive memory, which the partiality of a parent easily construes into\na proof of genius, he was early destined for the Scottish Church, and\nregarded as a philosopher before he had emerged from the nursery. While\nhis father pleased himself with the prospect of seeing his name\nassociated with the future greatness of his son, his mother, whose\nambition took a narrower range, thought she could die contented if she\nshould see him seated in the pulpit of his native church; and perhaps,\nfrom a pardonable piece of vanity, speculated as frequently upon the\neffect his appearance would have upon the hearts of the neighbouring\ndaughters, as his discourses upon the minds of their mothers. This\npractice, so common among the poorer classes in Scotland, of making one\nof their children a scholar, to the prejudice, as is alleged, of the\nrest, has been often remarked, and sometimes severely censured. But\nprobably the objections that have been urged against it, derive their\nchief force from the exaggerations upon which they are commonly founded.\nIt is not in general true that parents, by bestowing the rudiments of a\nliberal education upon one of the family, materially injure the\ncondition or prospects of the rest. For it must be remembered that the\nplebeian student is soon left to trust to his own exertions for support,\nand, like the monitor of a Lancastrian seminary, unites the characters\nof pupil and master, and teaches and is taught by turns.\n\nBut to proceed with our little narrative. The parish schoolmaster having\nintimated to the parents of his pupil, that the period was at hand when\nhe should be sent to prosecute his studies at the university, the usual\npreparations were made for his journey, and his departure was fixed for\nthe following day, when he was to proceed to Edinburgh under escort of\nthe village carrier and his black dog C\u00e6sar, two of the eldest and most\nintimate of his acquaintance. Goldsmith\u2019s poetical maxim, that little\nthings are great to little men, is universally true; and this was an\neventful day for the family of Belhervie, for that was the name of the\nresidence of Mr Arbuthnot. The father was as profuse of his admonitions\nas the mother was of her tears, and had a stranger beheld the afflicted\ngroup, he would have naturally imagined that they were bewailing some\nsignal calamity, in place of welcoming an event to which they had long\nlooked forward with pleasure. But the feelings of affectionate regret,\noccasioned by this separation, were most seasonably suspended by the\nreceipt of a letter from Mr Coventry, a respectable farmer in the\nneighbourhood, in which that gentleman offered to engage their son for a\nfew years, as a companion and tutor to his children. This was an offer\nwhich his parents were too prudent to reject, particularly as it might\nprove the means of future patronage as well as of present emolument. It\nwas therefore immediately agreed upon, that William should himself be\nthe bearer of their letter of acceptance, and proceed forthwith to his\nnew residence. On this occasion he was admonished anew; but the advices\nwere different from those formerly given, and were delivered by a\ndifferent person. His mother was now the principal speaker; and, instead\nof warning him against the snares that are laid for youth in a great\ncity, she furnished him with some rude lessons on the principles of\ngood-breeding, descending to a number of particulars too minute to be\nenumerated here. William listened to her harangue with becoming\nreverence and attention, and on the following morning, for the first\ntime, bade farewell to his affectionate parents.\n\nOn the afternoon of the same day, he arrived at Daisybank, where he was\nwelcomed with the greatest cordiality. His appearance was genteel and\nprepossessing, and it was not long before his new friends discovered,\nthat the slight degree of awkwardness which at first clung to his\nmanners, proceeded more from bashfulness and embarrassment than natural\nrusticity. But as he began to feel himself at home, this embarrassment\nof manner gradually gave place to an easy but unobtrusive politeness.\nIndeed it would not have been easy for a youth of similar views, at his\nfirst outset in life, to have fallen into more desirable company. Mr and\nMrs Coventry were proverbial among their neighbours for the simplicity\nand purity of their manners, and they had laboured, not unsuccessfully,\nto stamp a similar character upon the minds of their children. Their\nfamily consisted of two sons and two daughters, the former of whom were\nconfided to the care of William.\n\nMary, the eldest of the four, now in her sixteenth or seventeenth year,\nwas in every respect the most interesting object at Daisybank. To a mind\nhighly cultivated for her years, she united many of those personal\ngraces and attractions which command little homage in the crowd, but\nopen upon us in the shade of retirement, and lend to the domestic circle\nits most irresistible charms. In stature she scarcely reached the middle\nsize. To the beauty derived from form and colour she had few\npretensions; yet when her fine blue eyes moistened with a tear at a tale\nof distress, or beamed an unaffected welcome to the stranger or the\nfriend, he must have been more or less than man who felt not for her a\nsentiment superior to admiration. Hers, in a word, was the beauty of\nexpression\u2014the beauty of a mind reflected, in which the dullest disciple\nof Lavater could not for a moment have mistaken her real character. Her\neducation had been principally conducted under the eye of her parents,\nand might be termed domestic rather than fashionable. Not that she was\nentirely a stranger to those acquirements which are deemed indispensable\nin modern education. She had visited occasionally the great metropolis,\nthough, owing to the prudent solicitude of her parents, her residence\nthere had been comparatively short, yet probably long enough to acquire\nall its useful or elegant accomplishments, without any admixture of its\nfashionable frivolities.\n\nFrom this hasty portraiture of Miss Coventry, it will be easily believed\nthat it was next to impossible for a youth nearly of the same age, and\nnot dissimilar in his dispositions, to remain long insensible to charms\nthat were gradually maturing before his eyes, and becoming every day\nmore remarkable. Fortunately, however, the idea of dependence attached\nto his situation, and a temper naturally diffident determined him to\nrenounce for ever a hope which he feared in his present circumstances\nwould be deemed ungrateful and even presumptuous. But this was waging\nwar with nature, a task which he soon found to be above his strength. He\nhad now, therefore, to abandon the hope of victory for the safety of\nretreat, and content himself with concealing those sentiments he found\nit impossible to subdue. Yet so deceitful is love, that even this modest\nhope was followed with disappointment. One fine evening in June, when he\nwas about to unbend from the duties of the day, and retire to muse on\nthe amiable Mary, he encountered the fair wanderer herself, who was\nprobably returning from a similar errand. He accosted her in evident\nconfusion; and, without being conscious of what he said, invited her to\njoin him in a walk to a neighbouring height. His request was complied\nwith in the same spirit it had been made in, for embarrassment is often\ncontagious, particularly the embarrassment arising from love. On this\noccasion he intended to summon up all his powers of conversation, and\nyet his companion had never found him so silent. Some commonplace\ncompliments to the beauty of the evening were almost the only\nobservations which escaped his lips, and these he uttered more in the\nmanner of a sleep-walker than a lover. They soon reached the limit of\ntheir walk, and rested upon an eminence that commanded the prospect of\nan extensive valley below. Day was fast declining to that point which is\ntermed twilight, when the whole irrational creation seem preparing for\nrest, and only man dares to intrude upon the silence of nature. Miss\nCoventry beheld the approach of night with some uneasiness, and dreading\nto be seen with William alone, she began to rally him upon his apparent\nabsence and confusion, and proposed that they should immediately return\nto the house. At mention of this, William started as from a dream, and\nbeing unable longer to command his feelings, he candidly confessed to\nher the cause of his absence and dejection. He dwelt with much emotion\nupon his own demerit, and voluntarily accused himself for the\npresumption of a hope which he never meant to have revealed until the\nnearer accomplishment of his views had rendered it less imprudent and\nromantic. He declared that he would sooner submit to any hardship that\nincur the displeasure of her excellent parents, and entreated that,\nwhatever were her sentiments with regard to the suit he was so\npresumptuous as to prefer, she might assist him in concealing from them\na circumstance which he feared would be attended with that consequence.\nTo this tender and affectionate appeal, the gentle Mary could only\nanswer with her sighs and blushes. She often indeed attempted to speak,\nbut the words as often died upon her lips, and they had nearly reached\nhome before she could even whisper an answer to the reiterated question\nof her lover. But she did answer at last; and never was a monarch more\nproud of his conquest, or the homage of tributary princes, than William\nwas of the simple fealty of the heart of Mary.\n\nIn the bosom of this happy family William now found his hours glide away\nso agreeably that he looked forward with real regret to the termination\nof his engagement. His condition was perhaps one of those in which the\nnearest approach is made to perfect happiness; when the youthful mind,\nunseduced by the blandishments of ambition, confines its regards to a\nfew favourite objects, and dreads a separation from them as the greatest\nof evils. The contrast between the patriarchal simplicity of his\nfather\u2019s fireside, and the comparative elegance of Mr Coventry\u2019s\nparlour, for a season dazzled him with its novelty; while the ripening\ngraces of Mary threw around him a fascination which older and more\nunsusceptible minds than his might have found it difficult to resist. In\nhis domestic establishment Mr Coventry aimed at nothing beyond comfort\nand gentility. William was therefore treated in every respect as an\nequal, and was never banished from his patron\u2019s table to make room for a\nmore important guest, or condemned to hold Lent over a solitary meal,\nwhile the family were celebrating a holiday.\n\nAll our ideas are relative, and we estimate every thing by comparison.\nUpon this principle, William thought no female so lovely or amiable as\nMiss Coventry, and no residence so delightful as Daisybank. And he would\nnot have exchanged his feelings, while seated on a winter evening amidst\nhis favourite circle, scanning, for their amusement, a page of history,\nor the columns of a newspaper, while the snugness and comfort that\nreigned within made him forget the storm that pelted without, for the\nmost delicious paradise an eastern imagination ever painted.\n\nIt will thus readily be imagined, that the saddest day of our tutor\u2019s\nlife was that on which he parted from this amiable family. He had here,\nhe believed, spent the happiest moments of his existence, and instead of\nrejoicing that he had passed through one stage of his apprenticeship, he\ndwelt upon the past with pleasure, and looked forward to the future with\npain.\n\nFortune, however, presented an insuperable obstacle to his spending his\ndays in the inaction of private study; and he knew that he could neither\ngain, nor deserved to gain, the object of his affection, without\nestablishing himself in life, by pursuing the course which had been\noriginally chalked out to him. After, therefore, \u201cpledging oft to meet\nagain,\u201d he bade adieu to Daisybank, loaded with the blessings of the\nbest of parents, and followed with the prayers of the best of daughters.\nHe now paid a farewell visit to his own parents; and, after remaining\nwith them a few days, he proceeded to Edinburgh, and for a short period\nfelt his melancholy relieved, by the thousand novelties that attract the\nnotice of a stranger in a great city. But this was only a temporary\nrelief, and as he had no friend in whom he could confide, he soon felt\nhimself solitary in the midst of thousands. Often, when the Professor\nwas expatiating upon the force of the Greek particles, his imagination\nwas hovering over the abodes he had forsaken; and frequently it would\nhave been more difficult for him to have given an account of the\nlectures he had been attending, than to have calculated the probability\nof what was passing at a hundred miles\u2019 distance. But this absence and\ndejection at last wore off; and as he possessed good natural talents,\nand had been an industrious student formerly, he soon distinguished\nhimself in his classes, and before the usual period was engaged as a\ntutor in one of the best families in Scotland.\n\nThis event formed another important era in his life. His prospects were\nnow flattering; and as vanity did not fail to exaggerate them, he soon\ndropped a considerable portion of his humility, and began to regard\nhimself as a young man of merit, to whom fortune was lavish of her\nfavours. In his leisure hours he was disposed to mingle much in society,\nand, as his manners and address were easy and engaging, scarcely a week\nelapsed that that did not add to the number of his friends. The\naffections, when divided into many channels, cannot run deep in any,\nand, probably, for every new acquaintance whom William honoured with his\nesteem, it required a sacrifice of friendship at the expense of love,\nand produced some abatement of that devotion of soul which accompanies\nevery true and permanent attachment. At Daisybank he had seen a simple\nfavourite of the graces, but here he beheld the daughters of wealth and\nof fashion, surrounded with all the gloss of art, and soon began to\nwaver in his attachment, and even to regard his engagement as little\nmore than a youthful frolic. Still this temper of mind was not attained\nwithout many struggles between love and ambition, honour and interest;\nnor could he ever for a moment commune with himself, without feeling\nremorse for his inconstancy and ingratitude. He could not annihilate the\nconviction, that Miss Coventry was as faithful and worthy as ever, and\nhad she been present to appeal to his senses, it is probable he might\nhave been preserved from the crime of apostasy. But these were fits of\nreflection and repentance which repetition soon deprived of their\npoignancy. The world, the seductive world, returned with all its opiates\nand charms, to stifle in his bosom the feelings of honour, and\nobliterate every trace of returning tenderness. After this he became\nless punctual in his correspondence with Miss Coventry, and in place of\nanticipating the arrival of her letters, as he was wont to do, he\nallowed them to be sent slowly to his lodgings, opened them without\nanxiety, and read them without interest. Of all this inconstancy,\ningratitude, and neglect, the simple Mary remained a silent, though not\nunconcerned spectator. Kind and generous by nature, and judging of\nothers by herself, she framed a thousand excuses for his negligence; and\nwhen he did condescend to write to her, answered him as though she had\nbeen unconscious of any abatement in his attentions.\n\nMatters remained in this uncertain state for the space of three long\nyears\u2014at least they seemed long to Miss Coventry\u2014when William received\nhis licence as a preacher. He now therefore thought of redeeming a\npledge he had given to the minister of his native parish, to make his\nfirst public appearance in his pulpit; and after giving due intimation,\nhe departed for the parish of \u2014\u2014, with his best sermon in the pocket of\nhis best coat. The account of his visit spread with telegraphic\ndespatch, long before telegraphs were invented, and was known over half\nthe county many days before his arrival. This was another great and\neventful day for his mother. She blessed Providence that she had lived\nto see the near fulfilment of her most anxious wish, and rising a little\nin her ambition, thought she could now die contented, if she should see\nhim settled in a living of his own, and be greeted by her neighbours\nwith the envied name of grandmother.\u2014As William was expected to dine\nwith his parents on his way to the parsonage, or, as it is called in\nScotland, the manse, of \u2014\u2014, great preparations were made for his\nreception, and for the appearance of the whole family at church on the\nfollowing Sunday. Mrs Arbuthnot drew from the family-chest her\nwedding-gown, which had only seen the sun twice during thirty summers;\nand her husband, for the first time, reluctantly applied a brush to his\nholiday suit, which appeared, from the antiquity of its fashion, to have\ndescended, like the garments of the Swiss, through many successive\ngenerations of the Arbuthnots.\n\nThe little church of H\u2014\u2014 was crowded to the door, perhaps for the first\ntime, long before the bellman had given the usual signal. Mr Coventry,\nthough residing in a different parish, had made a journey thither with\nseveral of his family, for the purpose of witnessing the first public\nappearance of his friend. In this party was the amiable Mary, who took a\ngreater interest in the event than any one, save the preacher, was aware\nof.\n\nWilliam, on this occasion, recited a well written discourse with ease\nand fluency, and impressed his audience with a high opinion of his\ntalents and piety. Some of the elder of them, indeed, objected to his\ngestures and pronunciation, which they thought \u201cnew fangled\u201d and\ntheatrical; but they all agreed in thinking him a clever lad, and a\ngreat honour to his parents. His mother was now overwhelmed with\ncompliments and congratulations from all quarters, which she received\nwith visible marks of pride and emotion. Mr Coventry waited in the\nchurchyard till the congregation had retired, to salute his friend, and\ninvite him to spend a few days at Daisybank. Mary, who hung on her\nfather\u2019s arm, curtsied, blushed, and looked down. She had no well-turned\ncompliment to offer on the occasion, but her eyes expressed something at\nparting, which once would have been sweeter to his soul than the\napplause of all the world beside.\n\nAmbition, from the beginning, has been the bane of love. War and peace\nare not more opposite in their nature and effects than those rival\npassions, and the bosom that is agitated with the cares of the one has\nlittle relish for the gentle joys of the other. William beheld in the\nperson of Miss Coventry all he had been taught to regard as amiable or\nestimable in woman; but the recollection of the respect that had been\nshown him by females of distinction, mixed with exaggerated notions of\nhis own merit, made him undervalue those simple unobtrusive graces he\nonce valued so highly, and think almost any conquest easy after he had\nbeen settled in the rich living of B\u2014\u2014, which had been promised him by\nhis patron.\n\nOn the following day he paid a visit to Daisybank, and received the most\ncordial welcome from a family who sympathised almost equally with his\nparents in his prospects and advancement. During his stay there, he had\nfrequent opportunities of seeing Miss Coventry alone, but he neglected,\nor rather avoided them all; and when rallied on the subject of marriage,\ndeclaimed on the pleasures of celibacy, and hinted, with a good deal of\ninsincerity, his intention of living single. Although these speeches\nwere like daggers to the mind of her who regretted she could not rival\nhim in inconstancy and indifference, they produced no visible alteration\nin her behaviour. Hers was not one of those minds in which vanity\npredominates over every other feeling, and where disappointment is\ncommonly relieved by the hatred or resentment which it excites. Her soul\nwas soft as the passion that enslaved it, and the traces of early\naffection are not easily effaced from a mind into which the darker\npassions have never entered.\n\nWilliam bade adieu to Miss Coventry without dropping one word upon which\nshe could rear the superstructure of hope, and carried with him her\npeace of mind, as he had formerly carried with him her affections. From\nthat hour she became pensive and melancholy, in spite of all her efforts\nto appear cheerful and happy. She had rejected many lovers for the\ninconstant\u2019s sake, but that gave her no concern. Her union with him had\nbeen long the favourite object of her life, and she could have patiently\nresigned existence, now that its object was lost. But she shuddered at\nthe thought of the shock it would give her affectionate parents, for the\nsofter feelings of our nature are all of one family, and the tenderest\nwives have ever been the most dutiful daughters.\n\nIt was impossible for Mary long to conceal the sorrow which consumed\nher. Her fading cheeks and heavy eyes gave daily indications of what her\nlips refused to utter. Her parents became deeply alarmed at these\nsymptoms of indisposition, and anxiously and unceasingly inquired into\nthe cause of her illness; but her only answer was, that she felt no\npain. The best physicians were immediately consulted upon her case, who\nrecommended change of air and company; but all these remedies were tried\nwithout effect. The poison of disappointment had taken deep root in her\nheart, and defied the power of medicine.\n\nHer attendants, when they found all their prescriptions ineffectual,\nbegan to ascribe her malady to its real cause, and hinted to her parents\ntheir apprehensions that she had been crossed in love. The good people,\nthough greatly surprised at the suggestion, had too much prudence to\ntreat it with indifference, and they left no means untried, consistent\nwith a regard for the feelings of their child, to wile from her the\nimportant secret. At first she endeavoured to evade their inquiries; but\nfinding it impossible to allay their apprehensions without having\nrecourse to dissimulation, she confessed to her mother her attachment to\nWilliam, concealing only the promises he had made to her, and every\ncircumstance that imputed to him the slightest degree of blame. At the\nsame time she entreated them, with the greatest earnestness, that no use\nmight be made of a secret which she wished to have carried with her to\nthe grave. This was a hard task imposed upon her parents. They felt\nequally with herself the extreme delicacy of making the disclosure; but,\non the other hand, they contemplated nothing but the probable loss of\ntheir child; an event, the bare apprehension of which filled their minds\nwith the bitterest anguish. After many anxious consultations, Mr\nCoventry determined, unknown to any but his wife, to pay a visit to\nWilliam, and ascertain his sentiments with regard to his daughter.\n\nUpon his arrival at Edinburgh, he found that his friend had departed for\nthe manse of B\u2014\u2014, with which he had been recently presented. This event,\nwhich in other circumstances would have given him the liveliest\npleasure, awakened on this occasion emotions of a contrary nature, as he\nfeared it would make his now reverend friend more elevated in his\nnotions, and consequently more averse to a union with his daughter. He\ndid not, however, on that account conceal the real object of his\njourney, or endeavour to accomplish his purpose by stratagem or deceit.\nHe candidly disclosed his daughter\u2019s situation and sentiments,\nrequesting of his friend that he would open to him his mind with equal\ncandour; and added, that although he held wealth to be an improper\nmotive in marriage, and hoped that his daughter did not require such a\nrecommendation, in the event of this union, whatever he possessed would\nbe liberally shared with him.\n\nOn hearing of the situation of Miss Coventry, William became penetrated\nwith the deepest remorse; and being aware that his affection for her was\nrather stifled than estranged, he declared his willingness to make her\nhis wife. These words operated like a charm upon the drooping spirits of\nthe father, who embraced his friend with ardour, and besought him\nimmediately to accompany him home, that they might lose no time in\nmaking a communication, which he fondly hoped would have a similar\neffect upon the spirits of his daughter.\n\nThey departed accordingly together, indulging in the pleasing hope that\nall would yet be well; but on their arrival at Daisybank, they were\nseriously alarmed to hear that Miss Coventry had been considerably worse\nsince her father left home. She was now entirely confined to her\nchamber, and seemed to care for nothing so much as solitude, and an\nexemption from the trouble of talking. As soon as she was informed of\nthe arrival of their visitor, she suspected he had been sent for, and\ntherefore refused to see him; but upon being assured by her mother, who\nfound deceit in this instance indispensable, that his visit was\nvoluntary and accidental, she at last consented to give him an\ninterview.\n\nOn entering the room, which had formerly been the family parlour,\nWilliam was forcibly struck with the contrast it exhibited. Every object\nseemed to swim before his sight, and it was some moments before he\ndiscovered Miss Coventry, who reclined upon a sofa at the farther end of\nthe room. He advanced with a beating heart, and grasped the burning hand\nthat was extended to meet him. He pressed it to his lips and wept, and\nmuttered something incoherent of forgiveness and love. He looked\ndoubtingly on Mary\u2019s face for an answer,\u2014but her eye darted no reproach,\nand her lips uttered no reflection. A faint blush, that at this moment\noverspread her cheek, seemed a token of returning strength, and inspired\nhim with confidence and hope. It was the last effort of nature,\u2014and ere\nthe blood could return to its fountain, that fountain had closed for\never. Death approached his victim under the disguise of sleep, and\nappeared divested of his usual pains and terrors.\n\nWilliam retired from this scene of unutterable anguish, and for a long\nperiod was overwhelmed with the deepest melancholy and remorse. But time\ngradually softened and subdued his sorrow, and I trust perfected his\nrepentance. He is since married and wealthy, and is regarded by the\nworld as an individual eminently respectable and happy. But, amidst all\nhis comforts, there are moments when he would exchange his identity with\nthe meanest slave that breathes, and regards himself as the murderer of\nMary Coventry.\u2014_J. M\u2018D., in Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_, 1817.\n\n\n\n\n ADAM BELL.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\nThis tale, which may be depended on as in every part true, is singular,\nfrom the circumstance of its being insolvable, either from the facts\nthat have been discovered relating to it, or by reason; for though\nevents sometimes occur among mankind, which at the time seem\ninexplicable, yet there being always some individuals acquainted with\nthe primary causes of these events, they seldom fail of being brought to\nlight before all the actors in them, or their confidants, are removed\nfrom this state of existence. But the causes which produced the events\nhere related have never been accounted for in this world; even\nconjecture is left to wander in a labyrinth, unable to get hold of the\nthread that leads to the catastrophe.\n\nMr Bell was a gentleman of Annandale, in Dumfriesshire, in the south of\nScotland, and proprietor of a considerable estate in that district, part\nof which he occupied himself. He lost his father when he was an infant,\nand his mother dying when he was about 20 years of age, left him the\nsole proprietor of the estate, besides a large sum of money at interest,\nfor which he was indebted, in a great measure, to his mother\u2019s parsimony\nduring his minority. His person was tall, comely, and athletic, and his\nwhole delight was in warlike and violent exercises. He was the best\nhorseman and marksman in the county, and valued himself particularly\nupon his skill in the broad sword. Of this he often boasted aloud, and\nregretted that there was not one in the county whose skill was in some\ndegree equal to his own.\n\nIn the autumn of 1745, after being for several days busily and silently\nemployed in preparing for his journey, he left his own house, and went\nto Edinburgh, giving at the same time such directions to his servants as\nindicated his intention of being absent for some time.\n\nA few days after he had left his home, one morning, while his\nhousekeeper was putting the house in order for the day, her master, as\nshe thought, entered by the kitchen door, the other being bolted, and\npassed her in the middle of the floor. He was buttoned in his greatcoat,\nwhich was the same he had on when he went from home; he likewise had the\nsame hat on his head, and the same whip in his hand which he took with\nhim. At sight of him she uttered a shriek, but recovering her surprise,\ninstantly said to him, \u201cYou have not stayed so long from us, Sir.\u201d He\nmade no reply, but went sullenly into his own room, without throwing off\nhis greatcoat. After a pause of about five minutes, she followed him\ninto the room. He was standing at his desk with his back towards her.\nShe asked him if he wished to have a fire kindled, and afterwards if he\nwas well enough; but he still made no reply to any of these questions.\nShe was astonished, and returned into the kitchen. After tarrying about\nother five minutes, he went out at the front door, it being then open,\nand walked deliberately towards the bank of the river Kinnel, which was\ndeep and wooded, and in that he vanished from her sight. The woman ran\nout in the utmost consternation to acquaint the men who were servants\nbelonging to the house; and coming to one of the ploughmen, she told him\nthat their master was come home, and had certainly lost his reason, for\nthat he was wandering about the house and would not speak. The man\nloosed his horses from the plough and came home, listened to the woman\u2019s\nrelation, made her repeat it again and again, and then assured her that\nshe was raving, for their master\u2019s horse was not in the stable, and of\ncourse he could not be come home. However, as she persisted in her\nasseveration with every appearance of sincerity, he went into the linn\nto see what was become of his mysterious master. He was neither to be\nseen nor heard of in all the country. It was then concluded that the\nhousekeeper had seen an apparition, and that something had befallen\ntheir master; but on consulting with some old people, skilled in those\nmatters, they learned that when a \u201cwraith,\u201d or apparition of a living\nperson, appeared while the sun was up, instead of being a prelude of\ninstant death, it prognosticated very long life; and, moreover, that it\ncould not possibly be a ghost that she had seen, for they always chose\nthe night season for making their visits. In short, though it was the\ngeneral topic of conversation among the servants and the people in the\nvicinity, no reasonable conclusion could be formed on the subject.\n\nThe most probable conjecture was, that as Mr Bell was known to be so\nfond of arms, and had left his home on the very day that Prince Charles\nStuart and his Highlanders defeated General Hawley on Falkirk Muir, he\nhad gone either with him or the Duke of Cumberland to the north. It was,\nhowever, afterwards ascertained, that he had never joined any of the\narmies. Week passed after week, and month after month, but no word of Mr\nBell. A female cousin was his nearest living relation; her husband took\nthe management of his affairs; and concluding that he had either joined\nthe army, or drowned himself in the Kinnel, when he was seen go into the\nlinn, made no more inquiries after him.\n\nAbout this very time, a respectable farmer, whose surname was M\u2018Millan,\nand who resided in the neighbourhood of Musselburgh, happened to be in\nEdinburgh about some business. In the evening he called upon a friend\nwho lived near Holyrood-house; and being seized with an indisposition,\nthey persuaded him to tarry with them all night. About the middle of the\nnight he grew exceedingly ill, and not being able to find any rest or\nease in his bed, imagined he would be the better of a walk. He put on\nhis clothes, and, that he might not disturb the family, slipped quietly\nout at the back door, and walked in St Anthony\u2019s garden behind the\nhouse. The moon shone so bright, that it was almost as light as noonday,\nand he had scarcely taken a single turn, when he saw a tall man enter\nfrom the other side, buttoned in a drab-coloured greatcoat. It so\nhappened, that at that time M\u2018Millan stood in the shadow of the wall,\nand perceiving that the stranger did not observe him, a thought struck\nhim that it would not be amiss to keep himself concealed, that he might\nsee what the man was going to be about. He walked backwards and forwards\nfor some time in apparent impatience, looking at his watch every minute,\nuntil at length another man came in by the same way, buttoned likewise\nin a greatcoat, and having a bonnet on his head. He was remarkably stout\nmade, but considerably lower in stature than the other. They exchanged\nonly a single word; then turning both about, they threw off their coats,\ndrew their swords, and began a most desperate and well-contested combat.\n\nThe tall gentleman appeared to have the advantage. He constantly gained\nground on the other, and drove him half round the division of the garden\nin which they fought. Each of them strove to fight with his back towards\nthe moon, so that it might shine full in the face of his opponent; and\nmany rapid wheels were made for the purpose of gaining this position.\nThe engagement was long and obstinate, and by the desperate thrusts that\nwere frequently aimed on both sides, it was evident that they meant one\nanother\u2019s destruction. They came at length within a few yards of the\nplace where M\u2018Millan still stood concealed. They were both out of\nbreath, and at that instant a small cloud chancing to overshadow the\nmoon, one of them called out, \u201cHold, we cannot see.\u201d They uncovered\ntheir heads, wiped their faces, and as soon as the moon emerged from the\ncloud, each resumed his guard. Surely that was an awful pause! And\nshort, indeed, was the stage between it and eternity with the one! The\ntall gentleman made a lounge at the other, who parried and returned it;\nand as the former sprung back to avoid the thrust, his foot slipped, and\nhe stumbled forward towards his antagonist, who dexterously met his\nbreast in the fall with the point of his sword, and ran him through the\nbody. He made only one feeble convulsive struggle, as if attempting to\nrise, and expired almost instantaneously.\n\nM\u2018Millan was petrified with horror; but conceiving himself to be in a\nperilous situation, having stolen out of the house at that dead hour of\nthe night, he had so much presence of mind as to hold his peace, and to\nkeep from interfering in the smallest degree.\n\nThe surviving combatant wiped his sword with great composure;\u2014put on his\nbonnet, covered the body with one of the greatcoats, took up the other,\nand departed. M\u2018Millan returned quietly to his chamber without awakening\nany of the family. His pains were gone, but his mind was shocked and\nexceedingly perturbed; and after deliberating until morning, he\ndetermined to say nothing of the matter, and to make no living creature\nacquainted with what he had seen, thinking that suspicion would\ninfallibly rest on him. Accordingly, he kept his bed next morning, until\nhis friend brought him the tidings that a gentleman had been murdered at\nthe back of the house during the night. He then arose and examined the\nbody, which was that of a young man, seemingly from the country, having\nbrown hair, and fine manly features. He had neither letter, book, nor\nsignature of any kind about him that could in the least lead to a\ndiscovery of who he was; only a common silver watch was found in his\npocket, and an elegant sword was clasped in his cold bloody hand, which\nhad an A. and B. engraved on the hilt. The sword had entered at his\nbreast, and gone out at his back a little below the left shoulder. He\nhad likewise received a slight wound on the sword arm.\n\nThe body was carried to the dead-room, where it lay for eight days, and\nthough great numbers inspected it, yet none knew who or whence the\ndeceased was, and he was at length buried among the strangers in\nGrayfriars churchyard.\n\nSixteen years elapsed before M\u2018Millan mentioned to any person the\ncircumstance of his having seen the duel, but at that period, being in\nAnnandale receiving some sheep that he had bought, and chancing to hear\nof the astonishing circumstances of Bell\u2019s disappearance, he divulged\nthe whole. The time, the description of his person, his clothes, and\nabove all, the sword with the initials of his name engraved upon it,\nconfirmed the fact beyond the smallest shadow of doubt that it was Mr\nBell whom he had seen killed in the duel behind the Abbey. But who the\nperson was that slew him, how the quarrel commenced, or who it was that\nappeared to his housekeeper, remains to this day a profound secret, and\nis likely to remain so, until that day when every deed of darkness shall\nbe brought to light.\n\nSome have even ventured to blame McMillan for the whole, on account of\nhis long concealment of facts, and likewise in consideration of his\nuncommon bodily strength and daring disposition, he being one of the\nboldest and most enterprising men of the age in which he lived; but all\nwho knew him despised such insinuations, and declared them to be\nentirely inconsistent with his character, which was most honourable and\ndisinterested; and besides, his tale has every appearance of truth.\n\u201cPluris est oculatus testis unus quam auriti decem.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n MAUNS\u2019 STANE; OR, MINE HOST\u2019S TALE.\n\n\nIn the latter end of the autumn of \u2014\u2014, I set out by myself on an\nexcursion over the northern part of Scotland; and, during that time, my\nchief amusement was to observe the little changes of manners, language,\n&c., in the different districts. After having viewed, on my return, the\nprincipal curiosities in Buchan, I made a little alehouse, or \u201cpublic,\u201d\nmy head-quarters for the night. Having discussed my supper in solitude,\nI called up mine host to enable me to discuss my bottle, and to give me\na statistical account of the country around me. Seated in the \u201cblue\u201d\nend, and well supplied with the homely but satisfying luxuries which the\nplace afforded, I was in an excellent mood for enjoying the\ncommunicativeness of my landlord; and, after speaking about the cave at\nSlaines, the state of the crop, and the neighbouring franklins, edged\nhim, by degrees, to speak about the Abbey of Deer, an interesting ruin\nwhich I had examined in the course of the day, formerly the stronghold\nof the once powerful family of Cummin.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s dootless a bonny place about the Abbey,\u201d said he, \u201cbut naething\nlike what it was when the great Sir James the Rose cam to hide i\u2019 the\nBuchan woods, wi\u2019 a\u2019 the Grahames rampagin\u2019 at his tail, whilk you\nthat\u2019s a beuk learned man \u2019ill hae read o\u2019; an\u2019 maybe ye\u2019ll hae heard o\u2019\nthe saughen bush where he forgathered wi\u2019 his joe; or aiblins ye may\nhave seen\u2019t, for it\u2019s standing yet just at the corner o\u2019 gaukit Jamie\nJamieson\u2019s peat-stack. Ay, ay, the abbey was a brave place ance; but a\u2019\nthing, ye ken, comes till an end.\u201d So saying, he nodded to me, and\nbrought his glass to an end.\n\n\u201cThis place, then, must have been famed in days of yore, my friend?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe may tak my word for that,\u201d said he. \u201c\u2019Od, it _was_ a place! Sic a\nsight o\u2019 fechtin\u2019 as they had about it! But gin ye\u2019ll gang up the\ntrap-stair to the laft, an\u2019 open Jenny\u2019s kist, ye\u2019ll see sic a story\nabout it, prented by ane o\u2019 your learned Aberdeen\u2019s fouk, Maister Keith,\nI think; she coft it in Aberdeen for twal pennies, lang ago, an\u2019\nbattered it to the lid o\u2019 her kist. But gang up the stair canny, for\nfear that you should wauken her, puir thing;\u2014or, bide, I\u2019ll just wauken\nJamie Fleep, an\u2019 gar him help me down wi\u2019t, for our stair\u2019s no just that\ncanny for them \u2018t\u2019s no acquaint wi\u2019t, let alane a frail man wi\u2019 your\ninfirmity.\u201d\n\nI assured him that I would neither disturb the young lady\u2019s slumber, nor\nJamie Fleep\u2019s, and begged him to give me as much information as he could\nabout this castle.\n\n\u201cWeel, wishin\u2019 your gude health again.\u2014Our minister ance said, that\nSoloman\u2019s Temple was a\u2019 in ruins, wi\u2019 whin bushes, an\u2019 broom an\u2019\nthristles growin\u2019 ower the bonny carved wark an\u2019 the cedar wa\u2019s, just\nlike our ain Abbey. Noo, I judge that the Abbey o\u2019 Deer was just the\nmarrow o\u2019t, or the minister wadna hae said that. But when it was biggit,\nLord kens, for I dinna. It was just as you see it, lang afore your\nhonour was born; an\u2019 aiblins, as the by-word says, may be sae after\nye\u2019re hanged. But that\u2019s neither here nor there. The Cummins o\u2019 Buchan\nwere a dour and surly race; and, for a fearfu\u2019 time, nane near han\u2019 nor\nfar awa could ding them, an\u2019 yet mony a ane tried it. The fouk on their\nain lan\u2019 likit them weel enough; but the Crawfords, an\u2019 the Grahames,\nan\u2019 the Mars, an\u2019 the Lovats, were aye trying to comb them against the\nhair, an\u2019 mony a weary kempin\u2019 had they wi\u2019 them; but, some way or\nither, they could never ding them; an\u2019 fouk said that they gaed and\nlearned the black art frae the Pope o\u2019 Room, wha, I mysel heard the\nminister say, had aye a colleague wi\u2019 the Auld Chiel. I dinna ken fou it\nwas; in the tail o\u2019 the day, the hale country rase up against them, an\u2019\nbesieged them in the Abbey o\u2019 Deer. Ye\u2019ll see, my frien\u2019 [by this time\nmine host considered me as one of his cronies], tho\u2019 we ca\u2019 it the\nAbbey, it had naething to do wi\u2019 Papistry; na, na, no sae bad as a\u2019 that\neither, but just a noble\u2019s castle, where they keepit sodgers gaun about\nin airn an\u2019 scarlet, wi\u2019 their swords an\u2019 guns, an\u2019 begnets, an\u2019\nsentry-boxes, like the local militia in the barracks o\u2019 Aberdeen.\n\n\u201cWeel, ye see, they surrounded the castle, an\u2019 lang did they besiege it;\nbut there was a vast o\u2019 meat in the castle, an\u2019 the Buchan fouk fought\nlike the vera deil. They took their horse through a miscellaneous\npassage, half a mile long, aneath the hill o\u2019 Saplinbrae, an\u2019 watered\nthem in the burn o\u2019 Pulmer. But a\u2019 wadna do; they took the castle at\nlast, and a terrible slaughter they made amo\u2019 them; but they were sair\ndisappointed in ae partic\u2019ler, for Cummin\u2019s fouk sank a\u2019 their goud an\u2019\nsiller in a draw-wall, an\u2019 syne filled it up wi\u2019 stanes. They gat\nnaething in the way of spulzie to speak o\u2019; sae out o\u2019 spite they dang\ndoon the castle, an\u2019 it\u2019s never been biggit to this day. But the Cummins\nwere no sae bad as the Lairds o\u2019 Federat, after a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd who were these Federats?\u201d I inquired.\n\n\u201cThe Lairds o\u2019 Federat?\u201d said he, moistening his mouth again as a\npreamble to his oration. \u201cTroth, frae their deeds, ane would maist think\nthat they had a drap o\u2019 the deil\u2019s blude, like the pyets. Gin a\u2019 tales\nbe true, they hae the warmest place at his bink this vera minute. I\ndinna ken vera muckle about them, though, but the auldest fouk said they\nwere just byous wi\u2019 cruelty. Mony a gude man did they hing up i\u2019 their\nha\u2019, just for their ain sport; ye\u2019ll see the ring to the fore yet in the\nroof o\u2019t. Did ye ever hear o\u2019 Mauns\u2019 Stane, neebour?\u201d\n\n\u201cMauns\u2019 what?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cOu, Mauns\u2019 Stane. But it\u2019s no likely. Ye see it was just a queer clump\no\u2019 a roun\u2019-about heathen, waghtin\u2019 maybe twa tons or thereby. It wasna\nlike ony o\u2019 the stanes in our countra, an\u2019 it was as roun\u2019 as a fit-ba\u2019;\nI\u2019m sure it wad ding Professor Couplan himsel to tell what way it cam\nthere. Noo, fouk aye thought there was something uncanny about it, an\u2019\nsome gaed the length o\u2019 saying, that the deil used to bake ginshbread\nupon\u2019t; and, as sure as ye\u2019re sitting there, frien\u2019, there was\nknuckle-marks upon\u2019t, for my ain father has seen them as aften as I have\ntaes an\u2019 fingers. Aweel, ye see, Mauns Crawford, the last o\u2019 the Lairds\no\u2019 Federat, an\u2019 the deil had coost out (maybe because the Laird was just\nas wicked an\u2019 as clever as he was himsel), an\u2019 ye perceive the evil ane\nwantit to play him a trick. Noo, Mauns Crawford was ae day lookin\u2019 ower\nhis castle wa\u2019, and he saw a stalwart carl, in black claes, ridin\u2019 up\nthe loanin\u2019. He stopped at this chuckie o\u2019 a stane, an\u2019, loutin\u2019 himsel,\nhe took it up in his arms, and lifted it three times to his saddle-bow,\nan\u2019 syne he rade awa out o\u2019 sight, never comin\u2019 near the castle, as\nMauns thought he would hae done. \u2018Noo,\u2019 says the baron till himsel, says\nhe, \u2018I didna think that there was ony ane in a\u2019 the land that could hae\nplayed sic a ploy; but deil fetch me if I dinna lift it as weel as he\ndid.\u2019 Sae aff he gaed, for there was na sic a man for birr in a\u2019 the\ncountra, an\u2019 he kent it as weel, for he never met wi\u2019 his match. Weel,\nhe tried, and tugged, and better than tugged at the stane, but he coudna\nmudge it ava; an\u2019, when he looked about, he saw a man at his elbuck, a\u2019\nsmeared wi\u2019 smiddy-coom, snightern\u2019 an\u2019 laughin\u2019 at him. The Laird d\u2014\u2014d\nhim, an\u2019 bade him lift it, whilk he did as gin\u2019t had been a little\npinnin. The Laird was like to burst wi\u2019 rage at being fickled by sic a\nhag-ma-hush carle, and he took to the stane in a fury, and lifted it\ntill his knee; but the weight o\u2019t amaist ground his banes to smash. He\nheld the stane till his een-strings crackit, when he was as blin\u2019 as a\nmoudiwort. He was blin\u2019 till the day o\u2019 his death,\u2014that\u2019s to say, if\never he died, for there were queer sayings about it\u2014vera queer! vera\nqueer! The stane was ca\u2019d Mauns\u2019 Stane ever after; an\u2019 it was no thought\nthat canny to be near it after gloaming; for what says the psalm\u2014hem!\u2014I\nmean the sang\u2014\n\n \u2019Tween Ennetbutts an\u2019 Mauns\u2019 Stane\n Ilka night there walks ane.\n\n\u201cThere never was a chief of the family after; the men were scattered,\nan\u2019 the castle demolished. The doo and the hoodie craw nestle i\u2019 their\ntowers, and the hare maks her form on their grassy hearthstane.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs this stone still to be seen?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu na. Ye see, it was just upon Johnie Forbes\u2019s craft, an\u2019 fouk cam far\nan\u2019 near to leuk at it, an\u2019 trampit down a\u2019 the puir cottar body\u2019s corn;\nsae he houkit a hole just aside it, an\u2019 tumbled it intil\u2019t: by that\nmeans naebody sees\u2019t noo, but its weel kent that it\u2019s there, for they\u2019re\nlivin\u2019 yet wha\u2019ve seen it.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut the well at the Abbey\u2014did no one feel a desire to enrich himself\nwith the gold and silver buried there?\u201d\n\n\u201cHoot, ay; mony a ane tried to find out whaur it was, and, for that\nmatter, I\u2019ve maybe done as foolish a thing mysel; but nane ever made it\nout. There was a scholar, like yoursel, that gaed ae night down to the\nAbbey, an\u2019, ye see, he summoned up the deil.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe deuce he did!\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWeel, weel, the _deuce_, gin ye like it better,\u201d said he. \u201cAn\u2019 he was\ngaun to question him where the treasure was, but he had eneugh to do to\nget him laid without deaving him wi\u2019 questions, for a\u2019 the deils cam\nabout him, like bees bizzin\u2019 out o\u2019 a byke. He never coured the fright\nhe gat, but cried out, \u2018Help! help!\u2019 till his very enemy wad hae been\nwae to see him; and sae he cried till he died, which was no that lang\nafter. Fouk sudna meddle wi\u2019 sic ploys!\u201d\n\n\u201cMost wonderful! And do you believe that Beelzebub actually appeared to\nhim?\u201d\n\n\u201cBelieve it! What for no?\u201d said he, consequentially tapping the lid of\nhis snuff-horn. \u201cDidna my ain father see the evil ane i\u2019 the schule o\u2019\nAuld Deer?\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed!\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel I wot he did that. A wheen idle callants, when the dominie was out\nat his twal-hours, read the Lord\u2019s Prayer backlans, an\u2019 raised him, but\ncoudna lay him again; for he threepit ower them that he wadna gang awa\nunless he gat ane o\u2019 them wi\u2019 him. Ye may be sure this put them in an\nawfu\u2019 swither. They were a\u2019 squallin\u2019, an\u2019 crawlin\u2019, and sprawlin\u2019 amo\u2019\nthe couples to get out o\u2019 his grips. Ane o\u2019 them gat out an\u2019 tauld the\nmaister about it; an\u2019 when he cam down, the melted lead was rinnin\u2019 aff\nthe roof o\u2019 the house wi\u2019 the heat; sae, flingin\u2019 to the Black Thief a\nyoung bit kittlen o\u2019 the schule-mistress\u2019s, he sank through the floor\nwi\u2019 an awsome roar. I mysel have heard the mistress misca\u2019in\u2019 her man\nabout offering up the puir thing, baith saul and body, to Baal. But,\ntroth, I\u2019m no clear to speak o\u2019 the like o\u2019 this at sic a time o\u2019 night;\nsae, if your honour be na for anither jug, I\u2019ll e\u2019en wus you a gude\nnight, for its wearin\u2019 late, an\u2019 I maun awa\u2019 to Skippyfair i\u2019 the\nmornin\u2019.\u201d\n\nI assented to this, and quickly lost in sleep the remembrance of all\nthese tales of the olden time.\u2014_Aberdeen Censor_, 1825.\n\n\n\n\n THE FREEBOOTER OF LOCHABER.\n\n BY SIR THOMAS DICK LAUDER.\n\n\nTowards the end of the seventeenth century, there lived a certain\nnotorious freebooter, in the county of Moray, a native of Lochaber, of\nthe name of Cameron, but who was better known by his cognomen of _Padrig\nMac-an-Ts\u2019agairt_, which signifies, \u201cPeter, the Priest\u2019s Son.\u201d Numerous\nwere the \u201ccreachs,\u201d or robberies of cattle on a great scale, driven by\nhim from Strathspey. But he did not confine his depredations to that\ncountry; for, some time between the years 1690 and 1695, he made a clean\nsweep of the cattle from the rich pastures of the Aird, the territory of\nthe Frasers. That he might put his pursuers on a wrong scent, he did not\ngo directly towards Lochaber, but, crossing the river Ness at Lochend,\nhe struck over the mountains of Strathnairn and Strathdearn, and\nultimately encamped behind a hill above Duthel, called, from a copious\nspring on its summit, _Cairn-an-Sh\u2019uaran_, or the Well Hill. But,\nnotwithstanding all his precautions, the celebrated Simon Lord Lovat,\nthen chief of the Frasers, discovered his track, and despatched a\nspecial messenger to his father-in-law, Sir Ludovick Grant of Grant,\nbegging his aid in apprehending Mac-an-Ts\u2019agairt, and recovering the\ncattle.\n\nIt so happened that there lived at this time, on the laird of Grant\u2019s\nground, a man also called Cameron, surnamed Mugach More, of great\nstrength and undaunted courage; he had six sons and a stepson, whom his\nwife, formerly a woman of light character, had before her marriage with\nMugach, and, as they were all brave, Sir Ludovick applied to them to\nundertake the recapture of the cattle. Sir Ludovic was not mistaken in\nthe man. The Mugach no sooner received his orders, than he armed himself\nand his little band, and went in quest of the freebooter, whom he found\nin the act of cooking a dinner from part of the spoil. The Mugach called\non Padrig and his men to surrender, and they, though numerous, dreading\nthe well-known prowess of their adversary, fled to the opposite hills,\ntheir chief threatening bloody vengeance as he went. The Mugach drove\nthe cattle to a place of safety, and watched them till their owners came\nto recover them.\n\nPadrig did not utter his threats without the fullest intention of\ncarrying them into effect. In the latter end of the following spring, he\nvisited Strathspey with a strong party, and waylaid the Mugach, as he\nand his sons were returning from working at a small patch of land he had\non the brow of a hill, about half-a-mile above his house. Padrig and his\nparty concealed themselves in a thick covert of underwood, through which\nthey knew that the Mugach and his sons must pass; but seeing their\nintended victims well-armed, the cowardly assassins lay still in their\nhiding-place, and allowed them to pass, with the intention of taking a\nmore favourable opportunity for their purpose. That very night they\nsurprised and murdered two of the sons, who, being married, lived in\nseparate houses, at some distance from their father\u2019s; and, having thus\nexecuted so much of their diabolical purpose, they surrounded the\nMugach\u2019s cottage.\n\nNo sooner was his dwelling attacked, than the brave Mugach, immediately\nguessing who the assailants were, made the best arrangements for defence\nthat time and circumstances permitted. The door was the first point\nattempted; but it was strong, and he and his four sons placed themselves\nbehind it, determined to do bloody execution the moment it should be\nforced. Whilst thus engaged, the Mugach was startled by a noise above\nthe rafters, and, looking up, he perceived, in the obscurity, the figure\nof a man half through a hole in the wattled roof. Eager to despatch his\nfoe as he entered, he sprang upon a table, plunged his sword into his\nbody, and down fell\u2014his stepson, whom he had ever loved and cherished as\none of his own children! The youth had been cutting his way through the\nroof, with the intention of attacking Padrig from above, and so creating\na diversion in favour of those who were defending the door. The brave\nyoung man lived no longer than to say, \u201cDear father, I fear you have\nkilled me!\u201d\n\nFor a moment the Mugach stood petrified with horror and grief, but rage\nsoon usurped the place of both. \u201cLet me open the door!\u201d he cried, \u201cand\nrevenge his death, by drenching my sword in the blood of the villain!\u201d\nHis sons clung around him, to prevent what they conceived to be madness,\nand a strong struggle ensued between desperate bravery and filial duty;\nwhilst the Mugach\u2019s wife stood gazing on the corpse of her first-born\nson, in an agony of contending passions, being ignorant from all she had\nwitnessed but that the young man\u2019s death had been wilfully wrought by\nher husband. \u201cHast thou forgotten our former days?\u201d cried the wily\nPadrig, who saw the whole scene through a crevice in the door. \u201cHow\noften hast thou undone thy door to me, and wilt thou not open it now, to\ngive me way to punish him who has, but this moment, so foully slain thy\nbeloved son?\u201d Ancient recollections, and present affliction, conspired\nto twist her to his purpose. The struggle and altercation between the\nMugach and his sons still continued. A frenzy seized on the unhappy\nwoman; she flew to the door, undid the bolt, and Padrig and his\nassassins rushed in.\n\nThe infuriated Mugach no sooner beheld his enemy enter, than he sprang\nat him like a tiger, grasped him by the throat, and dashed him to the\nground. Already was his vigorous sword-arm drawn back, and his broad\nclaymore was about to find a passage to the traitor\u2019s heart, when his\nfaithless wife, coming behind him, threw over it a large canvas\nwinnowing-sheet, and, before he could extricate the blade from the\nnumerous folds, Padrig\u2019s weapon was reeking in the best heart\u2019s-blood of\nthe bravest Highlander that Strathspey could boast of. His four sons,\nwho had witnessed their mother\u2019s treachery, were paralyzed. The\nunfortunate woman herself, too, stood stupified and appalled. But she\nwas quickly recalled to her senses by the active clash of the swords of\nPadrig and his men. \u201cOh, my sons, my sons!\u201d she cried; \u201cspare my boys!\u201d\nBut the tempter needed her services no longer,\u2014she had done his work.\nShe was spurned to the ground and trampled under foot by those who soon\nstrewed the bloody floor around her with the lifeless corpses of her\nbrave sons.\n\nExulting in the full success of this expedition of vengeance,\nMac-an-Ts\u2019agairt beheaded the bodies, and piled the heads in a heap on\nan oblong hill that runs parallel to the road on the east side of Carr\nBridge, from which it is called _Tom-nan-Cean_, the Hill of the Heads.\nScarcely was he beyond the reach of danger, than his butchery was known\nat the Castle Grant, and Sir Ludovick immediately offered a great reward\nfor his apprehension; but Padrig, who had anticipated some such thing,\nfled to Ireland, where he remained for seven years. But the restlessness\nof the murderer is well known, and Padrig felt it in all its horrors.\nLeaving his Irish retreat, he returned to Lochaber. By a strange\naccident, a certain Mungo Grant, of Muckrach, having had his cattle and\nhorses carried away by some thieves from that quarter, pursued them hot\nfoot, recovered them, and was on his way returning with them, when, to\nhis astonishment, he met Padrig Mac-an-Ts\u2019agairt, quite alone in a\nnarrow pass, on the borders of his native country. Mungo instantly\nseized and made a prisoner of him. But his progress with his beasts was\ntedious; and as he was entering Strathspey at _Lag-na-caillich_, about a\nmile to the westward of Aviemore, he espied twelve desperate men, who,\ntaking advantage of his slow march, had crossed the hills to gain the\npass before him, for the purpose of rescuing Padrig. But Mungo was not\nto be daunted. Seeing them occupying the road in his front, he grasped\nhis prisoner with one hand, and brandishing his dirk with the other, he\nadvanced in the midst of his people and animals, swearing potently that\nthe first motion at an attempt at rescue by any one of them should be\nthe signal for his dirk to drink the life\u2019s-blood of Padrig\nMac-an-Ts\u2019agairt. They were so intimidated by his boldness that they\nallowed him to pass without assault, and left their friend to his fate.\nPadrig was forthwith carried to Castle Grant. But the remembrance of the\nMugach\u2019s murder had been by this time much obliterated by many events\nlittle less strange, and the laird, unwilling to be troubled with the\nmatter, ordered Mungo and his prisoner away.\n\nDisappointed and mortified, Mungo and his party were returning with\ntheir captive, discussing, as they went, what they had best do with him.\n\u201cA fine reward we have had for all our trouble!\u201d said one. \u201cThe laird\nmay catch the next thief her nainsel, for Donald!\u201d said another. \u201cLet\u2019s\nturn him loose!\u201d said a third. \u201cAy, ay,\u201d said a fourth; \u201cwhat for wud we\nbe plaguing oursels more wi\u2019 him?\u201d \u201cYes, yes! brave, generous men!\u201d said\nPadrig, roused by a sudden hope of life from the moody dream of the\ngallows-tree in which he had been plunged, whilst he was courting his\nmournful muse to compose his own lament, that he might die with an\neffect striking, as all the events of his life had been. \u201cYes, brave\nmen, free me from these bonds! It is unworthy of Strathspey men,\u2014it is\nunworthy of Grants to triumph over a fallen foe! Those whom I killed\nwere no clansmen of yours, but recreant Camerons, who betrayed a\nCameron! Let me go free, and that reward of which you have been\ndisappointed shall be quadrupled for sparing my life.\u201d Such words as\nthese, operating on minds so much prepared to receive them favourably,\nhad well-nigh worked their purpose. But \u201cNo!\u201d said Muckrach sternly, \u201cit\nshall never be said that a murderer escaped from my hands. Besides, it\nwas just so that he fairly spake the Mugach\u2019s false wife. But did he\nspare her sons on that account? If ye let him go, my men, the fate of\nthe Mugach may be ours; for what bravery can stand against treachery and\nassassination?\u201d This opened an entirely new view of the question to\nPadrig\u2019s rude guards, and the result of the conference was that they\nresolved to take him to Inverness, and to deliver him up to the sheriff.\n\nAs they were pursuing their way up the south side of the river Dulnan,\nthe hill of _Tom-nan-Cean_ appeared on that opposite to them. At sight\nof it the whole circumstances of Padrig\u2019s atrocious deed came fresh in\nto their minds. It seemed to cry on them for justice, and with one\nimpulse they shouted out, \u201cLet him die on the spot where he did the\nbloody act!\u201d Without a moment\u2019s farther delay, they determined to\nexecute their new resolution. But on their way across the plain, they\nhappened to observe a large fir tree, with a thick horizontal branch\ngrowing at right angles from the trunk, and of a sufficient height from\nthe ground to suit their purpose; and doubting if they might find so\nconvenient a gallows where they were going, they at once determined that\nhere Padrig should finish his mortal career. The neighbouring birch\nthicket supplied them with materials for making a withe; and whilst they\nwere twisting it, Padrig burst forth in a flood of Gaelic verse, which\nhis mind had been accumulating by the way. His song and the twig rope\nthat was to terminate his existence were spun out and finished at the\nsame moment, and he was instantly elevated to a height equally beyond\nhis ambition and his hopes.\n\n\n\n\n AN HOUR IN THE MANSE.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nIn a few weeks the annual sacrament of the Lord\u2019s Supper was to be\nadministered in the parish of Deanside; and the minister, venerable in\nold age, of authority by the power of his talents and learning, almost\nfeared for his sanctity, yet withal beloved for gentleness and\ncompassion that had never been found wanting, when required either by\nthe misfortunes or errors of any of his flock, had delivered for several\nsuccessive Sabbaths, to full congregations, sermons on the proper\npreparation of communicants in that awful ordinance. The old man was a\nfollower of Calvin; and many, who had listened to him with a resolution\nin their hearts to approach the table of the Redeemer, felt so\nawe-stricken and awakened at the conclusion of his exhortations, that\nthey gave their souls another year to meditate on what they had heard,\nand by a pure and humble course of life, to render themselves less\nunworthy to partake the mysterious and holy bread and wine.\n\nThe good old man received in the manse, for a couple of hours every\nevening, such of his parishioners as came to signify their wish to\npartake of the sacrament; and it was then noted, that, though he in\nnowise departed, in his conversation with them at such times, from the\nspirit of those doctrines which he had delivered from the pulpit, yet\nhis manner was milder, and more soothing, and full of encouragement; so\nthat many who went to him almost with quaking hearts, departed in\ntranquillity and peace, and looked forward to that most impressive and\nsolemn act of the Christian faith with calm and glad anticipation. The\nold man thought, truly and justly, that few, if any, would come to the\nmanse, after having heard him in the kirk, without due and deep\nreflection; and therefore, though he allowed none to pass through his\nhands without strict examination, he spoke to them all benignly, and\nwith that sort of paternal pity which a religious man, about to leave\nthis life, feels towards all his brethren of mankind, who are entering\nupon, or engaged in, its scenes of agitation, trouble, and danger.\n\nOn one of those evenings, the servant showed into the minister\u2019s study a\ntall, bold-looking, dark-visaged man, in the prime of life, who, with\nlittle of the usual courtesy, advanced into the middle of the room, and\nsomewhat abruptly declared the sacred purpose of his visit. But before\nhe could receive a reply, he looked around and before him; and there was\nsomething so solemn in the old minister\u2019s appearance, as he sat like a\nspirit, with his unclouded eyes fixed upon the intruder, that that\nperson\u2019s countenance fell, and his heart was involuntarily knocking\nagainst his side. An old large Bible, the same that he read from in the\npulpit, was lying open before him. One glimmering candle showed his\nbeautiful and silvery locks falling over his temples, as his head half\nstooped over the sacred page; a dead silence was in the room dedicated\nto meditation and prayer; the old man, it was known, had for some time\nfelt himself to be dying, and had spoken of the sacrament of this summer\nas the last he could ever hope to administer; so that altogether, in the\nsilence, the dimness, the sanctity, the unworldliness of the time, the\nplace, and the being before him, the visitor stood like one abashed and\nappalled; and bowing more reverently, or at least respectfully, he said,\nwith a quivering voice, \u201cSir, I come for your sanction to be admitted to\nthe table of our Lord.\u201d\n\nThe minister motioned to him with his hand to sit down; and it was a\nrelief to the trembling man to do so, for he was in the presence of one\nwho, he felt, saw into his heart. A sudden change from hardihood to\nterror took place within his dark nature; he wished himself out of the\ninsupportable sanctity of that breathless room; and a remorse, that had\nhitherto slept, or been drowned within him, now clutched his\nheartstrings, as if with an alternate grasp of frost and fire, and made\nhis knees knock against each other where he sat, and his face pale as\nashes.\n\n\u201cNorman Adams, saidst thou that thou wilt take into that hand, and put\ninto those lips, the symbol of the blood that was shed for sinners, and\nof the body that bowed on the cross, and then gave up the ghost? If so,\nlet us speak together, even as if thou wert communing with thine own\nheart. Never again may I join in that sacrament, for the hour of my\ndeparture is at hand. Say, wilt thou eat and drink death to thine\nimmortal soul?\u201d\n\nThe terrified man found strength to rise from his seat, and, staggering\ntowards the door, said, \u201cPardon, forgive me!\u2014I am not worthy.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is not I who can pardon, Norman. That power lies not with man; but\nsit down\u2014you are deadly pale\u2014and though, I fear, an ill-living and a\ndissolute man, greater sinners have repented and been saved. Approach\nnot now the table of the Lord, but confess all your sins before Him in\nthe silence of your own house, and upon your naked knees on the\nstone-floor every morning and every night; and if this you do\nfaithfully, humbly, and with a contrite heart, come to me again when the\nsacrament is over, and I will speak words of comfort to you (if then I\nam able to speak)\u2014if, Norman, it should be on my deathbed. This will I\ndo for the sake of thy soul, and for the sake of thy father, Norman,\nwhom my soul loved, and who was a support to me in my ministry for many\nlong, long years, even for two score and ten, for we were at school\ntogether; and had your father been living now, he would, like myself,\nhave this very day finished his eighty-fifth year. I send you not from\nme in anger, but in pity and love. Go, my son, and this very night begin\nyour repentance, for if that face speak the truth, your heart must be\nsorely charged.\u201d\n\nJust as the old man ceased speaking, and before the humble, or at least\naffrighted culprit had risen to go, another visitor of a very different\nkind was shown into the room\u2014a young, beautiful girl, almost shrouded in\nher cloak, with a sweet pale face, on which sadness seemed in vain to\nstrive with the natural expression of the happiness of youth.\n\n\u201cMary Simpson,\u201d said the kind old man, as she stood with a timid\ncourtesy near the door, \u201cMary Simpson, approach, and receive from my\nhands the token for which thou comest. Well dost thou know the history\nof thy Saviour\u2019s life, and rejoicest in the life and immortality brought\nto light by the gospel. Young and guileless, Mary, art thou; and dim as\nmy memory now is of many things, yet do I well remember the evening,\nwhen first beside my knee, thou heardst read how the Divine Infant was\nlaid in a manger, how the wise men from the East came to the place of\nHis nativity, and how the angels were heard singing in the fields of\nBethlehem all the night long.\u201d\n\nAlas! every word that had thus been uttered sent a pang into the poor\ncreature\u2019s heart, and, without lifting her eyes from the floor, and in a\nvoice more faint and hollow than belonged to one so young, she said, \u201cO\nsir! I come not as an intending communicant; yet the Lord my God knows\nthat I am rather miserable than guilty, and He will not suffer my soul\nto perish, though a baby is now within me, the child of guilt, and sin,\nand horror. This, my shame, come I to tell you; but for the father of my\nbabe unborn, cruel though he has been to me,\u2014oh! cruel, cruel,\nindeed,\u2014yet shall his name go down with me in silence to the grave. I\nmust not, must not breathe his name in mortal ears; but I have looked\nround me in the wide moor, and when nothing that could understand was\nby, nothing living but birds, and bees, and the sheep I was herding,\noften have I whispered his name in my prayers, and beseeched God and\nJesus to forgive him all his sins.\u201d\n\nAt these words, of which the passionate utterance seemed to relieve her\nheart, and before the pitying and bewildered old man could reply, Mary\nSimpson raised her eyes from the floor, and fearing to meet the face of\nthe minister, which had heretofore never shone upon her but with smiles,\nand of which the expected frown was to her altogether insupportable, she\nturned them wildly round the room, as if for a dark resting-place, and\nbeheld Norman Adams rooted to his seat, leaning towards her with his\nwhite, ghastly countenance, and his eyes starting from their sockets,\nseemingly in wrath, agony, fear, and remorse. That terrible face struck\npoor Mary to the heart, and she sank against the wall, and slipped down,\nshuddering, upon a chair.\n\n\u201cNorman Adams, I am old and weak, but do you put your arm round that\npoor lost creature, and keep her from falling down on the hard floor. I\nhear it is a stormy night, and she has walked some miles hither; no\nwonder she is overcome. You have heard her confession, but it was not\nmeant for your ear; so, till I see you again, say nothing of what you\nhave now heard.\u201d\n\n\u201cO sir! a cup of water, for my blood is either leaving my heart\naltogether, or it is drowning it. Your voice, sir, is going far, far\naway from me, and I am sinking down. Oh, hold me!\u2014hold me up! Is it a\npit into which I am falling?\u2014Saw I not Norman Adams?\u2014Where is he now?\u201d\n\nThe poor maiden did not fall off the chair, although Norman Adams\nsupported her not; but her head lay back against the wall, and a sigh,\nlong and dismal, burst from her bosom, that deeply affected the old\nman\u2019s heart, but struck that of the speechless and motionless sinner,\nlike the first toll of the prison bell that warns the felon to leave his\ncell and come forth to execution.\n\nThe minister fixed a stern eye upon Norman, for, from the poor girl\u2019s\nunconscious words, it was plain that he was the guilty wretch who had\nwrought all this misery. \u201cYou knew, did you not, that she had neither\nfather nor mother, sister nor brother, scarcely one relation on earth to\ncare for or watch over her; and yet you have used her so? If her beauty\nwas a temptation unto you, did not the sweet child\u2019s innocence touch\nyour hard and selfish heart with pity? or her guilt and grief must\nsurely now wring it with remorse. Look on her\u2014white, cold, breathless,\nstill as a corpse; and yet, thou bold bad man, thy footsteps would have\napproached the table of thy Lord!\u201d\n\nThe child now partly awoke from her swoon, and her dim opening eyes met\nthose of Norman Adams. She shut them with a shudder, and said, sickly\nand with a quivering voice, \u201cOh spare, spare me, Norman! Are we again in\nthat dark, fearful wood? Tremble not for your life on earth, Norman, for\nnever, never will I tell to mortal ears that terrible secret; but spare\nme, spare me, else our Saviour, with all His mercy, will never pardon\nyour unrelenting soul. These are cruel-looking eyes; you will not surely\nmurder poor Mary Simpson, unhappy as she is, and must for ever be\u2014yet\nlife is sweet! She beseeches you on her knees to spare her life!\u201d\u2014and,\nin the intense fear of phantasy, the poor creature struggled off the\nchair, and fell down indeed in a heap at his feet.\n\n\u201cCanst thou indeed be the son of old Norman Adams, the industrious, the\ntemperate, the mild, and the pious\u2014who so often sat in this very room\nwhich thy presence has now polluted, and spake with me on the mysteries\nof life and of death? Foul ravisher, what stayed thy hand from the\nmurder of that child, when there were none near to hear her shrieks in\nthe dark solitude of the great pine-wood?\u201d\n\nNorman Adams smote his heart and fell down too on his knees beside the\npoor ruined orphan. He put his arm round her, and, raising her from the\nfloor, said, \u201cNo, no, my sin is great, too great for Heaven\u2019s\nforgiveness; but, oh sir! say not\u2014say not that I would have murdered\nher; for, savage as my crime was, yet may God judge me less terribly\nthan if I had taken her life.\u201d\n\nIn a little while they were both seated with some composure, and silence\nwas in the room. No one spoke, and the old grayhaired man sat with his\neyes fixed, without reading, on the open Bible. At last he broke silence\nwith these words out of Isaiah, that seemed to have forced themselves on\nhis heedless eyes:\u2014\u201cThough your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as\nwhite as snow: though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.\u201d\n\nMary Simpson wept aloud at these words, and seemed to forget her own\nwrongs and grief in commiseration of the agonies of remorse and fear\nthat were now plainly preying on the soul of the guilty man. \u201cI forgive\nyou, Norman, and will soon be out of the way, no longer to anger you\nwith the sight of me.\u201d Then, fixing her streaming eyes on the minister,\nshe besought him not to be the means of bringing him to punishment and a\nshameful death, for that he might repent, and live to be a good man and\nrespected in the parish; but that she was a poor orphan for whom few\ncared, and who, when dead, would have but a small funeral.\n\n\u201cI will deliver myself up into the hands of justice,\u201d said the offender,\n\u201cfor I do not deserve to live. Mine was an inhuman crime, and let a\nviolent and shameful death be my doom.\u201d\n\nThe orphan girl now stood up as if her strength had been restored, and\nstretching out her hands passionately, with a flow of most affecting and\nbeautiful language, inspired by a meek, single, and sinless heart that\ncould not bear the thought of utter degradation and wretchedness\nbefalling any one of the rational children of God, implored and\nbeseeched the old man to comfort the sinner before them, and promise\nthat the dark transaction of guilt should never leave the concealment of\ntheir own three hearts. \u201cDid he not save the lives of two brothers once\nwho were drowning in that black mossy loch, when their own kindred, at\nwork among the hay, feared the deep sullen water, and all stood aloof\nshuddering and shaking, till Norman Adams leapt in to their rescue, and\ndrew them by the dripping hair to the shore, and then lay down beside\nthem on the heather as like to death as themselves? I myself saw it\ndone; I myself heard their mother call down the blessing of God on\nNorman\u2019s head, and then all the haymakers knelt down and prayed. When\nyou, on the Sabbath, returned thanks to God for that they were saved,\noh! kind sir, did you not name, in the full kirk, him who, under\nProvidence, did deliver them from death, and who, you said, had thus\nshowed himself to be a Christian indeed? May his sin against me be\nforgotten, for the sake of those two drowning boys, and their mother,\nwho blesses his name unto this day.\u201d\n\nFrom a few questions solemnly asked, and solemnly answered, the minister\nfound that Norman Adams had been won by the beauty and loveliness of\nthis poor orphan shepherdess, as he had sometimes spoken to her when\nsitting on the hill-side with her flock, but that pride had prevented\nhim from ever thinking of her in marriage. It appeared that he had also\nbeen falsely informed, by a youth whom Mary disliked for his brutal and\ngross manners, that she was not the innocent girl that her seeming\nsimplicity denoted. On returning from a festive meeting, where this\nabject person had made many mean insinuations against her virtue, Norman\nAdams met her returning to her master\u2019s house, in the dusk of the\nevening, on the footpath leading through a lonely wood; and, though his\ncrime was of the deepest dye, it seemed to the minister of the religion\nof mercy, that by repentance, and belief in the atonement that had once\nbeen made for sinners, he, too, might perhaps hope for forgiveness at\nthe throne of God.\n\n\u201cI warned you, miserable man, of the fatal nature of sin, when first it\nbrought a trouble over your countenance, and broke in upon the peaceful\nintegrity of your life. Was not the silence of the night often terrible\nto you, when you were alone in the moors, and the whisper of your own\nconscience told you, that every wicked thought was sacrilege to your\nfather\u2019s dust? Step by step, and almost imperceptibly, perhaps, did you\nadvance upon the road that leadeth to destruction; but look back now,\nand what a long dark journey have you taken, standing, as you are, on\nthe brink of everlasting death! Once you were kind, gentle, generous,\nmanly, and free; but you trusted to the deceitfulness of your own heart;\nyou estranged yourself from the house of the God of your fathers; and\nwhat has your nature done for you at last, but sunk you into a\nwretch\u2014savage, selfish, cruel, cowardly, and in good truth a slave? A\nfelon are you, and forfeited to the hangman\u2019s hands. Look on that poor\ninnocent child, and think what is man without God. What would you give\nnow, if the last three years of your reckless life had been passed in a\ndungeon dug deep into the earth, with hunger and thirst gnawing at your\nheart, and bent down under a cartload of chains? Yet look not so\nghastly, for I condemn you not utterly; nor, though I know your guilt,\ncan I know what good may yet be left uncorrupted and unextinguished in\nyour soul. Kneel not to me, Norman; fasten not so your eyes upon me;\nlift them upwards, and then turn them in upon your own heart, for the\ndreadful reckoning is between it and God.\u201d\n\nMary Simpson had now recovered all her strength, and she knelt down by\nthe side of the groaner. Deep was the pity she now felt for him, who to\nher had shown no pity; she did not refuse to lay her light arm tenderly\nupon his neck. Often had she prayed to God to save his soul, even among\nher rueful sobs of shame in the solitary glens; and now that she beheld\nhis sin punished with a remorse more than he could bear, the orphan\nwould have willingly died to avert from his prostrate head the wrath of\nthe Almighty.\n\nThe old man wept at the sight of so much innocence, and so much guilt,\nkneeling together before God, in strange union and fellowship of a\ncommon being. With his own fatherly arms he lifted up the orphan from\nher knees, and said, \u201cMary Simpson, my sweet and innocent Mary Simpson,\nfor innocent thou art, the elders will give thee a token, that will, on\nSabbath-day, admit thee (not for the first time, though so young) to the\ncommunion-table. Fear not to approach it; look at me, and on my face,\nwhen I bless the elements, and be thou strong in the strength of the\nLord. Norman Adams, return to your home. Go into the chamber where your\nfather died. Let your knees wear out the part of the floor on which he\nkneeled. It is somewhat worn already; you have seen the mark of your\nfather\u2019s knees. Who knows, but that pardon and peace may descend from\nHeaven upon such a sinner as thou? On none such as thou have mine eyes\never looked, in knowledge, among all those who have lived and died under\nmy care, for three generations. But great is the unknown guilt that may\nbe hidden even in the churchyard of a small quiet parish like this. Dost\nthou feel as if God-forsaken? Or, oh! say it unto me, canst thou, my\npoor son, dare to hope for repentance?\u201d\n\nThe pitiful tone of the old man\u2019s trembling voice, and the motion of his\nshaking and withered hands, as he lifted them up almost in an attitude\nof benediction, completed the prostration of that sinner\u2019s spirit. All\nhis better nature, which had too long been oppressed under scorn of holy\nordinances, and the coldness of infidelity, and the selfishness of\nlawless desires that insensibly harden the heart they do not dissolve,\nnow struggled to rise up and respect its rights. \u201cWhen I remember what I\nonce was, I can hope\u2014when I think what I now am, I only, only fear.\u201d\n\nA storm of rain and wind had come on, and Mary Simpson slept in the\nmanse that night. On the ensuing Sabbath she partook of the sacrament. A\nwoeful illness fell upon Norman Adams; and then for a long time no one\nsaw him, or knew where he had gone. It was said that he was in a distant\ncity, and that he was a miserable creature, that never again could look\nupon the sun. But it was otherwise ordered. He returned to his farm,\ngreatly changed in face and person, but even yet more changed in spirit.\n\nThe old minister had more days allotted to him than he had thought, and\nwas not taken away for some summers. Before he died, he had reason to\nknow that Norman Adams had repented in tears of blood, in thoughts of\nfaith, and in deeds of charity; and he did not fear to admit him, too,\nin good time, to the holy ordinance, along with Mary Simpson, then his\nwife, and the mother of his children.\n\n\n\n\n THE WARDEN OF THE MARCHES:\n _A TRADITIONARY STORY OF ANNANDALE_.\n\n\nThe predatory incursions of the Scots and English borderers, on each\nother\u2019s territories, are known to every one in the least acquainted with\neither the written or traditional history of his country. These were\nsometimes made by armed and numerous bodies, and it was not uncommon for\na band of marauders to take advantage of a thick fog or a dark night for\nplundering or driving away the cattle, with which they soon escaped over\nthe border, where they were generally secure. Such incursions were so\nfrequent and distressing to the peaceable and well-disposed inhabitants\nthat they complained loudly to their respective governments; in\nconsequence of which some one of the powerful nobles residing on the\nborders was invested with authority to suppress these depredations,\nunder the title of Warden of the Marches. His duty was to protect the\nfrontier, and alarm the country by firing the beacons which were placed\non the heights, where they could be seen at a great distance, as a\nwarning to the people to drive away their cattle, and, collecting in a\nbody, either to repel or pursue the invaders, as circumstances might\nrequire. The wardens also possessed a discretionary power in such\nmatters as came under their jurisdiction. The proper discharge of this\nimportant trust required vigilance, courage, and fidelity, but it was\nsometimes committed to improper hands, and consequently the duty was\nvery improperly performed.\n\nIn the reign of James V. one of these wardens was Sir John Charteris of\nAmisfield, near Dumfries, a brave but haughty man, who sometimes forgot\nhis important trust so far as to sacrifice his public duties to his\nprivate interests.\n\nGeorge Maxwell was a young and respectable farmer in Annandale, who had\nfrequently been active in repressing the petty incursions to which that\nquarter of the country was exposed. Having thereby rendered himself\nparticularly obnoxious to the English borderers, a strong party was\nformed, which succeeded in despoiling him, by plundering his house and\ndriving away his whole live stock. At the head of a large party he\npursued and overtook the \u201cspoil-encumbered foe;\u201d a fierce and bloody\ncontest ensued, in which George fell the victim of a former feud,\nleaving his widow, Marion, in poverty, with her son Wallace, an only\nchild in the tenth year of his age. By the liberality of her neighbours,\nthe widow was replaced in a small farm; but by subsequent incursions she\nwas reduced to such poverty that she occupied a small cottage, with a\ncow, which the kindness of a neighbouring farmer permitted to pasture on\nhis fields. This, with the industry and filial affection of her son, now\nin his twentieth year, enabled her to live with a degree of comfort and\ncontented resignation.\n\nWith a manly and athletic form, Wallace Maxwell inherited the courage of\nhis father, and the patriotic ardour of the chieftain after whom he had\nbeen named; and Wallace had been heard to declare, that although he\ncould not expect to free his country from the incursions of the English\nborderers, he trusted he should yet be able to take ample vengeance for\nthe untimely death of his father.\n\nBut although his own private wrongs and those of his country had a\npowerful influence on the mind of Wallace Maxwell, yet his heart was\nsusceptible of a far loftier passion.\n\nHis fine manly form and graceful bearing had attractions for many a\nrural fair; and he would have found no difficulty in matching with\nyouthful beauty considerably above his own humble station. But his\naffections were fixed on Mary Morrison, a maiden as poor in worldly\nwealth as himself; but nature had been more than usually indulgent to\nher in a handsome person and fine features; and, what was of infinitely\nmore value, her heart was imbued with virtuous principles, and her mind\nbetter cultivated than could have been expected from her station in\nlife. To these accomplishments were superadded a native dignity,\ntempered with modesty, and a most winning sweetness of manner. Mary was\nthe daughter of a man who had seen better days; but he was ruined by the\nincursions of the English borderers; and both he and her mother dying\nsoon after, Mary was left a helpless orphan in the twentieth year of her\nage. Her beauty procured her many admirers; and her unprotected state\n(for she had no relations in Annandale) left her exposed to the\ninsidious temptations of unprincipled villainy; but they soon discovered\nthat neither flattery, bribes, nor the fairest promises, had the\nslightest influence on her spotless mind. There were many, however, who\nsincerely loved her, and made most honourable proposals; among whom was\nWallace Maxwell, perhaps the poorest of her admirers, but who succeeded\nin gaining her esteem and affection. Mary and he were fellow-servants to\nthe farmer from whom his mother had her cottage; and, on account of the\ntroublesome state of the country, Wallace slept every night in his\nmother\u2019s house as her guardian and protector. Mary and he were about the\nsame age, both in the bloom of youthful beauty; but both had\ndiscrimination to look beyond external attractions; and, although they\nmight be said to live in the light of each other\u2019s eyes, reason\nconvinced them that the time was yet distant when it would be prudent to\nconsummate that union which was the dearest object of their wishes.\n\nA foray had been made by the English, in which their leader, the son of\na rich borderer, had been made prisoner, and a heavy ransom paid to Sir\nJohn, the warden, for his release. This the avaricious warden considered\na perquisite of his office; and it accordingly went into his private\npocket. Soon after this, the party who had resolved on ruining Wallace\nMaxwell for his threats of vengeance, took advantage of a thick fog\nduring the day, succeeded by a dark night, in making an incursion on\nAnnandale, principally for the purpose of capturing the young man. By\nstratagem they effected their purpose; and the widow\u2019s cow, and Wallace\nher son, were both carried off as part of the spoil. The youth\u2019s life\nmight have been in considerable danger, had his capture not been\ndiscovered by the man who had recently paid a high ransom for his own\nson, and he now took instant possession of Wallace, resolving that he\nshould be kept a close prisoner till ransomed by a sum equal to that\npaid to the warden.\n\nIt would be difficult, if not impossible, to say whether the grief of\nWidow Maxwell for her son, or that of Mary Morrison for her lover, was\ngreatest. But early in the ensuing morning the widow repaired to\nAmisfield, related the circumstance to Sir John, with tears beseeching\nhim, as the plunderers were not yet far distant, to despatch his forces\nafter them, and rescue her son, with the property of which she had been\ndespoiled, for they had carried off everything, even to her bed-clothes.\n\nWallace Maxwell had some time before incurred the warden\u2019s displeasure,\nwhose mind was not generous enough either to forget or forgive. He\ntreated Marion with an indifference approaching almost to contempt, by\ntelling her that it would be exceedingly improper to alarm the country\nabout such a trivial incident, to which every person in that quarter was\nexposed; and although she kneeled to him, he refused to comply with her\nrequest, and proudly turned away.\n\nWith a heavy and an aching heart, the widow called on Mary Morrison on\nher way home to her desolate dwelling, relating the failure of her\napplication, and uttering direful lamentations for the loss of her son;\nall of which were echoed by the no less desponding maiden.\n\nIn the anguish of her distress, Mary formed the resolution of waiting on\nthe warden, and again urging the petition which had already been so\nrudely rejected. Almost frantic, she hastened to the castle, demanding\nto see Sir John. Her person was known to the porter, and he was also now\nacquainted with the cause of her present distress; she therefore found a\nready admission. Always beautiful, the wildness of her air, the liquid\nfire which beamed in her eyes, from which tears streamed over her\nglowing cheeks, and the perturbation which heaved her swelling bosom,\nrendered her an object of more than ordinary interest in the sight of\nthe warden. She fell at his feet and attempted to tell her melancholy\ntale; but convulsive sobs stifled her utterance. He then took her\nunresisting hand, raised her up, led her to a seat, and bade her compose\nherself before she attempted to speak.\n\nWith a faltering tongue, and eyes which, like the lightning of heaven,\nseemed capable of penetrating a heart of adamant, and in all the energy\nand pathos of impassioned grief, she told her tale,\u2014imploring the\nwarden, if he ever regarded his mother, or if capable of feeling for the\nanguish of a woman, to have pity on them, and instantly exert himself to\nrestore the most dutiful of sons, and the most faithful of lovers, to\nhis humble petitioners, whose gratitude should cease only with their\nlives.\n\n\u201cYou are probably not aware,\u201d said he, in a kindly tone, \u201cof the\ndifficulty of gratifying your wishes. Wallace Maxwell has rendered\nhimself the object of vengeance to the English borderers; and, before\nnow, he must be in captivity so secure, that any measure to rescue him\nby force of arms would be unavailing. But, for your sake, I will adopt\nthe only means which can restore him, namely, to purchase his ransom by\ngold. But you are aware that it must be high, and I trust your gratitude\nwill be in proportion.\u201d\n\n\u201cEverything in our power shall be done to evince our gratitude,\u201d replied\nthe delighted Mary, a more animated glow suffusing her cheek, and her\neyes beaming with a brighter lustre,\u2014\u201cHeaven reward you.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo wait for my reward from heaven, would be to give credit to one who\ncan make ready payment,\u201d replied the warden. \u201cYou, lovely Mary, have it\nin your power to make me a return, which will render me your debtor,\nwithout in any degree impoverishing yourself;\u201d\u2014and he paused, afraid or\nashamed to speak the purpose of his heart. Such is the power which\nvirgin beauty and innocence can exert on the most depraved inclinations.\n\nAlthough alarmed, and suspecting his base design, such was the rectitude\nof Mary\u2019s guileless heart, that she could not believe the warden in\nearnest; and starting from his proffered embrace, she with crimson\nblushes replied, \u201cI am sure, sir, your heart could never permit you so\nfar to insult a hapless maiden. You have spoken to try my affection for\nWallace Maxwell; let me therefore again implore you to take such\nmeasures as you may think best for obtaining his release;\u201d and a fresh\nflood of tears flowed in torrents from her eyes, while she gazed\nwistfully in his face, with a look so imploringly tender, that it might\nhave moved the heart of a demon.\n\nWith many flattering blandishments, and much artful sophistry, he\nendeavoured to win her to his purpose; but perceiving that his attempts\nwere unavailing, he concluded thus:\u2014\u201cAll that I have promised I am ready\nto perform; but I swear by Heaven, that unless you grant me the favour\nwhich I have so humbly solicited, Wallace Maxwell may perish in a\ndungeon, or by the hand of his enemies; for he shall never be rescued by\nme. Think, then, in time, before you leave me, and for his sake, and\nyour own future happiness, do not foolishly destroy it for ever.\u201d\n\nWith her eyes flashing indignant fire, and her bosom throbbing with the\nanguish of insulted virtue, she flung herself from his hateful embrace,\nand, rushing from his presence, with a sorrowful and almost bursting\nheart, left the castle.\n\nWidow Maxwell had a mind not easily depressed, and although in great\naffliction for her son, did not despair of his release. She was ignorant\nof Mary\u2019s application to the warden, and had been revolving in her mind\nthe propriety of seeking an audience of the king, and detailing her\nwrongs, both at the hands of the English marauders and Sir John. She was\nbrooding on this when Mary entered her cottage, and, in the agony of\ndespairing love and insulted honour, related the reception she had met\nfrom the warden. The relation confirmed the widow\u2019s half formed\nresolution, and steeled her heart to its purpose. After they had\nresponded each other\u2019s sighs, and mingled tears together, the old woman\nproposed waiting on her friend the farmer, declaring her intentions,\nand, if he approved of them, soliciting his permission for Mary to\naccompany her.\n\nThe warden\u2019s indolent neglect of duty was a subject of general\ncomplaint; the farmer, therefore, highly approved of the widow\u2019s\nproposal, believing that it would not only procure her redress, but\nmight be of advantage to the country. He urged their speedy and secret\ndeparture, requesting that whatever answer they received might not be\ndivulged till the final result was seen; and next morning, at early\ndawn, the widow and Mary took their departure for Stirling. King James\nwas easy of access to the humblest of his subjects; and the two had\nlittle difficulty in obtaining admission to the royal presence. Widow\nMaxwell had in youth been a beautiful woman, and, although her early\nbloom had passed, might still have been termed a comely and attractive\nmatron, albeit in the autumn of life. In a word, her face was still such\nas would have recommended her suit to the king, whose heart was at all\ntimes feelingly alive to the attraction of female beauty. But, on the\npresent occasion, although she was the petitioner, the auxiliary whom\nshe had brought, though silent, was infinitely the more powerful\npleader; for Mary might be said to resemble the half-blown rose in the\nearly summer, when its glowing leaves are wet with the dews of morning.\nJames was so struck with their appearance, that, before they had spoken,\nhe secretly wished that their petitions might be such as he could with\njustice and honour grant, for he already felt that it would be\nimpossible to refuse them.\n\nAlthough struck with awe on coming into the presence of their sovereign,\nthe easy condescension and affability of James soon restored them to\ncomparative tranquillity; and the widow told her \u201cplain, unvarnished\ntale\u201d with such artless simplicity, and moving pathos, as would have\nmade an impression on a less partial auditor than his Majesty. When she\ncame to state the result of Mary\u2019s application to Sir John, she paused,\nblushed, and still remained silent. James instantly conjectured the\ncause, which was confirmed when he saw Mary\u2019s face crimsoned all over.\n\nSuppressing his indignation, \u201cWell, I shall be soon in Annandale,\u201d said\nhe, \u201cand will endeavour to do you justice. Look at this nobleman,\u201d\npointing to one in the chamber; \u201cwhen I send him for you, come to me\nwhere he shall guide. In the meantime, he will find you safe lodgings\nfor the night, and give you sufficient to bear your expenses home,\nwhither I wish you to return as soon as possible, and be assured that\nyour case shall not be forgotten.\u201d\n\nIt is generally known that James, with a love of justice, had a\nconsiderable share of eccentricity in his character, and that he\nfrequently went over the country in various disguises\u2014such as that of a\npedlar, an itinerant musician, or even a wandering beggar. These\ndisguises were sometimes assumed for the purpose of discovering the\nabuses practised by his servants, and not unfrequently from the love of\nfrolic, and, like the Caliph in the \u201cArabian Nights,\u201d in quest of\namusement. On these occasions, when he chose to discover himself, it was\nalways by the designation of the \u201cGudeman of Ballengeich\u201d. He had a\nprivate passage by which he could leave the palace, unseen by any one,\nand he could make his retreat alone, or accompanied by a disguised\nattendant, according to his inclination.\n\nOn the present occasion, he determined to visit the warden of the March\n_incog._; and, making the necessary arrangements, he soon arrived in\nAnnandale. His inquiries concerning the widow and Mary corroborated the\nopinion he had previously formed, and learning where Mary resided, he\nresolved to repair thither in person, disguised as a mendicant. On\napproaching the farmer\u2019s, he had to pass a rivulet, at which there was a\ngirl washing linen, and a little observation convinced him it was Mary\nMorrison. When near, he pretended to be taken suddenly ill, and sat down\non a knoll, groaning piteously. Mary came instantly to him, tenderly\nenquiring what ailed him, and whether she could render him any\nassistance. James replied, it was a painful distemper, by which he was\nfrequently attacked; but if she could procure him a draught of warm\nmilk, that, and an hour\u2019s rest, would relieve him. Mary answered, that\nif he could, with her assistance, walk to the farm, which she pointed\nout near by, he would be kindly cared for. She assisted him to rise,\nand, taking his arm, permitted him to lean upon her shoulder, as they\ncrept slowly along. He met much sympathy in the family, and there he\nheard the history of Mary and Wallace Maxwell (not without execrations\non the warden for his indolence), and their affirmations that they were\nsure, if the king knew how he neglected his duty, he would either be\ndismissed or severely punished; although the former had spoken plainer\nthan others whom James had conversed with, he found that Sir John was\ngenerally disliked, and he became impatient for the hour of retribution.\n\nMarching back towards Dumfries, James rendezvoused for the night in a\nsmall village called Duncow, in the parish of Kirkmahoe, and next\nmorning he set out for Amisfield, which lay in the neighbourhood,\ndisguised as a beggar. Part of his retinue he left in Duncow, and part\nhe ordered to lie in wait in a ravine near Amisfield till he should\nrequire their attendance. Having cast away his beggar\u2019s cloak, he\nappeared at the gate of the warden\u2019s castle in the dress of a plain\ncountryman, and requested the porter to procure him an immediate\naudience of Sir John. But he was answered that the warden had just sat\ndown to dinner, during which it was a standing order that he should\nnever be disturbed on any pretence whatever.\n\n\u201cAnd how long will he sit?\u201d said James.\n\n\u201cTwo hours, perhaps three; he must not be intruded on till his bell\nring,\u201d replied the porter.\n\n\u201cI am a stranger, and cannot wait so long; take this silver groat, and\ngo to your master, and say that I wish to see him on business of\nimportance, and will detain him only a few minutes.\u201d\n\nThe porter delivered the message, and soon returned, saying\u2014\u201cSir John\nsays, that however important your business may be, you must wait his\ntime, or go the way you came.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is very hard. Here are two groats; go again, and say that I have\ncome from the Border, where I saw the English preparing for an\nincursion, and have posted thither with the information; and that I\nthink he will be neglecting his duty if he do not immediately fire the\nbeacons and alarm the country.\u201d\n\nThis message was also carried, and the porter returned with a sorrowful\nlook, and shaking head.\n\n\u201cWell, does the warden consent to see me?\u201d said the anxious stranger,\nwho had gained the porter\u2019s goodwill by his liberality.\n\n\u201cI beg your pardon, friend,\u201d replied the menial; \u201cbut I must give Sir\nJohn\u2019s answer in his own words. He says if you choose to wait two hours\nhe will then see whether you are a knave or a fool; but if you send\nanother such impertinent message to him, both you and I shall have cause\nto repent it. However, for your civility, come with me, and I will find\nyou something to eat and a horn of good ale, to put off the time till\nSir John can be seen.\u201d\n\n\u201cI give you hearty thanks, my good fellow, but, as I said, I cannot\nwait. Here, take these three groats; go again to the warden, and say\nthat the Gudeman of Ballengeich insists upon seeing him immediately.\u201d\n\nNo sooner was the porter\u2019s back turned, than James winded his buglehorn\nso loudly that its echoes seemed to shake the castle walls; and the\nporter found his master in consternation, which his message changed into\nfear and trembling.\n\nBy the time the warden had reached the gate, James had thrown off his\ncoat, and stood arrayed in the garb and insignia of royalty, while his\ntrain of nobles were galloping up in great haste. When they were\ncollected around him, the king, for the first time, condescended to\naddress the terrified warden, who had prostrated himself at the feet of\nhis sovereign.\n\n\u201cRise, Sir John,\u201d said he, with a stern and commanding air. \u201cYou bade\nyour porter tell me that I was either knave or fool, and you were right,\nfor I have erred in delegating my power to a knave like you.\u201d\n\nIn tremulous accents the warden attempted to excuse himself by\nstammering out that he did not know he was wanted by his Majesty.\n\n\u201cBut I sent you a message that I wished to speak with you on business of\nimportance, and you refused to be disturbed. The meanest of my subjects\nhas access to me at all times. I hear before I condemn, and shall do so\nwith you, against whom I have many and heavy charges.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill it please your Majesty to honour my humble dwelling with your\npresence, and afford me an opportunity of speaking in my own defence?\u201d\nsaid the justly alarmed warden.\n\n\u201cNo, Sir John, I will not enter beneath that roof as a judge, where I\nwas refused admission as a petitioner. I hold my court at Hoddam Castle,\nwhere I command your immediate attendance; where I will hear your answer\nto the charges I have against you. In the meantime, before our\ndeparture, you will give orders for the entertainment of my retinue, men\nand horses, at your castle, during my stay in Annandale.\u201d\n\nThe king then appointed several of the lords in attendance to accompany\nhim to Hoddam Castle, whither he commanded the warden to follow him with\nall possible despatch.\n\nSir John was conscious of negligence, and even something worse, in the\ndischarge of his duty, although ignorant of the particular charges to be\nbrought against him; but when ushered into the presence of his\nsovereign, he endeavoured to assume the easy confidence of innocence.\n\nJames proceeded to business, by inquiring if there was not a recent\nincursion of a small marauding party, in which a poor widow\u2019s cow was\ncarried off, her house plundered, and her son taken prisoner; and if she\ndid not early next morning state this to him, requesting him to recover\nher property.\n\n\u201cDid you, Sir John, do your utmost in the case?\u201d\n\n\u201cI acknowledge I did not; but the widow shall have the best cow in my\npossession, and her house furnished anew. I hope that will satisfy your\nMajesty.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd her son, how is he to be restored?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen we have the good fortune to make an English prisoner, he can be\nexchanged.\u201d\n\n\u201cMark me! Sir John. If Wallace Maxwell is not brought before me in good\nhealth within a week from this date, you shall hang by the neck from\nthat tree waving before the window. I have no more to say at present. Be\nready to wait on me in one hour when your presence is required.\u201d\n\nThe warden knew the determined resolution of the king, and instantly\ndespatched a confidential servant, vested with full powers to procure\nthe liberation of Wallace Maxwell, at whatever price, and to bring him\nsafely back without a moment\u2019s delay. In the meantime, the retinue of\nmen and horses, amounting to several hundreds, were living at free\nquarters, in Sir John\u2019s castle, and the visits of the king diffusing\ngladness and joy over the whole country.\n\nNext morning James sent the young nobleman, whom he had pointed out to\nthe widow at Stirling, to bring her and Mary Morrison to Hoddam Castle.\nHe received both with easy condescension; when the widow, with much\ngrateful humility, endeavoured to express her thanks, saying that Sir\nJohn had last evening sent her a cow worth double that she had lost;\nalso blankets, and other articles of higher value than all that had been\ncarried away; but, with tears in her eyes, she said, all these were as\nnothing without her dear son. Assuring them that their request had not\nbeen neglected, James dismissed them, with the joyful hope of soon\nseeing Wallace, as he would send for them immediately on his arrival.\n\nThe distress of the warden increased every hour, for he was a prisoner\nin his own castle; and his feelings may be conjectured, when he received\na message from the king, commanding him to come to Hoddam Castle next\nday by noon, and either bring Wallace Maxwell along with him, or prepare\nfor a speedy exit into the next world. He had just seen the sun rise, of\nwhich it seemed probable he should never see the setting, when his\nservant arrived with Wallace, whose liberty had been purchased at an\nexorbitant ransom. Without allowing the young man to rest, Sir John\nhurried him off to Hoddam Castle, and sent in a message that he waited\nan audience of his Majesty.\n\nTo make sure of the youth\u2019s identity, the king sent instantly for his\nmother, and the meeting called forth all the best feelings of his heart,\nfor maternal affection triumphed over every other emotion, and it was\nonly after the first ebullition of it had subsided, that she bade him\nkneel to his sovereign, to whom he owed his liberty, and most probably\nhis life. Wallace gracefully bent his knee, and took Heaven to witness\nthat both should be devoted to his Majesty\u2019s service.\n\nJames was delighted with the manly appearance and gallant behaviour of\nWallace; and, after having satisfied himself of the sincerity of his\nattachment to Mary, he ordered him to withdraw.\n\nHe next despatched a messenger for Mary, who, the moment she came, was\nushered into the presence of Sir John; James marking the countenance of\nboth,\u2014that of Mary flushed with resentment, while her eye flashed with\nindignant fire. The pale and deadly hue which overspread the warden\u2019s\ncheek was a tacit acknowledgment of his guilt.\n\n\u201cDo you know that young woman, Sir John? Reply to my questions truly;\nand be assured that your life depends upon the sincerity of your\nanswers,\u201d said the king, in a determined and stern voice.\n\n\u201cYes, my liege, I have seen her,\u201d said Sir John, his lip quivering, and\nhis tongue faltering.\n\n\u201cWhere?\u201d\n\n\u201cAt Amisfield.\u201d\n\n\u201cOn what occasion?\u201d\n\n\u201cShe came to me for the release of Wallace Maxwell.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you refused her, except upon conditions which were an insult to\nher, and a disgrace to yourself. Speak; is it not so?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo my shame, my sovereign, I confess my guilt; but I am willing to make\nall the reparation in my power; and I leave it to be named by your\nMajesty.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou deserve to be hanged, Sir John; but when I look on that face, I\nacknowledge your temptation, and it pleads a mitigation of punishment.\nYou know that Mary loves and is beloved by Wallace Maxwell, whom you\nhave already ransomed; you shall give him a farm of not less than fifty\nacres of good land, rent-free, during his life, or that of the woman he\nmarries; and, further, you shall stock it with cattle, and every article\nnecessary, with a comfortable dwelling;\u2014all this you shall perform\nwithin three months from this date. If you think these conditions hard,\nI give you the alternative of swinging from that tree before sunset.\nTake your choice.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy sovereign, I submit to the conditions, and promise that I shall do\nmy best to make the couple happy.\u201d\n\nWallace was now called in, when Mary clasped him in her arms, both\nfalling on their knees before their sovereign. He raised them up and\nsaid, \u201cI have tried both your loves, and found them faithful. Your Mary\nis all that you believed her, and brings you a dowry which she will\nexplain. I shall see your hands united before I leave Annandale, and\npreside at the feast. Let your care of the widow be a remuneration for\nwhat she has done for both, and I trust all of you will long remember\nthe Gudeman of Ballengeich\u2019s visit to Annandale.\u201d\u2014_Edinburgh Literary\nGazette._\n\n\n\n\n THE ALEHOUSE PARTY:\n _A CHAPTER FROM AN UNPUBLISHED NOVEL_.\n\n BY THE AUTHORS OF \u201cTHE ODD VOLUME.\u201d\n\n The night drave on wi\u2019 sangs and clatter,\n And aye the ale was growing better.\u2014BURNS.\n\n\nOn the evening of that day which saw Mrs Wallace enter Park a bride,\nRobin Kinniburgh and a number of his cronies met at the village alehouse\nto celebrate the happy event. Every chair, stool, and bench being\noccupied, Robin and his chum, Tammy Tacket, took possession of the top\nof the meal girnel; and as they were elevated somewhat above the\ncompany, they appeared like two rival provosts, looking down on their\nsurrounding bailies.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a gude thing,\u201d said Tammy, \u201cthat the wives and weans are keepit\nout the night; folk get enough o\u2019 them at hame.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wonder,\u201d said Jamie Wilson, \u201cwhat\u2019s become o\u2019 Andrew Gilmour.\u201d\n\n\u201cHae ye no heard,\u201d said Robin, \u201cthat his wife died yesterday?\u201d\n\n\u201cIs she dead?\u201d exclaimed Tammy Tacket. \u201cFaith,\u201d continued he, giving\nRobin a jog with his elbow, \u201cI think a man might hae waur furniture in\nhis house than a dead wife.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a truth,\u201d replied Jamie Wilson, \u201cas mony an honest man kens to\nhis cost.\u2014But send round the pint stoup, and let us hae a health to the\nlaird and the leddy, and mony happy years to them and theirs.\u201d\n\nWhen the applause attending this toast had subsided, Robin was\nuniversally called on for a song.\n\n\u201cI hae the hoast,\u201d answered Robin; \u201cthat\u2019s aye what the leddies say when\nthey are asked to sing.\u201d\n\n\u201cDeil a hoast is about you,\u201d cried Wattie Shuttle; \u201ccome awa wi\u2019 a sang\nwithout mair ado.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel,\u201d replied Robin, \u201cwhat maun be, maun be; so I\u2019ll gie ye a sang\nthat was made by a laddie that lived east-awa; he was aye daundering,\npoor chiel, amang the broomie knowes, and mony\u2019s the time I hae seen him\nlying at the side o\u2019 the wimpling burn, writing on ony bit paper he\ncould get haud o\u2019. After he was dead, this bit sang was found in his\npocket, and his puir mother gied it to me, as a kind o\u2019 keepsake; and\nnow I\u2019ll let you hear it,\u2014I sing it to the tune o\u2019 \u2018I hae laid a herrin\u2019\nin saut.\u2019\u201d\n\nSONG.\n\n It\u2019s I\u2019m a sweet lassie, without e\u2019er a faut;\n Sae ilka ane tells me,\u2014sae it maun be true;\n To his kail my auld faither has plenty o\u2019 saut,\n And that brings the lads in gowpens to woo.\n There\u2019s Saunders M\u2018Latchie, wha bides at the Mill,\n He wants a wee wifie, to bake and to brew;\n But Saunders, for me, at the Mill may stay still,\n For his first wife was pushioned, if what they say\u2019s true.\n\n The next is Tam Watt, who is grieve to the Laird,\u2014\n Last Sabbath, at puir me a sheep\u2019s e\u2019e he threw;\n But Tam\u2019s like the picters I\u2019ve seen o\u2019 Blue Beard,\n And sic folk\u2019s no that chancie, if what they say\u2019s true.\n Then there\u2019s Grierson the cobbler, he\u2019ll fleech an\u2019 he\u2019ll beg,\n That I\u2019d be his awl in awl, darlin\u2019 and doo;\n But Grierson the cobbler\u2019s a happity leg,\n And nae man that hobbles need come here to woo.\n\n And there\u2019s Murdoch the gauger, wha rides a blind horse,\n And nae man can mak a mair beautifu\u2019 boo;\n But I shall ne\u2019er tak him, for better, for worse,\n For, sax days a week, gauger Murdoch is fou.\n I wonder when Willie Waught\u2019s faither \u2019ll dee;\n (I wonder hoo that brings the blude to my brow;)\n I wonder if Willie will then be for me;\u2014\n I wonder if then he\u2019ll be coming to woo?\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s your turn now to sing, Tammy,\u201d said Robin, \u201calthough I dinna ken\nthat ye are very gude at it.\u201d\n\n\u201cMe sing!\u201d cried Tammy, \u201cI canna even sing a psalm, far less a sang; but\nif ye like, I\u2019ll tell you a story.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome awa then, a story is next best; but haud a\u2019 your tongues there,\nyou chiels,\u201d cried Robin, giving the wink to his cronies; \u201cwe a\u2019 ken\nTammy is unco gude at telling a story, mair especially if it be about\nhimsel.\u201d\n\n\u201cAweel,\u201d said Tammy, clearing his throat, \u201cI\u2019ll tell you what happened\nto me when I was ance in Embro\u2019. I fancy ye a\u2019 ken the Calton hill?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhatna daftlike question is that, when ye ken very weel we hae a\u2019 been\nin Embro\u2019 as weel as yoursel?\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel then,\u201d began Tammy, \u201cI was coming ower the hill\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat hill?\u201d asked Jamie Wilson. \u201cCorstorphine hill?\u201d\n\n\u201cCorstorphine fiddlestick!\u201d exclaimed Tammy. \u201cDid ye no hear me say the\nCalton hill at the first, which, ye ken, is thought there the principal\nhill?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s that ye\u2019re saying about Principal Hill?\u201d asked Robin. \u201cI kent\nhim weel ance in a day.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, Tammy,\u201d cried Willie Walkinshaw, \u201ccan ye no gang on wi\u2019 your\nstory, without a\u2019 this balwavering and nonsense about coming ower ane o\u2019\nour Professors; my faith, it\u2019s no an easy matter to come ower some o\u2019\nthem.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery weel,\u201d said Tammy, a little angrily, \u201cI\u2019ll say nae mair about it,\nbut just drap the hill.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhaur, whaur?\u201d cried several voices at once.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m thinkin\u2019,\u201d said Robin, drily, \u201csome o\u2019 the Embro\u2019 folk would be\nmuckle obliged to ye if ye would drap it in the Nor\u2019 Loch.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re a set o\u2019 gomerals!\u201d exclaimed Tammy, in great wrath. \u201cI meant\nnaething o\u2019 the sort; but only that I would gie ower speaking about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo we\u2019re no to hae the story after a\u2019?\u201d said Matthew Henderson.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Tammy; \u201cI\u2019m quite agreeable to tell\u2019t, if ye will only sit\nstill and haud your tongues. Aweel, I was coming ower the hill ae\nnight.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Odsake, Tammy,\u201d cried Robin, \u201cwill ye ne\u2019er get ower that hill? Ye hae\ntell\u2019t us that ten times already; gang on, man, wi\u2019 the story.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen, to mak a lang story short, as I was coming ower the hill ae night\nabout ten o\u2019clock I fell in\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cFell in!\u201d cried Matthew Henderson, \u201cWhaur? Was\u2019t a hole, or a well?\u201d\n\n\u201cI fell in,\u201d replied Tammy, \u201cwi\u2019 a man.\u201d\n\n\u201cFell in wi\u2019 a man!\u201d said Willie Walkinshaw. \u201cWeel, as there were twa o\u2019\nye, ye could help ane anither out.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na,\u201d roared Tammy, \u201cI dinna mean that at a\u2019; I just cam up wi\u2019\nhim.\u201d\n\n\u201cI doubt, Tammy,\u201d cried Robin, giving a sly wink to his cronies, \u201cif ye\ngaed up the Calton hill wi\u2019 a man at ten o\u2019clock at night, I\u2019m thinking\nye\u2019ll hae been boozing some gate or ither wi\u2019 him afore that.\u201d\n\n\u201cMe boozing?\u201d cried Tammy. \u201cI ne\u2019er saw the man\u2019s face afore or since;\nunless it was in the police office the next day.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, Tammy Tacket,\u201d said Robin, gravely, \u201cjust tak a\u2019 frien\u2019s advice,\nand gie ower sic splores; they\u2019re no creditable to a decent married man\nlike you; and dinna be bleezing and bragging about being in the police\noffice; for it stands to reason ye wouldna be there for ony gude.\u201d\n\n\u201cDeil tak me,\u201d cried Tammy, jumping up on the meal girnel, and\nbrandishing the pint stoup, \u201cif I dinna fling this at the head of the\nfirst man who says a word afore I be done wi\u2019 my story:\u2014And, as I said\nbefore, I fell in\u2014\u201d\n\nPoor Tammy was not at all prepared for his words being so soon verified,\nfor, in his eagerness to enforce attention, he stamped violently with\nhis hobnailed shoe on the girnel, which giving way with a loud crash,\nTammy suddenly disappeared from the view of the astonished party. Robin,\nwho had barely time to save himself from the falling ruins, was still\nlaughing with all his might, when Mrs Scoreup burst in upon them,\nsaying, \u201cWhat the sorrow is a\u2019 this stramash about?\u201d\u2014but seeing a pale\nand ghastly figure rearing itself from the very heart of her meal\ngirnel, she ejaculated, \u201cGude preserve us!\u201d and, retreating a few steps,\nseized the broth ladle, and prepared to stand on the defensive.\n\nAt this moment Grizzy Tacket made her appearance at the open door,\nsaying, \u201cIs blethering Tam here?\u201d\n\n\u201cHelp me out, Robin, man,\u201d cried Tammy.\n\n\u201cHelp ye out!\u201d said Grizzy; \u201cWhat the sorrow took you in there, ye\ndrucken ne\u2019er-do-weel?\u201d\n\n\u201cDinna abuse your gudeman, wife,\u201d said Jamie Wilson.\n\n\u201cGudeman!\u201d retorted Grizzy; \u201ctroth, there\u2019s few o\u2019 ye deserve the name;\nand as for that idle loon, I ken he\u2019ll no work a stroke the morn, though\nwife and weans should want baith milk and meal.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Odsake, wife,\u201d cried Robin, \u201cif ye shake Tammy weel, he\u2019ll keep ye a\u2019\nin parritch for a week.\u201d\n\n\u201c_She\u2019ll_ shake him,\u201d cried the angry Mrs Scoreup; \u201ccocks are free o\u2019\nhorses\u2019 corn; _I\u2019ll_ shake him,\u201d making, as she spoke, towards the\nunfortunate half-choked Tammy.\n\n\u201cWill ye, faith?\u201d screamed Grizzy, putting her arms akimbo. \u201cWill ye\noffer to lay a hand on my gudeman, and me standing here? Come out this\nminute, ye Jonadub, and come hame to your ain house.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo ae fit shall he steer frae this,\u201d cried Mrs Scoreup, slapping-to the\ndoor, \u201ctill I see wha is to pay me for the spoiling o\u2019 my gude new\ngirnel, forby the meal that\u2019s wasted.\u201d\n\n\u201cNew girnel!\u201d exclaimed Grizzy, with a provoking sneer, \u201cit\u2019s about as\nauld as yoursel, and as little worth.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe ill-tongued randy!\u201d cried Mrs Scoreup, giving the ladle a most\nportentous flourish.\n\n\u201cWhisht, whisht, gudewife,\u201d said Robin; \u201csay nae mair about it, we\u2019ll\nmak it up amang us; and now, Grizzy, tak Tammy awa hame.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s no right in you, Robin,\u201d said Grizzy, \u201cto be filling Tammy fou,\nand keeping decent folks out o\u2019 their beds till this time o\u2019 night.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a\u2019 Tammy\u2019s faut,\u201d replied Robin; \u201cfor ye ken as well as me, that\nwhen ance he begins to tell a story, there\u2019s nae such thing as stopping\nhim; he has been blethering about the Calton hill at nae allowance.\u201d\n\nThe last words seemed to strike on Tammy\u2019s ear; who hiccuped out, \u201cAs I\ncam ower the Calton hill\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cWill naebody stap a peat in that man\u2019s hause?\u201d exclaimed Matthew\nHenderson. \u201cFor ony sake, honest woman, tak him awa, or we\u2019ll be keepit\non the Calton hill the whole night.\u201d\n\n\u201cTak haud o\u2019 me, Tammy,\u201d said Robin; \u201cI\u2019ll gang hame wi\u2019 ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can gang mysel,\u201d said Tammy, giving Robin a shove, and staggering\ntowards the door.\n\n\u201cGang yoursel!\u201d cried Grizzy, as she followed her helpmate; \u201cye dinna\nlook very like it:\u201d and thus the party broke up\u2014\n\n And each went aff their separate way,\n Resolved to meet anither day.\n\n\n\n\n AUCHINDRANE; OR, THE AYRSHIRE TRAGEDY.\n\n BY SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n\nJohn Muir, or Mure, of Auchindrane, was a gentleman of an ancient family\nand good estate, in the west of Scotland, bold, ambitious, treacherous\nto the last degree, and utterly unconscientious,\u2014a Richard the Third in\nprivate life, inaccessible alike to pity and remorse. His view was to\nraise the power and extend the grandeur of his own family. This\ngentleman had married the daughter of Thomas Kennedy of Barganie, who\nwas, excepting the Earl of Cassilis, the most important person in all\nCarrick, the district of Ayrshire which he inhabited, and where the name\nof Kennedy held so great a sway as to give rise to the popular rhyme,\u2014\n\n \u2019Twixt Wigton and the town of Ayr,\n Portpatrick and the Cruives of Cree,\n No man need think for to bide there,\n Unless he court the Kennedie.\n\nNow, Muir of Auchindrane, who had promised himself high advancement by\nmeans of his father-in-law, saw, with envy and resentment, that his\ninfluence remained second and inferior to the house of Cassilis, chief\nof all the Kennedies. The Earl was indeed a minor, but his authority was\nmaintained and his affairs well managed by his uncle, Sir Thomas Kennedy\nof Culleyne, the brother to the deceased earl, and tutor and guardian to\nthe present. This worthy gentleman supported his nephew\u2019s dignity and\nthe credit of the house so effectually that Barganie\u2019s consequence was\nmuch thrown into the shade, and the ambitious Auchindrane, his\nson-in-law, saw no better remedy than to remove so formidable a rival as\nCulleyne by violent means.\n\nFor this purpose, in the year 1597, he came with a party of followers to\nthe town of Maybole (where Sir Thomas Kennedy of Culleyne resided), and\nlay in ambush in an orchard through which he knew that his destined\nvictim was to pass, in returning homewards from a house where he was\nengaged to sup. Sir Thomas Kennedy came alone and unattended, when he\nwas suddenly seized and fired upon by Auchindrane and his accomplices,\nwho, having missed their aim, drew their swords and rushed upon him to\nslay him. But the party thus assailed at disadvantage had the good\nfortune to hide himself for that time in a ruinous house, where he lay\nconcealed till the inhabitants of the place came to his assistance.\n\nSir Thomas Kennedy prosecuted Muir for this assault, who, finding\nhimself in danger from the law, made a sort of apology and agreement\nwith the Lord of Culleyne, to whose daughter he united his eldest son,\nin testimony of the closest friendship in future. This agreement was\nsincere on the part of Kennedy, who, after it had been entered into,\nshowed himself Auchindrane\u2019s friend and assistant on all occasions. But\nit was most false and treacherous on that of Muir, who continued the\npurpose of murdering his new friend and ally on the first opportunity.\n\nAuchindrane\u2019s first attempt to effect this was by means of the young\nGilbert Kennedy of Barganie (for old Barganie, Auchindrane\u2019s\nfather-in-law, was dead), whom he persuaded to brave Cassilis, as one\nwho usurped an undue influence over the rest of the name. Accordingly,\nthis hot-headed youth, at the instigation of Auchindrane, rode past the\ngate of the Earl of Cassilis without waiting on his chief, or sending\nhim any message of civility. This led to mutual defiance, being regarded\nby the earl, according to the ideas of the time, as a personal insult.\nBoth parties took the field with their followers, at the head of about\ntwo hundred and fifty men on each side. The action which ensued was\nshorter and less bloody than might have been expected. Young Barganie,\nwith the rashness of headlong courage, and Auchindrane, fired by deadly\nenmity to the house of Cassilis, made a precipitate attack on the earl,\nwhose men were strongly posted and under cover. They were received by a\nheavy fire. Barganie was slain. Muir of Auchindrane, severely wounded in\nthe thigh, became unable to sit on his horse, and the leaders thus slain\nor disabled, their party drew off without continuing the action. It must\nbe particularly observed that Sir Thomas Kennedy remained neuter in this\nquarrel, considering his connection with Auchindrane as too intimate to\nbe broken even by his desire to assist his nephew.\n\nFor this temperate and honourable conduct he met a vile reward; for\nAuchindrane, in resentment of the loss of his relative Barganie, and the\ndownfall of his ambitious hopes, continued his practices against the\nlife of Sir Thomas of Culleyne, and chance favoured his wicked purpose.\n\nThe knight of Culleyne, finding himself obliged to go to Edinburgh on a\nparticular day, sent a message by a servant to Muir, in which he told\nhim, in the most unsuspecting confidence, the purpose of his journey,\nand named the road which he proposed to take, inviting Muir to meet him\nat Duppill, to the west of the town of Ayr, a place appointed for the\npurpose of giving him any commissions which he might have for Edinburgh,\nand assuring his treacherous ally he would attend to any business which\nhe might have in the Scottish metropolis as anxiously as to his own. Sir\nThomas Kennedy\u2019s message was carried to the town of Maybole, where his\nmessenger, for some trivial reason, had the import committed to writing\nby a schoolmaster in that town, and despatched it to its destination by\nmeans of a poor student, named Dalrymple, instead of carrying it to the\nhouse of Auchindrane in person.\n\nThis suggested to Muir a diabolical plot. Having thus received tidings\nof Sir Thomas Kennedy\u2019s motions, he conceived the infernal purpose of\nhaving the confiding friend who sent the information waylaid and\nmurdered at the place appointed to meet with him, not only in\nfriendship, but for the purpose of rendering him service. He dismissed\nthe messenger Dalrymple, cautioning the lad to carry back the letter to\nMaybole, and to say that he had not found him, Auchindrane, in his\nhouse. Having taken this precaution, he proceeded to instigate the\nbrother of the slain Gilbert of Barganie, Thomas Kennedy of Drumurghie\nby name, and Walter Muir of Cloncaird, a kinsman of his own, to take\nthis opportunity of revenging Barganie\u2019s death. The fiery young men were\neasily induced to undertake the crime. They waylaid the unsuspecting Sir\nThomas of Culleyne at the place appointed to meet the traitor\nAuchindrane, and the murderers having in company five or six servants\nwell mounted and armed, assaulted and cruelly murdered him with many\nwounds.\n\nThe revenge due for his uncle\u2019s murder was keenly pursued by the Earl of\nCassilis. As the murderers fled from trial, they were declared outlaws;\nwhich doom being pronounced by three blasts of a horn, was called \u201cbeing\nput to the horn, and declared the king\u2019s rebel.\u201d Muir of Auchindrane was\nstrongly suspected of having been the instigator of the crime. But he\nconceived there could be no evidence to prove his guilt if he could keep\nthe boy Dalrymple out of the way, who delivered the letter which made\nhim acquainted with Culleyne\u2019s journey, and the place at which he meant\nto halt. Muir brought Dalrymple to his house, but the youth tiring of\nthis confinement, Muir sent him to reside with a friend, Montgomery of\nSkelmorley, who maintained him under a borrowed name amid the desert\nregions of the then almost savage island of Arran. Being confident in\nthe absence of this material witness, Auchindrane, instead of flying\nlike his agents Drumurghie and Cloncaird, presented himself boldly at\nthe bar, demanded a fair trial, and offered his person in combat to the\ndeath against any of Lord Cassilis\u2019 friends who might impugn his\ninnocence. This audacity was successful, and he was dismissed without\ntrial.\n\nStill, however, Muir did not consider himself safe so long as Dalrymple\nwas within the realm of Scotland; and the danger grew more pressing,\nwhen he learned that the lad had become impatient of the restraint which\nhe sustained in the island of Arran, and returned to some of his friends\nin Ayrshire. Muir no sooner heard of this than he again obtained\npossession of the boy\u2019s person, and a second time concealed him in\nAuchindrane, until he found an opportunity to transport him to the Low\nCountries, where he contrived to have him enlisted in Buccleuch\u2019s\nregiment; trusting, doubtless, that some one of the numerous chances of\nwar might destroy the poor young man whose life was so dangerous to him.\n\nBut after five or six years\u2019 uncertain safety, bought at the expense of\nso much violence and cunning, Auchindrane\u2019s fears were exasperated with\nfrenzy, when he found this dangerous witness, having escaped from all\nthe perils of climate and battle, had left, or been discharged from, the\nLegion of Borderers, and had again accomplished his return to Ayrshire.\nThere is ground to suspect that Dalrymple knew the nature of the hold\nwhich he possessed over Auchindrane, and was desirous of extorting from\nhis fears some better provision than he had found either in Arran or the\nNetherlands. But, if so, it was a fatal experiment to tamper with the\nfears of such a man as Auchindrane, who determined to rid himself\neffectually of this unhappy young man.\n\nMuir now lodged him in a house of his own, called Chapeldonan, tenanted\nby a vassal and connection of his, named James Bannatyne. This man he\ncommissioned to meet him at ten o\u2019clock at night, on the sea-sands, near\nGirvan, and bring with him the unfortunate Dalrymple, the object of his\nfear and dread. The victim seems to have come with Bannatyne without the\nleast suspicion. When Bannatyne and Dalrymple came to the appointed\nspot, Auchindrane met them, accompanied by his eldest son James. Old\nAuchindrane, having taken Bannatyne aside, imparted his bloody purpose\nof ridding himself of Dalrymple for ever, by murdering him on the spot.\nHis own life and honour were, he said, endangered by the manner in which\nthis inconvenient witness repeatedly thrust himself back into Ayrshire,\nand nothing could secure his safety but taking the lad\u2019s life, in which\naction he requested James Bannatyne\u2019s assistance. Bannatyne felt some\ncompunction, and remonstrated against the cruel expedient, saying it\nwould be better to transport Dalrymple to Ireland, and take precautions\nagainst his return. While old Auchindrane seemed disposed to listen to\nthis proposal, his son concluded that the time was come for\naccomplishing the purpose of their meeting, and without waiting the\ntermination of his father\u2019s conference with Bannatyne, he rushed\nsuddenly on Dalrymple, beat him to the ground, and kneeling down upon\nhim, with his father\u2019s assistance accomplished the crime, by strangling\nthe unhappy object of their fear and jealousy. Bannatyne, the witness,\nand partly the accomplice, of the murder, assisted them in their attempt\nto make a hole in the sand with a spade which they had brought on\npurpose, in order to conceal the dead body. But as the tide was coming\nin, the hole which they made filled with water before they could get the\nbody buried; and the ground seemed, to their terrified consciences, to\nrefuse to be accessory to concealing their crime. Despairing of hiding\nthe corpse in the manner they proposed, the murderers carried it out\ninto the sea as deep as they dared wade, and there abandoned it to the\nbillows, trusting that the wind, which was blowing off the shore, would\ndrive these remains of their crime out to sea, where they would never\nmore be heard of. But the sea, as well as the land, seemed unwilling to\nconceal their cruelty. After floating for some hours, or days, the body\nwas, by the wind and tide, again driven on shore, near the very spot\nwhere the murder had been committed.\n\nThis attracted general attention; and when the corpse was known to be\nthat of the same William Dalrymple whom Auchindrane had so often\nspirited out of the country, or concealed when he was in it, a strong\nand general suspicion arose that this young person had met with foul\nplay from the bold bad man, who had shown himself so much interested in\nhis absence. Auchindrane, indeed, found himself so much the object of\nsuspicion from this new crime that he resolved to fly from justice, and\nsuffer himself to be declared a rebel and an outlaw rather than face a\ntrial. He accordingly sought to provide himself with some ostensible\ncause for avoiding the law, with which the feelings of his kindred and\nfriends might sympathise; and none occurred to him as so natural as an\nassault upon some friend and adherent of the Earl of Cassilis. Should he\nkill such a one, it would be indeed an unlawful action, but so far from\nbeing infamous, would be accounted the natural consequence of the avowed\nquarrel between the families. With this purpose, Muir, with the\nassistance of a relative, of whom he seems always to have had some ready\nto execute his worst purposes, beset Hugh Kennedy of Garriehorne, a\nfollower of the earl, against whom they had especial ill-will, fired\ntheir pistols at him, and used other means to put him to death. But\nGarriehorne, a stout-hearted man and well-armed, defended himself in a\nvery different manner from the unfortunate knight of Culleyne, and beat\noff the assailants, wounding young Auchindrane in the right hand, so\nthat he wellnigh lost the use of it.\n\nBut though Auchindrane\u2019s purpose did not entirely succeed, he availed\nhimself of it to circulate a report that if he could obtain a pardon for\nfiring upon his feudal enemy with pistols, weapons declared unlawful by\nAct of Parliament, he would willingly stand his trial for the death of\nDalrymple, respecting which he protested his total innocence. The king,\nhowever, was decidedly of opinion that the Muirs, both father and son,\nwere alike guilty of both crimes, and used intercession with the Earl of\nAbercorn, as a person of power in these western counties, as well as in\nIreland, to arrest and transmit them prisoners to Edinburgh. In\nconsequence of the Earl\u2019s exertions, old Auchindrane was made prisoner,\nand lodged in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh.\n\nYoung Auchindrane no sooner heard that his father was in custody, than\nhe became as apprehensive of Bannatyne, the accomplice in Dalrymple\u2019s\nmurder, telling tales, as ever his father had been of Dalrymple. He\ntherefore hastened to him, and prevailed on him to pass over for a while\nto the neighbouring coast of Ireland, finding him money and means to\naccomplish the voyage, and engaging in the meantime to take care of his\naffairs in Scotland. Secure, as they thought, in this precaution, old\nAuchindrane persisted in his innocence, and his son found security to\nstand his trial. Both appeared with the same confidence at the day\nappointed. The trial was, however, postponed, and Muir the elder\ndismissed, under high security to return when called for.\n\nBut King James, being convinced of the guilt of the accused, ordered\nyoung Auchindrane, instead of being sent to trial, to be examined under\nthe force of torture, in order to compel him to tell whatever he knew of\nthe things charged against him. He was accordingly severely tortured;\nbut the result only served to show that such examinations are as useless\nas they are cruel.\n\nYoung Auchindrane, a strong and determined ruffian, endured the torture\nwith the utmost firmness, and by the constant audacity with which, in\nspite of the intolerable pain, he continued to assert his innocence, he\nspread so favourable an opinion of his case, that the detaining him in\nprison, instead of bringing him to open trial, was censured as severe\nand oppressive. James, however, remained firmly persuaded of his guilt,\nand by an exertion of authority quite inconsistent with our present\nlaws, commanded young Auchindrane to be still detained in close custody\ntill further light could be thrown on these dark proceedings.\n\nIn the meanwhile, old Auchindrane being, as we have seen, at liberty on\npledges, skulked about in the west, feeling how little security he had\ngained by Dalrymple\u2019s murder, and that he had placed himself by that\ncrime in the power of Bannatyne, whose evidence concerning the death of\nDalrympie could not be less fatal than what Dalrymple might have told\nconcerning Auchindrane\u2019s accession to the conspiracy against Sir Thomas\nKennedy of Culleyne. But though the event had shown the error of his\nwicked policy, Auchindrane could think of no better mode in this case\nthan that which had failed in relation to Dalrymple. When any man\u2019s life\nbecame inconsistent with his own safety, no idea seems to have occurred\nto this inveterate ruffian save to murder the person by whom he might\nhimself be any way endangered. Bannatyne, knowing with what sort of men\nhe had to deal, kept on his guard, and by this caution disconcerted more\nthan one attempt to take his life. At length Bannatyne, tiring of this\nstate of insecurity, and in despair of escaping such repeated plots, and\nalso feeling remorse for the crime to which he had been accessory,\nresolved rather to submit himself to the severity of the law than remain\nthe object of the principal criminal\u2019s practices. He surrendered himself\nto the Earl of Abercorn, and was conveyed to Edinburgh, where he\nconfessed before the king and council all the particulars of the murder\nof Dalrymple, and the attempt to hide his body by committing it to the\nsea.\n\nWhen Bannatyne was confronted with the two Muirs before the Privy\nCouncil, they denied with vehemence every part of the evidence he had\ngiven, and affirmed that the witness had been bribed to destroy them by\na false tale. Bannatyne\u2019s behaviour seemed sincere and simple, that of\nAuchindrane more resolute and crafty. The wretched accomplice fell upon\nhis knees, invoking God to witness that all the land in Scotland could\nnot have bribed him to bring a false accusation against a master whom he\nhad served, loved, and followed in so many dangers, and calling upon\nAuchindrane to honour God by confessing the crime he had committed. Muir\nthe elder, on the other hand, boldly replied, that he hoped God would\nnot so far forsake him as to permit him to confess a crime of which he\nwas innocent, and exhorted Bannatyne in his turn to confess the\npractices by which he had been induced to devise such falsehoods against\nhim.\n\nThe two Muirs, father and son, were therefore put upon their solemn\ntrial, along with Bannatyne, in 1611, and after a great deal of evidence\nhad been brought in support of Bannatyne\u2019s confession, all three were\nfound guilty. The elder Auchindrane was convicted of counselling and\ndirecting the murder of Sir Thomas Kennedy of Culleyne, and also of the\nactual murder of the lad Dalrymple. Bannatyne and the younger Muir were\nfound guilty of the latter crime, and all three were sentenced to be\nbeheaded. Bannatyne, however, the accomplice, received the king\u2019s\npardon, in consequence of his voluntary surrender and confession. The\ntwo Muirs were both executed. The younger was affected by the\nremonstrances of the clergy who attended him, and he confessed the guilt\nof which he was accused. The father also was at length brought to avow\nthe fact, but in other respects died as impenitent as he had lived; and\nso ended this dark and extraordinary tragedy.\n\n\n\n\n A TALE OF THE PLAGUE IN EDINBURGH.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\nIn several parts of Scotland, such things are to be found as \u201ctales\u201d of\nthe Plague. Amidst so much human suffering as the events of a pestilence\nnecessarily involved, it is of course to be supposed that, occasionally,\ncircumstances would occur of a peculiarly disastrous and affecting\ndescription,\u2014that many loving hearts would be torn asunder, or laid side\nby side in the grave, many orphans left desolate, and patriarchs bereft\nof all their descendants, and that cases of so painful a sort as called\nforth greater compassion at the time, would be remembered, after much of\nthe ordinary details was generally forgotten. The celebrated story of\nBessy Bell and Mary Gray is a case in point. So romantic, so mournful a\ntale, appealing as it does to every bosom, could not fail to be\ncommemorated, even though it had been destitute of the great charm of\nlocality. Neither could such a tale of suffering and horror as that of\nthe Teviotdale shepherd\u2019s family ever be forgotten in the district where\nit occurred,\u2014interesting at it is, has been, and will be, to every\nsuccessive generation of mothers, and duly listened to and shuddered at\nby so many infantine audiences. In the course of our researches, we have\nlikewise picked up a few extraordinary circumstances connected with the\nlast visit paid by the plague to Edinburgh; which, improbable as they\nmay perhaps appear, we believe to be, to a certain extent, allied to\ntruth, and shall now submit them to our readers.\n\nWhen Edinburgh was afflicted, for the last time, with the pestilence,\nsuch was its effect upon the energies of the citizens, and so long was\nits continuance, that the grass grew on the principal street, and even\nat the Cross, though that Scottish Rialto was then perhaps the most\ncrowded thoroughfare in Britain. Silence, more than that of the stillest\nmidnight, pervaded the streets during the day. The sunlight fell upon\nthe quiet houses as it falls on a line of sombre and neglected\ntombstones in some sequestered churchyard\u2014gilding, but not altering,\ntheir desolate features. The area of the High Street, on being entered\nby a stranger, might have been contemplated with feelings similar to\nthose with which Christian, in the \u201cPilgrim\u2019s Progress,\u201d viewed the\nawful courtyard of Giant Despair; for, as in that well-imagined scene,\nthe very ground bore the marks of wildness and desolation; every window\naround, like the loopholes of the dungeons in Doubting Castle, seemed to\ntell its tale of misery within, and the whole seemed to lie prostrate\nand powerless under the dominion of an unseen demon, which fancy might\nhave conceived as stalking around in a bodily form, leisurely dooming\nits subjects to successive execution.\n\nWhen the pestilence was at its greatest height, a strange perplexity\nbegan, and not without reason, to take possession of the few physicians\nand nurses who attended the sick. It was customary for the distempered\nto die, or, as the rare case happened, to recover, on a particular day\nafter having first exhibited symptoms of illness. This was an understood\nrule of the plague, which had never been known to fail. All at once, it\nbegan to appear that a good many people, especially those who were left\nalone in their houses by the death or desertion of friends, died before\nthe arrival of the critical day. In some of these cases, not only was\nthe rule of the disease broken, but, what vexed the physicians more, the\npowers of medicine seemed to have been set at defiance; for several\npatients of distinction, who had been able to purchase good attendance\nand were therefore considered as in less than ordinary danger, were\nfound to have expired after taking salutary drugs, and being left with\ngood hopes by their physicians. It almost seemed as if some new disease\nwere beginning to engraft itself upon the pestilence\u2014a new feature\nrising upon its horrid aspect. Subtle and fatal as it formerly was, it\nwas now inconceivably more so. It could formerly be calculated upon; but\nit was now quite arbitrary and precarious. Medicine had lost its power\nover it. God, who created it in its first monstrous form, appeared to\nhave endowed it with an additional sting, against which feeble mortality\ncould present no competent shield. Physicians beheld its new ravages\nwith surprise and despair; and a deeper shade of horror was spread, in\nconsequence, over the public mind.\n\nAs an air of more than natural mystery seemed to accompany this truly\ncalamitous turn of affairs, it was, of course, to be expected, in that\nsuperstitious age, that many would attribute it to a more than natural\ncause. By the ministers, it was taken for an additional manifestation of\nGod\u2019s wrath, and as such held forth in not a few pulpits, accompanied\nwith all the due exhortations to a better life, which it was not\nunlikely would be attended with good effect among the thin congregations\nof haggard and terrified scarecrows, who persisted in meeting regularly\nat places of worship. The learned puzzled themselves with conjectures as\nto its probable causes and cures; while the common people gave way to\nthe most wild and fanciful surmises, almost all of which were as far\nfrom the truth. The only popular observation worthy of any attention,\nwas that the greater part of those who suffered from this new disease\ndied during the night, and all of them while unattended.\n\nNot many days after the alarm first arose, a poor woman arrested a\nphysician in the street, and desired to confer with him a brief space.\nHe at first shook her off, saying he was at present completely engaged,\nand could take no new patients. But when she informed him that she did\nnot desire his attendance, and only wished to communicate something\nwhich might help to clear up the mystery of the late premature deaths,\nhe stopped and lent a patient ear. She told him that on the previous\nnight, having occasion to leave her house, in order to visit a sick\nneighbour, who lay upon a lonely death-bed in the second flat below her\nown garret, she took a lamp in her hand, that she might the better find\nher way down. As she descended the stair, which she described as a\n\u201cturnpike,\u201d or spiral one, she heard a low and inexpressibly doleful\nmoan, as if proceeding from the house of her neighbour,\u2014such a moan, she\nsaid, as she had ever heard proceed from any of the numerous death-beds\nit had been her lot to attend. She hastened faster down the stair than\nher limbs were well able to carry her, under the idea that her friend\nwas undergoing some severe suffering, which she might be able to\nalleviate. Before, however, she had reached the first landing-place, a\nnoise, as of footsteps, arose from the house of pain, and caused her to\napprehend that all was not right in a house which she knew no one ever\nvisited, in that time of desolation, but herself. She quickened her pace\nstill more than before, and soon reached the landing-place at her\nneighbour\u2019s door. Something, as she expressed it, seeming to \u201cswoof\u201d\ndown the stair, like the noise of a full garment brushing the walls of a\nnarrow passage, she drew in the lamp, and looking down beyond it, saw\nwhat she conceived to be the dark drapery of the back of a tall human\nfigure, loosely clad, moving, or rather gliding, out of sight, and in a\nmoment gone. So uncertain was she at first of the reality of what she\nsaw, that she believed it to be the shadow of the central pile of the\nstair gliding downwards as she brought round the light; but the state of\nmatters in the inside of the house soon convinced her, to her horror,\nthat it must have been something more dreadful and real\u2014the unfortunate\nwoman being dead; though as yet it was three days till the time when,\naccording to the old rules of the disease, she might have lived or died.\nThe physician heard this story with astonishment; but as it only\ninformed his mind, which was not free from superstition, that the whole\nmatter was becoming more and more mysterious, he drew no conclusions\nfrom it; but simply observing, with a professional shake of the head,\nthat all was not right in the town, went upon his way.\n\nThe old woman, who, of course, could not be expected to let so good a\nsubject of gossip and wonderment lie idle in her mind, like the guinea\nkept by the Vicar of Wakefield\u2019s daughters, forthwith proceeded to\ndissipate it abroad among her neighbours, who soon (to follow out the\nidea of the coin) reduced it into still larger and coarser pieces, and\npaid it away, in that exaggerated form, to a wider circle of neighbours,\nby whom it was speedily dispersed in various shapes over the whole town.\nThe popular mind, like the ear of a sick man, being then peculiarly\nsensitive, received the intelligence with a degree of alarm, such as the\nnews of a lost battle has not always occasioned amongst a people; and,\nas the atmosphere is best calculated for the conveyance of sound during\nthe time of frost, so did the air of the plague seem peculiarly well\nfitted for the propagation of this fearful report. The whole of the\npeople were impressed, on hearing the story, with a feeling of undefined\nawe, mixed with horror. The back of a tall figure, in dark long clothes,\nseen but for a moment! There was a picturesque indistinctness in the\ndescription, which left room for the imagination; taken in conjunction,\ntoo, with the moan heard at first by the old woman on the stair, and the\ndemise of the sick woman at the very time, it was truly startling. To\nadd to the panic, a report arose next day, that the figure had been seen\non the preceding evening, by different persons, flitting about various\nstairs and alleys, always in the shade, and disappearing immediately\nafter being first perceived. An idea began to prevail that it was the\nimage of Death\u2014Death, who had thus come in his personated form, to a\ncity which seemed to have been placed so peculiarly under his dominion,\nin order to execute his office with the greater promptitude. It was\nthought, if so fantastic a dream may be assigned to the thinking\nfaculty, that the grand destroyer, who, in ordinary times is invisible,\nmight, perhaps, have the power of rendering himself palpable to the\nsight in cases where he approached his victims under circumstances of\npeculiar horror; and this wild imagination was the more fearful,\ninasmuch as it was supposed that, with the increase of the mortality, he\nwould become more and more distinctly visible, till, perhaps, after\nhaving despatched all, he would burst forth in open triumph, and roam at\nlarge throughout a city of desolation.\n\nIt happened on the second day after the rise of this popular fancy, that\nan armed ship, of a very singular construction, and manned by a crew of\nstrangely foreign-looking men, entered Leith harbour. It was a Barbary\nrover; but the crew showed no intention of hostility to the town of\nLeith, though at the present pass it would have fallen an easy prey to\ntheir arms, being quite as much afflicted with the pestilence as its\nmetropolitan neighbour. A detachment of the crew, comprising one who\nappeared to be the commander, immediately landed, and proceeded to\nEdinburgh, which they did not scruple to enter. They inquired for the\nprovost, and, on being conducted to the presence of that dignitary,\ntheir chief disclosed their purpose in thus visiting Edinburgh, which\nwas the useful one of supplying it in its present distress with a cargo\nof drugs, approved in the East for their efficacy against the plague,\nand a few men who could undertake to administer them properly to the\nsick. The provost heard this intelligence with overflowing eyes; for,\nbesides the anxiety he felt about the welfare of the city, he was\nespecially interested in the health of his daughter, an only child, who\nhappened to be involved in the common calamity. The terms proposed by\nthe Africans were somewhat exorbitant. They demanded to have the half of\nthe wealth of those whom they restored to health. But the provost told\nthem that he believed many of the most wealthy citizens would be glad to\nemploy them on these terms; and, for his own part, he was willing to\nsacrifice anything he had, short of his salvation, for the benefit of\nhis daughter. Assured of at least the safety of their persons and goods,\nthe strangers drew from the ship a large quantity of medicines, and\nbegan that very evening to attend as physicians those who chose to call\nthem in. The captain\u2014a man in the prime of life, and remarkable amongst\nthe rest for his superior dress and bearing\u2014engaged himself to attend\nthe provost\u2019s daughter, who had now nearly reached the crisis of the\ndistemper, and hitherto had not been expected to survive.\n\nThe house of Sir John Smith, the provost of Edinburgh, in the year 1645,\nwas situated in the Cap-and-Feather close, an alley occupying the site\nof the present North Bridge. The bottom of this alley being closed,\nthere was no thoroughfare or egress towards the North Loch; but the\nprovost\u2019s house possessed this convenience, being the tenement which\nclosed the lower extremity, and having a back-door that opened upon an\nalley to the eastward, namely, Halkerston\u2019s Wynd. This house was, at the\ntime we speak of, crammed full of valuable goods, plate, &c., which had\nbeen deposited in the provost\u2019s hands by many of his afflicted\nfellow-citizens, under the impression that, if they survived, he was\nhonest enough to restore them unimpaired, and, if otherwise, he was\nworthy to inherit them. His daughter, who had been seized before it was\nfound possible to remove her from the town, lay in a little room at the\nback of the house, which, besides one door opening from the large\nstaircase in the front, had also a more private entry communicating with\nthe narrower and obsolete \u201cturnpike\u201d behind. At that time, little\nprecaution was taken anywhere in Scotland about the locking of doors. To\nhave the door simply closed, so that the fairies could not enter, was in\ngeneral considered sufficient, as it is at the present day in many\nremote parts. In Edinburgh, during the time of the plague, the greatest\nindifference to security of this sort prevailed. In general, the doors\nwere left unlocked from within, in order to admit the cleansers, or any\ncharitable neighbour who might come to minister to the bed-rid sick.\nThis was not exactly the case in Sir John Smith\u2019s house; for the\nmain-door was scrupulously locked, with a view to the safety of the\ngoods committed to his charge. Nevertheless, from neglect, or from want\nof apprehension, the posterior entrance was afterwards found to have\nbeen not so well secured.\n\nThe Barbary physician had administered a potion to his patient soon\nafter his admission into the house. He knew that symptoms either\nfavourable or unfavourable would speedily appear, and he therefore\nresolved to remain in the room in order to watch the result. About\nmidnight, as he sat in a remote corner of the room, looking towards the\nbed upon which his charge was extended, while a small lamp burned upon a\nlow table between, he was suddenly surprised to observe something like a\ndark cloud, unaccompanied by any noise, interpose itself slowly and\ngradually between his eyes and the bed. He at first thought that he was\ndeceived,\u2014that he was beginning to fall asleep,\u2014or that the strange\nappearance was occasioned by some peculiarity of the light, which, being\nplaced almost directly between him and the bed, caused him to see the\nlatter object very indistinctly. He was soon undeceived by hearing a\nnoise,\u2014the slightest possible,\u2014and perceiving something like motion in\nthe ill-defined lineaments of the apparition. \u201cGracious Heaven!\u201d thought\nhe, \u201ccan this be the angel of death hovering over his victim, preparing\nto strike the mortal blow, and ready to receive the departing soul into\nthe inconceivable recesses of its awful form?\u201d It almost appeared as if\nthe cloud stooped over the bed for the performance of this task.\nPresently, the patient uttered a half-suppressed sigh, and then\naltogether ceased the regular respirations, which had hitherto been\nmonotonous and audible throughout the room. The awe-struck attendant\ncould contain himself no longer, but permitted a sort of cry to escape\nhim, and started to his feet. The cloud instantly, as it were, rose from\nits inclined posture over the bed, turned hastily round, and, in a\nmoment contracting itself into a human shape, glided softly, but\nhastily, from the apartment. \u201cHa!\u201d thought the African, \u201cI have known\nsuch personages as this in Aleppo. These angels of death are sometimes\nfound to be mortal themselves\u2014I shall pursue and try.\u201d He, therefore,\nquickly followed the phantom through the private door by which it had\nescaped, not forgetting to seize his semicircular sword in passing the\ntable where it lay. The stair was dark and steep; but he kept his feet\ntill he reached the bottom. Casting, then, a hasty glance around him, he\nperceived a shadow vanish from the moon-lit ground, at an angle of the\nhouse, and instantly started forward in the pursuit. He soon found\nhimself in the open wynd above-mentioned, along which he supposed the\nmysterious object to have gone. All here was dark; but being certain of\nthe course adopted by the pursued party, he did not hesitate a moment in\nplunging headlong down its steep profundity. He was confirmed in his\npurpose by immediately afterwards observing, at some distance in\nadvance, a small jet of moonlight, proceeding from a side alley,\nobscured for a second by what he conceived to be the transit of a large\ndark object. This he soon also reached, and finding that his own person\ncaused a similar obscurity, he was confirmed in his conjecture that the\napparition bore a substantial form. Still forward and downward he boldly\nrushed, till, reaching an open area at the bottom, part of which was\nlighted by the moon, he plainly saw, at the distance of about thirty\nyards before him, the figure as of a tall man, loosely enveloped in a\nprodigious cloak, gliding along the ground, and apparently making for a\nsmall bridge, which at this particular place crossed the drain of the\nNorth Loch, and served as a communication with the village called the\nMutries Hill. He made directly for the fugitive, thinking to overtake\nhim almost before he could reach the bridge. But what was his surprise,\nwhen in a moment the flying object vanished from his sight, as if it had\nsunk into the ground, and left him alone and objectless in his headlong\npursuit. It was possible that it had fallen into some concealed well or\npit, but this he was never able to discover.\n\nBewildered and confused, he at length returned to the provost\u2019s house,\nand re-entered the apartment of the sick maiden. To his delight and\nastonishment he found her already in a state of visible convalescence,\nwith a gradually deepening glow of health diffusing itself over her\ncheek. Whether his courage and fidelity had been the means of scaring\naway the evil demon it is impossible to say; but certain it is, that the\nravages of the plague began soon afterwards to decline in Edinburgh, and\nat length died away altogether.\n\nThe conclusion of this singular traditionary story bears that the\nprovost\u2019s daughter, being completely restored to health, was married to\nthe foreigner who had saved her life. This seems to have been the result\nof an affection which they had conceived for each other during the\nperiod of her convalescence. The African, becoming joint-heir with his\nwife of the provost\u2019s vast property, abandoned his former piratical\nlife, became, it is said, a douce Presbyterian, and settled down for the\nremainder of his days in Edinburgh. The match turned out exceedingly\nwell; and it is even said that the foreigner became so assimilated with\nthe people of Edinburgh, to whom he had proved so memorable a\nbenefactor, that he held at one time an office of considerable civic\ndignity and importance. Certain it is, that he built for his residence a\nmagnificent \u201cland\u201d near the head of the Canongate, upon the front of\nwhich he caused to be erected a statue of the emperor of Barbary, in\ntestimony of the respect he still cherished for his native country; and\nthis memorial yet remains in its original niche, as a subsidiary proof\nof the verity of the above relation.\n\n\n\n\n THE PROBATIONER\u2019S FIRST SERMON.\n\n BY DANIEL GORRIE.\n\n\nOn a cold March evening, and in the metropolis of Scotland, I received\nlicence as a probationer. The reverend fathers of the Presbytery were so\nsatisfied with my orthodoxy that they gave me most cordially the right\nhand of fellowship, and warmly wished me success. I had half-anticipated\na reprimand for heretical tendencies; but as no censure was uttered, I\nwas at once overcome by their kindness, and charmed with their\nunexpected liberality. I hastened home to receive the congratulations of\nmy friends, and then I repaired to a clothier\u2019s for a suit of canonical\nblacks. My mother had already provided a boxful of white cravats\nsufficient to supply the whole bench of bishops. To err is human, and it\nis also human for a humble man to feel considerably elated in certain\ncircumstances, and at certain times.\n\nI need not be ashamed to confess that a new dignity seemed to rest upon\nme, like the mantle of the prophet, on that eventful evening. I saw the\nreflection of my face on the bowl of a silver spoon, and wondered at the\nresemblance it bore to the bold, heroic countenance of Edward Irving.\nHigh were my hopes, and few were my fears, for I only expected to speak\nand conquer. The responsibilities of the profession were great, I knew,\nbut they only cast their shadow before. The kind of life on which I was\nabout to enter possessed all the attractions of novelty. I was to\nexchange passivity for action\u2014the quiet of the cloister for the stir of\nthe field. Yet, while thus I thought of the battle, and made my vows,\nthe still picture of a rural manse, girdled with incense-breathing\nflowerplots, and shaded with murmuring trees, stole upon my slumbers ere\nI awoke at the dawn of the next day\u2014a vision, alas! too often resembling\nthe unreal beauty of the mirage in the desert.\n\nIt may be pardoned in a novitiate, standing on the threshold, if I saw\nonly the sunny side of preacher-life. Spring was coming, like Miriam and\nher maidens, with timbrels and with dances, and the golden summer-tide\nwas following in her wake, and I knew that I would look on many lovely\nscenes, receive kindness from strangers, enjoy the hospitality of the\nhumble, and haply sow some seeds of goodness and truth in receptive\nhearts.\n\nI had frequently heard strange stories about preachers, and several\ntimes I had met some curious specimens of the class. One, it was said,\ntravelled over the country with a sermon and a-half and a tobacco-pipe.\nAnother, it was averred, carried neither parchments nor portmanteau,\nwent gadding abroad, and was in fact the generalissimo of gossips. A\nthird poked his nose into presses, supped jelly and jam, pocketed lumps\nof sugar, and performed other absurdities not at all creditable to his\ncloth. I had also learned from ministers\u2019 wives in the country, that\nsome were as unsocial and morose as turnkeys, and others quite the\nreverse\u2014lively young fellows, who could rock the cradle, and keep all\nthe children in high glee. It was necessary for me, then, I felt, to be\ncircumspect, to abstain from all eccentricities, to be sociable among\nsocial people, and dignified when occasion required. Experience soon\ntaught me that a joke from clerical lips sounds like profanity in the\nears of the rigidly righteous. A kind friend told me to beware of elders\nwho wished to discuss the doctrine of reprobation, and to avoid walking\narm-in-arm with any rural beauty.\n\n\u201cWere you, in your unsuspecting innocence,\u201d he said, \u201cto commit this\nlast enormity, the village gossips would tell it to the beadle, the\nbeadle to the managers, the managers to the elders, and your glory would\ndepart.\u201d\n\nThe advice was a wise one, as I afterwards found; but gallantry is more\na characteristic of youth than prudence.\n\nI had prepared a considerable supply of discourses. They were\nelaborately written, and I looked with paternal affection upon the\ncompanions of my future wanderings. I shunned those dry doctrinal\ndiscussions which shed so sweet an opiate over the eyes of old, young,\nand middle-aged. The topics selected were such as I believed would\ninterest and instruct all classes of people. I had enlarged upon the\nzeal and self-sacrifice of the sainted men of old, pictured the Holy One\nsilent in the death chamber, and weeping at the tomb, and drawn\nillustrations from the heavens above, and the earth beneath. Something\nfresh was needed, I thought\u2014a Christianity rich in blossoms as in fruit.\n\nI received an appointment for the first Sabbath after licence, and on\nSaturday afternoon I was rattling along Princes\u2019 Street in the\nQueensferry omnibus. A small town across the Firth, in the kingdom of\nFife, not far from the coast, was my destination. Although the sermon I\nwas to deliver on the morrow had been well committed to memory, and\nfrequently declaimed during the week, yet I found myself conning it over\nagain ere we had crossed the Dean Bridge, and certain passages became\nmysteriously blended in my mind with the images of Craigcrook and\nCorstorphine. Then I began to wonder if the other passengers suspected I\nwas a preacher on my maiden expedition. One woman was occupied in gazing\nvery fondly upon the face of a dozing child three months old; a\nred-faced, purple-nosed old gentleman was sucking the round head of a\nwalking-stick; a stout elderly lady seemed to find the leathern cushion\nvery uncomfortable, since of her down-sitting and up-rising there was no\nend; a young gentleman of the Tittlebat Titmouse tribe breathed heavily,\nand at intervals snored; and a young lady, my _vis-a-vis_ in the\nopposite corner, was the only one who seemed really to be aware of my\npresence, and the only one who appeared willing to break the unsocial\nsilence. I remembered my friend\u2019s advice, and was somewhat afraid to\nspeak. Besides, heads, and particulars, and practical applications, were\nmaking such a thoroughfare of my mind, that there was considerable\ndanger of committing absurd mistakes in conversation. I became really\nsorry for the young lady, she looked at me so inquiringly, and seemed so\nanxious that I should speak. There was a keen frost in the air, and one\nor two outsiders were flapping their hands across their shoulders\u2014might\nI not say that the afternoon was cold? Gray-white clouds were gathering\nfrom horizon to horizon and dimming the day\u2014might I not suggest the\npossibility of snow? Suddenly the light wavering crystals slid down the\nwindow-glass, and with uplifted eyebrows and look of innocent surprise,\nthe fair young traveller exclaimed, \u201cOh! it snows.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo it does, ma\u2019am,\u201d I rejoined, and spoke no more.\n\nShe might think of me that evening as very silent or very surly; but she\nno doubt changed her opinion next day, for I saw her sitting in the\nfront gallery of the church when I rose to give out the first psalm.\n\nIn crossing the ferry, I thought not of the royal dames and princely\npageants that so often in the days of other years passed to and from the\nshores of Fife. The waters of the Forth were dreary enough. Inchcolm and\nthe opposite coast were shrouded from view in the streaming skirts of\nthe snow-clouds. I rolled myself up in a corner of the boat where no\ndeacon\u2019s eye could intrude, and warmed my heart with a cigar. Then some\nlimping fiend whispered in my ears the awful words, \u201cWhat if you should\n_stick_?\u201d Once I had witnessed an unfortunate being in that painful\npredicament in the pulpit. I had marked, with sickening apprehensions,\nthe string of unconnected sentences, the hesitation, the pallor\noverspreading his face, the terrible stammer, the convulsive clutch, the\npause, the sudden gulp, the dead stop, and portentous silence. A\n\u201cstickit minister,\u201d like Dominie Sampson, is nothing to a preacher who\n\u201csticks.\u201d It was a horrid idea. I resisted the fiend, knit my brow,\nclenched my fist, and determined to speak or die. \u201cAlways keep your\nmouth open,\u201d was the charge of a learned divine to his son, and the\nwords afforded me much consolation.\n\nThe night was falling fast, and the snow was falling faster when I\nreached the outskirts of the little inland town where I had been\nappointed to officiate. Here my rapid march was arrested by an elderly\nman who inquired if I was the expected preacher, and receiving an answer\nin the affirmative, he relieved me of my portmanteau, which contained my\nprecious parchment, and led the way to my lodgings. He gave me to\nunderstand that he was the beadle, and that I was to lodge with Mrs\nM\u2018Bain, who kept a small grocery shop, and had a room to spare in her\nhouse. The congregation, with much saving grace, had let the manse until\na new minister was obtained. Old John, like the great proportion of\ncountry beadles, was a simple, decent man, and a sort of character in\nhis way. He was particularly inquisitive, and asked me some very plain\nquestions as we trudged along the narrow street, getting gradually\nwhitened by the falling snow. He told me that my predecessor on the\nprevious Sabbath was a very clever young man, but only a \u201cwee thocht\nnew-fangled.\u201d From further inquiry I found that the learned Theban had\nbeen astonishing John and several members of the congregation by\ndescribing the revolution of the earth on its axis.\n\n\u201cNoo, sir,\u201d said the worthy beadle, \u201ccan ye tell me, if the world is aye\nwhirlin\u2019 round aboot, what\u2019s the reason we never come to the warm\ncountries?\u201d\n\nI endeavoured to make the matter plain to his apprehension by supposing\na rotatory motion of the human head, and the nose always maintaining its\ndignified position in the centre between the right ear and the left\u2014an\nillustration which honest John did not seem to regard as satisfactory in\nthe slightest degree.\n\nMrs M\u2018Bain\u2019s house was of a very humble description; but she appeared to\nbe a tidy woman, and the room allotted to me, though small, was clean\nand comfortable. John put down my portmanteau on a chair, with the mien\nand manner of one who has done his duty, and informed me that one of the\nelders and the precentor would likely call in a short time. For the\nprecentor I was perfectly prepared, knowing well the psalms that would\nbest suit my discourse; but I was not so sure what motive an elder could\nhave for visiting me on a Saturday night. I inwardly hoped, at least,\nthat if he did make his appearance, he would have the good sense not to\ntrouble me long with his presence or his conversation, as I was again\nanxious to rehearse my discourse to silent chairs and an attentive\ntable.\n\nWhen Mrs M\u2018Bain was placing the tea-dishes on the table, she seemed\ndisposed for a little talk, while I, on the contrary, was not at all in\na communicative mood. However, she persevered, and drew me on by\ndegrees, until at last she brought a series of queries to a climax by\nasking if I had been long a preacher. Now, this was a most absurd\nquestion for me to answer in my peculiar circumstances. If the people\nknew that I had never \u201cwagged my head in a poupit\u201d before, they would be\nsure to listen to me with the most dreadful silence, so that the\nslightest stammer would be multiplied and magnified by a hundred echoes.\nWhat was to be done? The question must be answered, and the truth must\nbe told, despite the consequences. Mustering up courage, I told my\nlandlady how the matter stood. Astonished she was, as might naturally\nhave been expected. She uplifted her eyebrows, opened wide her eyes,\ndrew a long breath, and said\u2014\u201cDearie me, sir, ye\u2019ll be awfu\u2019 feared!\u201d\nWith this ejaculation, which afforded me little consolation indeed, Mrs\nM\u2018Bain left the apartment, and I knew that the tidings would be over the\ntown, and talked about at every fireside in less than twenty minutes. It\ncould not be helped; courage and resignation alone were required.\n\nI had just finished swallowing in haste three cups of very hot tea, when\nthe precentor entered. He was a man past middle age, with a countenance\nsomewhat grim and gaunt, and a very unmusical mouth. His hair was\nsandy-coloured, and he was Sawney all over. I saw at once, from his\nsteady stare, and the peculiar expression of his face, that Mrs M\u2018Bain\nhad communicated to him the very pleasant intelligence that the new\narrival was a \u201cgreen hand.\u201d He was not long in making me know that he\nwas aware of the fact, although he did so in a very cautious, provoking\nkind of style. When the ice was fairly broken, he said, \u201cIt\u2019s a kittle\nthing standin\u2019 up afore an audience the first time. I mind fine yet what\nan awfu\u2019 state I was in when I first sang i\u2019 the desk. I kent the Auld\nHunderd as weel as I kent my mither; but I wasna lang begun when I ran\nawa\u2019 wi\u2019 the harrows.\u201d This kind of talk was rapidly becoming\nunendurable, and I entertained anything but a Christian sentiment of\nbrotherly love towards the conductor of the psalmody.\n\n\u201cHow long have you acted as precentor,\u201d I enquired, anxious to change\nthe current of conversation.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve precented in oor kirk,\u201d he replied, \u201cfor twunty years, and,\nbarrin\u2019 three days last simmer, I\u2019ve never missed a Sabbath.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is very extraordinary,\u201d I rejoined; \u201cand what was wrong with you\nlast summer?\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, sir, ye see I was howkin\u2019 tatties for the denner in oor yaird ae\nday, when I coupit ower a skep by mistake, and I was awfu\u2019 stung by\nbees.\u201d\n\n\u201cDear me,\u201d I rejoined (for I could not resist such a favourable\nopportunity of stinging him again), \u201cit was curious how the bees should\nhave taken you for a drone!\u201d\n\nThis remark had the desired effect. The precentor soon took himself off,\nand I was left in undisputed possession of the room. I had offended the\nbeadle, and insulted the precentor\u2014how was it possible that I could\npreach with acceptation to the people? I became nervous lest the elder\nalso should enter, for I was perfectly persuaded that I could not escape\nincurring his reprobation by some unfortunate reply.\n\nAs the night wore on, my trepidation increased. I paced up and down the\nroom, repeating and re-repeating my discourse from beginning to end, and\nfrom the end to the beginning. Every period, colon, hyphen, point of\nexclamation, point of interrogation, and comma was engraved upon my\nmind, and yet I was not satisfied. Something might escape me\u2014some\nsounding sentence might take wings and flee away. I heard Mrs M\u2018Bain\nlistening at times behind the door when I went humming and thrumming\nacross the room; and I felt a strong inclination to call her in, and\npunish her by making her act the part of a popular audience. I cooled\ndown somewhat before bedtime, and, at my landlady\u2019s request, retired\nearly to bed.\n\n\u201cA gude sleep,\u201d she said, \u201cis the forerunner of a good sermon.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d I rejoined, \u201cand a good sleep is the ordinary accompaniment of a\nbad one.\u201d\n\nMrs M\u2018Bain chuckled, and looked as if she thought there was something\npromising in the young man after all.\n\nTo bed I went, but not to slumber, knowing well that sleep, like some\neccentric daughters of Eve, must be won without being wooed. I did not\ntry to \u201cfall over.\u201d None but the rankest fool ever thinks of\nperpetrating such absurdity. I commenced for the five hundredth\ntime\u2014what else could I do?\u2014to con over my discourse. I had just finished\nthe introduction, without missing a syllable, when\u2014horror of\nhorrors!\u2014the first head had vanished\u2014evaporated\u2014gone to some outrageous\nlimbo and could not, would not be recalled. What was to be done? I sat\nup in bed\u2014a villanous crib it was\u2014and the perspiration stood beaded on\nmy brow. The tingling darkness filled the room; the snow-flakes fussled\non the window panes. Mrs M\u2018Bain was in bed; the candle was out; there\nwere no lucifers; my precious manuscript was under my pillow; the\nmissing head was there, but I could neither see nor seize it. It was a\n_caput mortuum_. I cannot describe the agony that I endured, the feeling\nof despair that I experienced. My heart beat loudly, and the inexorable\nclock tick-ticked, as if everything in the world were going on with the\nutmost smoothness and regularity. I must have sat for an hour groping\nabout in my benighted brain for my lost head. But sleep at length came,\nand fantastic dreams, born of fear and excitement, took possession of\nme. I thought that I stood on Mars Hill, and that around me was gathered\na great crowd of Stoics, Epicureans, Methodists, Mormons, and\nMahommedans. They listened attentively for a time, but as soon as I had\nfinished the introduction to my discourse, they immediately commenced to\ngrin and make grimaces, shouting, howling, roaring like legions of\ndemons. In the twinkling of an eye, the scene changed, and I stood in\nthe centre of a vast camp-meeting in the backwoods of America. Negroes\nand Red Indians were there as well as stalwart planters with their wives\nand families. A hymn, pealed with a sea-like sound from a thousand\nvoices, had just died away, and I was preparing to address the mighty\nmultitude, when a sudden storm came crashing down among the woods, and\nthe assemblage was scattered abroad like the leaves of autumn. I was\ntossed throughout the night from one wildered dream to another, and\nfinally awoke in the morning rather jaded than refreshed. With the\nreturn of consciousness, however, returned the lost head, and I was\ndelighted to discover before rising that my memory was master of my\ndiscourse.\n\nThe morning wore on, stiller for the snow that lay one or two inches\ndeep on the ground. The hour of service approached, the bells began to\nsound; I never heard them pealing so loudly before, even in the largest\ncities. My heart beat to the beating of the bells. At last the beadle\ncame, cool, calm, imperturbable, hoisted the pulpit Bible under his arm,\nand signified to me, with an easy inclination of his head, that all was\nnow ready. Mrs M\u2018Bain was standing in the passage as we came out of the\nroom, holding the door-key in one hand, and her Bible wrapped in a white\npocket handkerchief in the other. I walked along the street as steadily\nand sedately as my perturbation would permit, and all the little boys\nand girls, I thought, knew that I was to preach my first sermon that\nday. There was a death-like stillness in the church when I entered. My\nlook was concentrated on the pulpit, but I knew that every eye in the\nchurch was fixed upon the untried preacher. I managed to get through the\nintroductory services with more fluency and calmness than I anticipated,\nonly I invariably found myself conning over the first head of my\ndiscourse while the assembled worshippers were singing the psalms. The\nprecentor _was_ a drone. Even that afforded me some satisfaction,\nalthough the unmelodious tones agitated still more my excited nervous\nsystem. At the close of the second psalm, the time of my great trial\ncame. I rose and announced the text with great deliberation. Then every\neye was fixed upon me; the moment was awful; the silence was dreadful.\nThe ready manner in which the first dozen of sentences came to my\nrecollection made me feel somewhat calm, comfortable, and composed; but\na sudden sense of the peculiar nature of my situation, the consciousness\nthat all the people knew it was my first appearance in public, disturbed\nmy equanimity and shook my self-possession. A dizziness came over me;\nthe congregation revolved around the pulpit. I grasped the Bible, and\ndeclaimed vehemently in order if possible to recover myself; but from\nthe beginning of the first head to the last application, although I must\nhave adhered to my manuscript, I was speaking like one in a dream, not\nmaster of myself, the will passive, and memory alone awake. When I\nconcluded the last period, I could scarcely believe that I had preached\nmy discourse. The weakness of my limbs told me of the struggle. On\nleaving the church I overheard some remarks concerning myself pass\nbetween two of the officials.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s a brisk bit birkie that,\u201d quoth the beadle.\n\n\u201c\u2019Od ay,\u201d responded the precentor, but \u201che has a bee in his bannet.\u201d\n\nSweet reader, if you are studying for the Church, do not be deterred by\nvain fears from prosecuting your labours. It is a glorious thing to\nsucceed, even when you are unconscious of your success, and thus it\nhappened with \u201cMy First Sermon.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE CRIMES OF RICHARD HAWKINS.\n\n BY THOMAS AIRD.\n\n\nWhen a young man, Richard Hawkins was guilty of the heinous crime of\nbetraying the daughter of a respectable farmer in the west of Galloway,\nof the name of Emily Robson. As he yet loved the injured maiden, he\nwould have married her, but in this he was determinedly opposed by her\nrelatives, and particularly by her only brother, betwixt whom and\nhimself an inveterate hostility had, from various causes, been growing\nup since their earliest boyhood. From remorse partly, and shame and\ndisappointment, and partly from other causes, Hawkins hereupon left his\nhome and went abroad; but after making a considerable sum of money he\nreturned to Scotland, determined to use every remonstrance to win over\nEmily\u2019s friends to allow him yet by marriage to make reparation to the\ngentle maiden, the remembrance of whose beauty and faithful confiding\nspirit had unceasingly haunted him in a foreign land. He arrived first\nat Glasgow, and proceeded thence to Edinburgh, where he purposed to stay\na week or a fortnight before going southward to his native county, in\nwhich also Emily Robson resided.\n\nDuring his stay in the metropolis, having been one evening invited to\nsup at the house of a gentleman, originally from the same county with\nhimself, scarcely had he taken his seat in his host\u2019s parlour, when\nEmily\u2019s brother entered, and, instantly recognizing him, advanced with a\nface of grim wrath, denounced him as a villain, declared he would not\nsit a moment in his company, and to make good his declaration, instantly\nturned on his heel and left the house. The violent spirit of Hawkins was\nin a moment stung to madness by this rash and unseasonable insolence,\nwhich was offered him, moreover, before a number of gentlemen; he rose,\ncraved their leave for a moment, that he might follow, and show Mr\nRobson his mistake; and sallying out of the house, without his hat, he\novertook his aggressor on the street, tapped him on the shoulder, and\nthus bespoke him, with a grim smile:\u2014\u201cWhy, sir, give me leave to\npropound to you that this same word and exit of yours are most\npreciously insolent. With your leave, now, I must have you back, gently\nto unsay me a word or two; or, by heaven! this night your blood shall\nwash out the imputation!\u201d\n\n\u201cThis hour\u2014this hour!\u201d replied Robson, in a hoarse compressed whisper;\n\u201cmy soul craves to grapple with you, and put our mutual affair to a\nmortal arbitrament. Hark ye, Hawkins, you are a stranger in this city, I\npresume, and cannot reasonably be expected easily to provide yourself\nwith a second; moreover, no one would back such a villain;\u2014now, will you\nfollow me this moment to my lodgings, accept from my hand one of a pair\nof pistols, and let us, without farther formality, retire to a\nconvenient place, and do ourselves a pleasure and a justice. I am weary\nof living under the same sun with you, and if I can shed your foul blood\nbeneath yon chaste stars of God, I would willingly die for it. Dare you\nfollow me?\u2014and, quickly, before those fellows think of looking after\nus?\u201d\n\nTo Hawkins\u2019 boiling heart of indignation \u2019twas no hard task so to\nfollow, and the above proposal of Robson was strictly and instantly\nfollowed up. We must notice here particularly, that, as the parties were\nabout to leave the house, a letter was put into Robson\u2019s hand, who,\nseeing that it was from his mother, and bore the outward notification of\nmourning, craved Hawkins\u2019 permission to read it, which he did with a\ntwinkling in his eye, and a working, as of deep grief, in the muscles of\nhis face; but in a minute he violently crushed the letter, put it into\nhis pocket, and, turning anew to his foe with glaring eyes of anger,\ntold him that all was ready. And now we shall only state generally, that\nwithin an hour from the first provocation of the evening, this mortal\nand irregular duel was settled, and left Robson shot through the body by\nhis antagonist.\n\nNo sooner did Hawkins see him fall, than horror and remorse for his deed\nrushed upon him; he ran to the prostrate youth, attempted to raise him\nup, but dared not offer pity or ask forgiveness, for which his soul yet\npanted. The wounded man rejected his assistance\u2014waved him off, and thus\nfaintly but fearfully spoke:\u2014\u201cNow, mine enemy! I will tell you, that you\nmay sooner know the curse of God, which shall for ever cling and warp\nitself round all the red cords of your heart. That letter from my\nmother, which you saw me read, told me of the death of that sister Emily\nwhom I so loved; whom you\u2014oh, God!\u2014who never recovered from your\nvillany. And my father, too!\u2014Off, fiend, nor mock me! You shall not so\ntriumph\u2014you shall not see me die!\u201d So saying, the wounded youth, who was\nlying on his back, with his pale writhen features upturned, and dimly\nseen in the twilight, with a convulsive effort now threw himself round,\nwith his face upon the grass.\n\nIn a fearful agony stood Hawkins, twisting his hands, not knowing\nwhether again to attempt raising his victim, or to run to the city for a\nsurgeon. The former he at length did, and found no resistance; for,\nalas! the unhappy youth was dead. The appearance of two or three\nindividuals now making towards the bloody spot, which was near the\nsuburbs of the town, and to which, in all probability, they had been\ndrawn by the report of the pistols, roused Hawkins, for the first time,\nto a sense of his own danger. He quickly left the ground, dashed through\nthe fields, and, without distinctly calculating his route, instinctively\nturned towards his native district.\n\nAs he proceeded onwards, he began to consider the bearings of his\ndifficult situation, and at last resolved to hasten on through the\ncountry, to lay his case before his excellent friend Frank Dillon, who\nwas the only son of a gentleman in the western parts of Galloway, and\nwho, he knew, was at present residing with his father. Full of the most\nriotous glee, and nimble-witted as Mercutio, Frank, he was aware, could\nbe no less gravely wise as an adviser in a difficult emergency, and he\ndetermined, in the present case, to be wholly ruled by his opinion.\nInvigorated from thus having settled for himself a definite course, he\nwalked swiftly forward through the night, which shone with the finest\nbeauty of the moon. Yet what peace to the murderer, whose red title not\nthe fairest duellist, who has slain a human being, can to his own\nconscience reduce? The cold glittering leaves on the trees, struck with\na quick, momentary gust, made him start as he passed; and the shadowy\nfoot and figure of the lover, coming round from the back window of the\nlone cottage, was to his startled apprehension the avenger of blood at\nhand. As he looked afar along the glittering road, the black fir trees\nupon the edge of the moor seemed men coming running down to meet him;\nand the long howl of some houseless cur, and the distant hoof of the\ntraveller, which struck his listening ear with two or three beatings,\nseemed all in the track of pursuit and vengeance.\n\nMorning came, and to the weary fugitive was agreeably cloudy; but the\nsun rose upon him in the forenoon, shining from between the glassy,\nglistering clouds with far greater heat than it does from a pure blue\nsky. Hawkins had now crossed many a broad acre of the weary moorlands,\nfatigued and thirsty, his heart beating in his ears, and not a drop of\nwater that he could see to sprinkle the dry pulses of his bosom, when he\ncame to a long morass, which barred his straightforward path. His first\nbusiness was to quench his thirst from a dull stank, overgrown with\npaddowpipe, and black with myriads of tadpoles. There, finding himself\nso faint from fatigue that he could not brook the idea of going round by\nthe end of the moss, and being far less able to make his way through the\nmiddle of it, by leaping from _hagg_ to _hagg_, he threw himself down on\nthe sunny side of some long reeds, and fell fast asleep.\n\nHe was waked by the screaming of lapwings, and the noise of a\nneighbouring bittern, to a feeling of violent throbbing, headache, and\nnausea, which were probably owing to the sun\u2019s having beat upon him\nwhilst he lay asleep, aggravated by the reflection from the reeds. He\narose, but finding himself quite unable to pursue his journey, again\nthrew himself down on a small airy brow of land, to get what breeze\nmight be stirring abroad. There were several companies of people at work\ndigging peats in the moss, and one party now sat down very near him to\ntheir dinner. One of them, a young woman, had passed so near him, as to\nbe able to guess, from his countenance, that he was unwell; and in a few\nminutes, with the fine charity of womanhood, she came to him with some\nfood, of which, to satisfy her kindness, rather than his own hunger, he\nate a little. The air changed in the afternoon, and streaming clouds of\nhail crossed over that wild country, yet he lay still. Party after party\nleft the moss, and yet he was there. He made, indeed, a show of leaving\nthe place at a quick rate, to disappoint the fears of the people who had\nseen him at noon, and who, as they again came near to gather up their\nsupernumerary clothes, were evidently perplexed on his account, which\nthey showed by looking first towards him and then at each other. It was\nall he could do to get quite out of their sight beyond a little\neminence; and there, once more, he lay down in utter prostration of mind\nand body.\n\nTwilight began to darken upon the pools of that desolate place. The wild\nbirds were gone to their heathy nests, all save the curlew, whose\nbravura was still sung over the fells, and borne far away into the dim\nand silent night. At length a tall, powerful-looking man came stepping\nthrough the moss, and as he passed near the poor youth, asked, in slow\nspeech, who he was. In the reaction of nature, Hawkins was, in a moment,\nanxious about his situation, and replied to him that he had fallen sick\non his way, and was unable to go in quest of a resting-place for the\nnight. Approaching and turning himself round to the youth as he arose,\nthe genius of the place had him on his back in a moment, and went off\nwith him carelessly and in silence over the heath. In about half an hour\nthey came to a lonely cottage, which the kind creature entered; and,\nsetting the young man down, without the least appearance of fatigue on\nhis part, \u201cHere, gudewife,\u201d said he, \u201cis a bairn t\u2019ye, that I hae foun\u2019\ni\u2019 the moss: now, let us see ye be gude to him.\u201d Either this injunction\nwas very effective, or it was not at all necessary; for, had the youth\nbeen her own son, come from a far country to see her, this hostess of\nthe cottage could not have treated him more kindly. From his little\nconversation during the evening, her husband, like most very bulky men,\nappeared to be of dull intellect; but there was a third personage in the\ncomposition of his household, a younger brother, a very little man,\u2014the\nflower of the flock,\u2014who made ample amends for his senior brother\u2019s\ndeficiencies as a talker. A smattering of Church-history had filled his\nsoul with a thousand stories of persecution and martyrdom, and, from\nsome old history of America, he had gained a little knowledge of Upper\nCanada, for which, Hawkins was during the night repeatedly given to\nunderstand, he was once on the very point of setting out, an abiding\nembryo of bold travel, which, in his own eye, seemed to invest him with\nall the honours and privileges of _bona fide_ voyagers. His guest had a\nthousand questions put to him on these interesting topics, less for his\nanswers, it was evident, than for an opportunity to the little man of\nsetting forth his own information. All this was tolerably fair; but it\nwas truly disgusting when the little oracle took the Bible after supper,\nand, in place of his elder brother, who was otherwise also the head of\nthe family, performed the religious services of the evening, presuming\nto add a comment to the chapter which he read; to enforce which, his\nelbow was drawn back to the sharpest angle of edification, from which,\never and anon unslinging itself like a shifting rhomboid, it forced\nforward the stiff information in many a pompous instalment. The\npertinacious forefinger was at work too; and before it trembled the\nmystic Babylon, which, in a side argument, that digit was uplifted to\ndenounce. Moreover, the whole lecture was given in a squeaking,\npragmatic voice, which sounded like the sharping of thatchers\u2019 knives.\n\nNext morning the duellist renewed his journey, hoping against\neveningtide to reach Dillon\u2019s house, which he guessed could not now be\nmore than forty miles distant. About mid-afternoon, as he was going\nthrough a small hamlet of five or six cottages, he stepped into one of\nthem, and requested a little water to drink. There was a hushed\nsolemnity, he could see in a moment, throughout the little apartment\ninto which, rather too unceremoniously, he had entered; and a\nkind-looking matron, in a dark robe, whispered in his ear, as she gave\nhim a porringer of sweet water, with a little oatmeal sprinkled upon it,\nthat an only daughter of the house, a fine young woman, was lying \u201ca\ncorpse.\u201d Without noticing his presence, and indeed with her face hid,\nsat the mother doubtless of the maiden, heedless of the whispered\nconsolations of two or three officious matrons, and racking in that full\nand intense sorrow with which strangers cannot intermeddle. The sloping\nbeams of the declining sun shone beautifully in through a small lattice,\nillumining a half-decayed nosegay of flowers which stood on the sunny\nwhitewashed sill\u2014emblem of a more sorrowful decay!\u2014and after traversing\nthe middle of the apartment, with a thin deep bar of light, peopled by a\nmaze of dancing motes, struck into the white bed, where lay something\ncovered up and awfully indistinct, like sanctified thing not to be gazed\nat, which the fugitive\u2019s fascinated eye yet tried to shape into the\nelegant body of the maiden, as she lay before her virgin sheets purer\nthan they, with the salt above her still and unvexed bosom. The\nrestricted din of boys at play\u2014for that buoyant age is yet truly\nreverential, and feels most deeply the solemn occasion of death\u2014was\nheard faint and aloof from the house of mourning. This, and the lonely\nchirrup of a single sparrow from the thatch; the soft purring of the cat\nat the sunny pane; the muffled tread of the mourners over the threshold;\nand the audible grief of that poor mother, seemed, instead of\ninterruption, rather parts of the solemn stillness.\n\nAs Hawkins was going out, after lingering a minute in this sacred\ninterior, he met, in the narrow passage which led to the door, a man\nwith the coffin, on the lid of which he read, as it was pushed up to his\nvery face, \u201cEmily Robson, aged 22.\u201d The heart of the murderer\u2014the\nseducer\u2014was in a moment as if steeped in the benumbing waters of\npetrifaction; he was horrified; he would fain have passed, but could not\nfor want of room; and as the coffin was not to be withdrawn in\naccommodation to him, he was pushed again into the interior of the\ncottage to encounter a look of piercing recognition from Emily\u2019s\nafflicted mother, who had started up on hearing the hollow grating of\nthe coffin as it struck occasionally on the walls of the narrow\nentrance. \u201cTake him away\u2014take him away\u2014take him away!\u201d she screamed,\nwhen she saw Hawkins, and pressed her face down on the white bed of\ndeath. As for the youth, who was fearfully conscious of another bloody\nwoe which had not yet reached her heart, and of which he was still the\nauthor, and who saw, moreover, that this poor mother was now come to\npoverty, probably from his own first injury against the peace of her\nfamily, he needed not to be told to depart. With conscience, that truest\nconducting-rod, flashing its moral electricities of shame and fear, and\nwith knees knocking against each other, he stumbled out of the house,\nand making his way by chance to an idle quarry, overgrown with weeds, he\nthere threw himself down, with his face on the ground. In this situation\nhe lay the whole night and all next forenoon; and in the afternoon\u2014for\nhe had occasionally risen to look for the assembling of the funeral\ntrain\u2014he joined the small group who carried his Emily to the churchyard,\nand saw her young body laid in the grave. Oh! who can cast away\ncarelessly, like a useless thing, the finely-moulded clay, perfumed with\nthe lingering beauty of warm motions, sweet graces, and young charities!\nBut had not the young man, think ye, tenfold reason to weep for her whom\nhe now saw laid down within the dark shadow of the grave?\n\nIn the evening, he found his way to Frank Dillon\u2019s; met his friend by\nchance at a little distance from his father\u2019s house, and told him at\nonce his unhappy situation. \u201cMy father,\u201d replied Frank, \u201ccannot be an\nadviser here, because he is a Justice of the Peace. But he has been at\nLondon for some time, and I do not expect him home till to-morrow; so\nyou can go with me to our house for this night, where we shall\ndeliberate what next must be done in this truly sad affair of yours.\nCome on.\u201d\n\nIt is unnecessary for us to explain at length the circumstances which\nfrustrated the friendly intentions of Dillon, and which enabled the\nofficers of justice to trace Hawkins to his place of concealment. They\narrived that very evening; and, notwithstanding the efforts of Frank to\nsave his friend, secured the unhappy duellist, who, within two days\nafterwards, found himself in Edinburgh, securely lodged in jail.\n\nThe issue of Hawkins\u2019 trial was that he was condemned to death as a\nmurderer. This severe sentence of the law was, however, commuted into\nthat of banishment for seven years. But he never again returned to his\nnative country. And it must be told of him also, that no happiness ever\nshone upon this after-life of his. Independent of his first crime, which\nbrought a beautiful young woman prematurely to the grave, he had broken\nrashly \u201cinto the bloody house of life,\u201d and, in the language of Holy\nWrit, \u201cslain a young man to his hurt.\u201d\n\nOh! for that still and quiet conscience\u2014those third heavens within a\nman\u2014wherein he can soar within himself and be at peace, where the image\nof God shines down, never dislimned nor long hid by those wild racks and\ndeep continents of gloom which come over the soul of the blood-guilty\nman!\n\n\n\n\n THE HEADSTONE.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nThe coffin was let down to the bottom of the grave, the planks were\nremoved from the heaped-up brink, the first rattling clods had struck\ntheir knell, the quick shovelling was over, and the long, broad,\nskilfully cut pieces of turf were aptly joined together, and trimly laid\nby the beating spade, so that the newest mound in the churchyard was\nscarcely distinguishable from those that were grown over by the\nundisturbed grass and daisies of a luxuriant spring. The burial was soon\nover; and the party, with one consenting motion, having uncovered their\nheads in decent reverence of the place and occasion, were beginning to\nseparate, and about to leave the churchyard. Here some acquaintances,\nfrom distant parts of the parish, who had not had an opportunity of\naddressing each other in the house that had belonged to the deceased,\nnor in the course of the few hundred yards that the little procession\nhad to move over from his bed to his grave, were shaking hands, quietly\nbut cheerfully, and inquiring after the welfare of each other\u2019s\nfamilies. There, a small knot of neighbours were speaking, without\nexaggeration, of the respectable character which the deceased had borne,\nand mentioning to one another little incidents of his life, some of them\nso remote as to be known only to the grayheaded persons of the group;\nwhile a few yards farther removed from the spot, were standing together\nparties who discussed ordinary concerns, altogether unconnected with the\nfuneral, such as the state of the markets, the promise of the season, or\nchange of tenants; but still with a sobriety of manner and voice that\nwas insensibly produced by the influence of the simple ceremony now\nclosed, by the quiet graves around, and the shadow of the spire and gray\nwalls of the house of God.\n\nTwo men yet stood together at the head of the grave, with countenances\nof sincere but unimpassioned grief. They were brothers, the only sons of\nhim who had been buried. And there was something in their situation that\nnaturally kept the eyes of many directed upon them for a longer time,\nand more intently, than would have been the case had there been nothing\nmore observable about them than the common symptoms of a common sorrow.\nBut these two brothers, who were now standing at the head of their\nfather\u2019s grave, had for some years been totally estranged from each\nother, and the only words that had passed between them, during all that\ntime, had been uttered within a few days past, during the necessary\npreparations for the old man\u2019s funeral.\n\nNo deep and deadly quarrel was between these brothers, and neither of\nthem could distinctly tell the cause of this unnatural estrangement.\nPerhaps dim jealousies of their father\u2019s favour\u2014selfish thoughts that\nwill sometimes force themselves into poor men\u2019s hearts respecting\ntemporal expectations\u2014unaccommodating manners on both sides\u2014taunting\nwords that mean little when uttered, but which rankle and fester in\nremembrance\u2014imagined opposition of interests, that, duly considered,\nwould have been found one and the same\u2014these, and many other causes,\nslight when single, but strong when rising up together in one baneful\nband, had gradually but fatally infected their hearts, till at last they\nwho in youth had been seldom separate, and truly attached, now met at\nmarket, and, miserable to say, at church, with dark and averted faces,\nlike different clansmen during a feud.\n\nSurely if anything could have softened their hearts towards each other,\nit must have been to stand silently, side by side, while the earth,\nstones, and clods, were falling down upon their father\u2019s coffin. And,\ndoubtless, their hearts were so softened. But pride, though it cannot\nprevent the holy affections of nature from being felt, may prevent them\nfrom being shown; and these two brothers stood there together,\ndetermined not to let each other know the mutual tenderness that, in\nspite of them, was gushing up in their hearts, and teaching them the\nunconfessed folly and wickedness of their causeless quarrel.\n\nA headstone had been prepared, and a person came forward to plant it.\nThe elder brother directed him how to place it\u2014a plain stone, with a\nsand-glass, skull, and cross-bones, chiselled not rudely, and a few\nwords inscribed. The younger brother regarded the operation with a\ntroubled eye, and said, loudly enough to be heard by several of the\nbystanders, \u201cWilliam, this was not kind in you;\u2014you should have told me\nof this. I loved my father as well as you could love him. You were the\nelder, and, it may be, the favourite son; but I had a right in nature to\nhave joined you in ordering this headstone, had I not?\u201d\n\nDuring these words, the stone was sinking into the earth, and many\npersons who were on their way from the grave returned. For a while the\nelder brother said nothing, for he had a consciousness in his heart that\nhe ought to have consulted his father\u2019s son in designing this last\nbecoming mark of affection and respect to his memory; so the stone was\nplanted in silence, and now stood erect, decently and simply among the\nother unostentatious memorials of the humble dead.\n\nThe inscription merely gave the name and age of the deceased, and told\nthat the stone had been erected \u201cby his affectionate sons.\u201d The sight of\nthese words seemed to soften the displeasure of the angry man, and he\nsaid, somewhat more mildly, \u201cYes, we were his affectionate sons, and\nsince my name is on the stone, I am satisfied, brother. We have not\ndrawn together kindly of late years, and perhaps never may; but I\nacknowledge and respect your worth; and here, before our own friends,\nand before the friends of our father, with my foot above his head, I\nexpress my willingness to be on better and other terms with you, and if\nwe cannot command love in our hearts, let us, at least, brother, bar out\nall unkindness.\u201d\n\nThe minister, who had attended the funeral, and had something intrusted\nto him to say publicly before he left the churchyard, now came forward,\nand asked the elder brother why he spake not regarding this matter. He\nsaw that there was something of a cold and sullen pride rising up in his\nheart\u2014for not easily may any man hope to dismiss from the chamber of his\nheart even the vilest guest, if once cherished there. With a solemn and\nalmost severe air, he looked upon the relenting man, and then, changing\nhis countenance into serenity, said gently,\u2014\n\n Behold how good a thing it is,\n And how becoming well,\n Together such as brethren are\n In unity to dwell.\n\nThe time, the place, and this beautiful expression of a natural\nsentiment, quite overcame a heart in which many kind, if not warm,\naffections dwelt; and the man thus appealed to bowed down his head and\nwept.\n\n\u201cGive me your hand, brother;\u201d and it was given, while a murmur of\nsatisfaction arose from all present, and all hearts felt kindlier and\nmore humanely towards each other.\n\nAs the brothers stood fervently, but composedly, grasping each other\u2019s\nhands, in the little hollow that lay between the grave of their mother,\nlong since dead, and that of their father, whose shroud was haply not\nyet still from the fall of dust to dust, the minister stood beside them\nwith a pleasant countenance, and said, \u201cI must fulfil the promise I made\nto your father on his deathbed. I must read to you a few words which his\nhand wrote at an hour when his tongue denied its office. I must not say\nthat you did your duty to your old father; for did he not often beseech\nyou, apart from one another, to be reconciled, for your own sakes as\nChristians, for his sake, and for the sake of the mother who bare you,\nand, Stephen, who died that you might be born? When the palsy struck him\nfor the last time, you were both absent, nor was it your fault that you\nwere not beside the old man when he died. As long as sense continued\nwith him here, did he think of you two, and of you two alone. Tears were\nin his eyes; I saw them there, and on his cheek too, when no breath came\nfrom his lips. But of this no more. He died with this paper in his hand;\nand he made me know that I was to read it to you over his grave. I now\nobey him:\n\n\u201c\u2018My sons, if you will let my bones lie quiet in the grave, near the\ndust of your mother, depart not from my burial till, in the name of God\nand Christ, you promise to love one another as you used to do. Dear\nboys, receive my blessing.\u2019\u201d\n\nSome turned their heads away to hide the tears that needed not to be\nhidden; and when the brothers had released each other from a long and\nsobbing embrace, many went up to them, and in a single word or two\nexpressed their joy at this perfect reconcilement. The brothers\nthemselves walked away from the churchyard, arm in arm with the\nminister, to the manse. On the following Sabbath they were seen sitting\nwith their families in the same pew; and it was observed that they read\ntogether off the same Bible when the minister gave out the text, and\nthat they sang together, taking hold of the same psalm-book. The same\npsalm was sung (given out at their own request), of which one verse had\nbeen repeated at their father\u2019s grave; and a larger sum than usual was\non that Sabbath found in the plate for the poor, for Love and Charity\nare sisters. And ever after, both during the peace and the troubles of\nthis life, the hearts of the brothers were as one, and in nothing were\nthey divided.\n\n\n\n\n THE WIDOW\u2019S PREDICTION:\n _A TALE OF THE SIEGE OF NAMUR_.\n\n\nOn the morning of the 30th August 1695, just as the sun began to tinge\nthe dark and blood-stained battlements of Namur, a detachment of\nMackay\u2019s Scottish regiment made their rounds, relieving the last\nnight-sentinels, and placing those of the morning. As soon as the party\nreturned to their quarters, and relaxed from the formalities of military\ndiscipline, their leader, a tall, muscular man, of about middle age,\nwith a keen eye and manly features, though swarthy and embrowned with\ntoil, and wearing an expression but little akin to the gentle or the\namiable, moved to an angle of the bastion, and, leaning on his spontoon,\nfixed an anxious gaze on the rising sun. While he remained in this\nposition, he was approached by another officer, who, slapping him\nroughly on the shoulder, accosted him in these words\u2014\n\n\u201cWhat, Monteith! are you in a musing mood? Pray, let me have the benefit\nof your morning meditations.\u201d\n\n\u201cSir!\u201d said Monteith, turning hastily round. \u201cOh! \u2019tis you, Keppel. What\nthink you of this morning?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, that it will be a glorious day for some; and for you and me, I\nhope, among others. Do you know that the Elector of Bavaria purposes a\ngeneral assault to-day?\u201d\n\n\u201cI might guess as much, from the preparations going on. Well, would it\nwere to-morrow!\u201d\n\n\u201cSure you are not afraid, Monteith?\u201d\n\n\u201cAfraid! It is not worth while to quarrel at present; but methinks you,\nKeppel, might have spared that word. There are not many men who might\nutter it and live.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, I meant no offence; yet permit me to say, that your words and\nmanner are strangely at variance with your usual bearing on a\nbattle-morn.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps so,\u201d replied Monteith; \u201cand, but that your English prejudices\nwill refuse assent, it might be accounted for. That sun will rise\nto-morrow with equal power and splendour, gilding this earth\u2019s murky\nvapours, but I shall not behold his glory.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, do tell me some soothful narrative of a second-sighted seer,\u201d said\nKeppel. \u201cI promise to do my best to believe it. At any rate, I will not\nlaugh outright, I assure you.\u201d\n\n\u201cI fear not that. It is no matter to excite mirth; and, in truth, I feel\nat present strangely inclined to be communicative. Besides, I have a\nrequest to make; and I may as well do something to induce you to grant\nit.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat I readily will, if in my power,\u201d replied Keppel. \u201cSo, proceed with\nyour story, if you please.\u201d\n\n\u201cListen attentively, then\u2014and be at once my first and my last confidant.\n\n\u201cShortly after the battle of Bothwell Bridge, I joined the troop\ncommanded by Irvine of Bonshaw; and gloriously did we scour the country,\nhunting the rebel Covenanters, and acting our pleasure upon man, woman,\nand child, person and property. I was then but young, and, for a time,\nrather witnessed than acted in the wild and exciting commission which we\nso amply discharged. But use is all in all. Ere half-a-dozen years had\nsped their round, I was one of the prettiest men in the troop at\neverything. It was in the autumn of 1684, as I too well remember, that\nwe were engaged in beating up the haunts of the Covenanters on the\nskirts of Galloway and Ayrshire. A deep mist, which covered the moors\nthick as a shroud\u2014friendly at times to the Whigs, but, in the present\ninstance, their foe\u2014concealed our approach, till we were close upon a\nnumerous conventicle. We hailed, and bade them stand; but, trusting to\ntheir mosses and glens, they scattered and fled. We pursued in various\ndirections, pressing hard upon the fugitives. In spite of several\nmorasses which I had to skirt, and difficult glens to thread, being well\nmounted, I gained rapidly on a young mountaineer, who, finding escape by\nflight impossible, bent his course to a house at a short distance, as\nhoping for shelter there, like a hare to her form. I shouted to him to\nstand; he ran on. Again I hailed him; but he heeded not; when, dreading\nto lose all trace of him, should he gain the house, I fired. The bullet\ntook effect. He fell, and his heart\u2019s blood gushed on his father\u2019s\nthreshold. Just at that instant an aged woman, alarmed by the gallop of\nmy horse, and the report of the pistol, rushed to the door, and\nstumbling, fell upon the body of her dying son. She raised his drooping\nhead upon her knee, kissed his bloody brow, and screamed aloud, \u2018Oh, God\nof the widow and the fatherless, have mercy on me!\u2019 One ghastly\nconvulsive shudder shook all her nerves, and the next moment they were\ncalm as the steel of my sword; then raising her pale and shrivelled\ncountenance, every feature of which was fixed in the calm, unearthly\nearnestness of utter despair, or perfect resignation, she addressed me,\nevery word falling distinct and piercing on my ear like dropping\nmusketry.\n\n\u201c\u2018And hast thou this day made me a widowed, childless mother? Hast thou\nshed the precious blood of this young servant of Jehovah? And canst thou\nhope that thy lot will be one of unmingled happiness? Go, red-handed\npersecutor! Follow thine evil way! But hear one message of truth from a\nfeeble and unworthy tongue. Remorse, like a bloodhound, shall dog thy\nsteps; and the serpent of an evil conscience shall coil around thy\nheart. From this hour thou shalt never know peace. Thou shalt seek\ndeath, and long to meet it as a friend; but it shall flee thee. And when\nthou shalt begin to love life, and dread death, then shall thine enemy\ncome upon thee; and thou shalt not escape. Hence to thy bloody comrades,\nthou second Cain! Thou accursed and banished from the face of Heaven and\nof mercy!\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Foul hag!\u2019 I exclaimed, it would take little to make me send thee to\njoin thy psalm-singing offspring!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Well do I know that thou wouldst if thou wert permitted!\u2019 replied she.\n\u2018But go thy way, and bethink thee how thou wilt answer to thy Creator\nfor this morning\u2019s work!\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd, ceasing to regard me, she stooped her head over the dead body of\nher son. I could endure no more, but wheeled around, and galloped off to\njoin my companions.\n\n\u201cFrom that hour, I felt myself a doomed and miserable man. In vain did I\nattempt to banish from my mind the deed I had done, and the words I had\nheard. In the midst of mirth and revelry, the dying groan of the youth,\nand the words of doom spoken by his mother, rung for ever in my ears,\nconverting the festal board to a scene of carnage and horror, till the\nvery wine-cup seemed to foam over with hot bubbling gore. Once I\ntried\u2014laugh, if you will\u2014I tried to pray; but the clotted locks of the\ndying man, and the earnest gaze of the soul-stricken mother, came\nbetwixt me and Heaven,\u2014my lip faltered\u2014my breath stopped\u2014my very soul\nstood still, for I knew that my victims were in Paradise, and how could\nI think of happiness\u2014_I_, their murderer\u2014in one common home with them?\nDespair took possession of my whole being. I rushed voluntarily to the\ncentre of every deadly peril, in hopes to find an end to my misery.\nYourself can bear me witness that I have ever been the first to meet,\nthe last to retire from, danger. Often, when I heard the battle-signal\ngiven, and when I passed the trench, or stormed the breach, in front of\nmy troop, it was less to gain applause and promotion than to provoke the\nencounter of death. \u2019Twas all in vain. I was doomed not to die, while I\nlonged for death. And now\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, by your own account, you run no manner of risk, and at the same\ntime are proceeding on a rapid career of military success,\u201d said Keppel;\n\u201cand, for my life, I cannot see why that should affect you, supposing it\nall perfectly true.\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause you have not yet heard the whole. But listen a few minutes\nlonger. During last winter, our division, as you know, was quartered in\nBrussels, and was very kindly entertained by the wealthy and\ngood-natured Flemings. Utterly tired of the heartless dissipation of\nlife in a camp, I endeavoured to make myself agreeable to my landlord,\nthat I might obtain a more intimate admission into his family circle. To\nthis I was the more incited, that I expected some pleasure in the\nsociety of his daughter. In all I succeeded to my wish. I became quite a\nfavourite with the old man, and procured ready access to the company of\nhis child. But I was sufficiently piqued to find, that in spite of all\nmy gallantry, I could not learn whether I had made any impression upon\nthe heart of the laughing Fanchon. What peace and playful toying could\nnot accomplish, war and sorrow did. We were called out of winter\nquarters, to commence what was anticipated to be a bloody campaign. I\nobtained an interview to take a long and doubtful farewell. In my arms\nthe weeping girl owned her love, and pledged her hand, should I survive\nto return once more to Brussels. Keppel, I am a doomed man; and my doom\nis about to be accomplished! Formerly I wished to die; but death fled\nme. Now I wish to live; and death will come upon me! I know I shall\nnever more see Brussels, nor my lovely little Fleming. Wilt thou carry\nher my last farewell; and tell her to forget a man who was unworthy of\nher love\u2014whose destiny drove him to love, and be beloved, that he might\nexperience the worst of human wretchedness? You\u2019ll do this for me,\nKeppel?\u201d\n\n\u201cIf I myself survive, I will. But this is some delusion\u2014some strong\ndream. I trust it will not unnerve your arm in the moment of the storm.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo! I may die\u2014_must_ die; but it shall be in front of my troop, or in\nthe middle of the breach. Yet how I long to escape this doom! I have won\nenough of glory; I despise pillage and wealth; but I feel my very\nheartstrings shrink from the now terrible idea of final dissolution. Oh!\nthat the fatal hour were past, or that I had still my former eagerness\nto die! Keppel, if I dared, I would to-day own myself a coward.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome with me,\u201d said Keppel, \u201cto my quarters. The night air has made you\naguish. The cold fit will yield to a cup of as generous Rhine wine as\never was drunk on the banks of the Sambre.\u201d Monteith consented, and the\ntwo moved off to partake of the stimulating and substantial comforts of\na soldier\u2019s breakfast in the Netherlands.\n\nIt was between one and two in the afternoon. An unusual stillness\nreigned in the lines of the besiegers. The garrison remained equally\nsilent, as watching in deep suspense on what point the storm portended\nby this terrible calm would burst. A single piece of artillery was\ndischarged. Instantly a body of grenadiers rushed from the\nintrenchments, struggled over masses of ruins, and mounted the breach.\nThe shock was dreadful. Man strove with man, and blow succeeded to blow,\nwith fierce and breathless energy. The English reached the summit, but\nwere almost immediately beaten back, leaving numbers of their bravest\ngrovelling among the blackened fragments. Their leader, Lord Cutts, had\nhimself received a dangerous wound in the head; but disregarding it, he\nselected two hundred men from Mackay\u2019s regiment, and putting them under\nthe command of Lieutenants Cockle and Monteith, sent them to restore the\nfortunes of the assault. Their charge was irresistible. Led on by\nMonteith, who displayed a wild and frantic desperation, rather than\nbravery, they broke through all impediments, drove the French from the\ncovered way, seized on one of the batteries, and turned the cannon\nagainst the enemy. To enable them to maintain this advantage, they were\nreinforced by parties from other divisions. Keppel, advancing in one of\nthose parties, discovered the mangled form of his friend Monteith, lying\non heaps of the enemy on the very summit of the captured battery. He\nattempted to raise the seemingly lifeless body. Monteith opened his\neyes,\u2014\u201cSave me!\u201d he cried; \u201csave me! I will not die! I dare not\u2014I must\nnot die!\u201d\n\nIt were too horrid to specify the ghastly nature of the mortal wounds\nwhich had torn and disfigured his frame. To live was impossible. Yet\nKeppel strove to render him some assistance, were it but to soothe his\nparting spirit. Again he opened his glazing eyes,\u2014\u201cI will resist thee to\nthe last!\u201d he cried, in a raving delirium. \u201cI killed him but in the\ndischarge of my duty. What worse was I than others? Poor consolation\nnow! The doom\u2014the doom! I cannot\u2014dare not\u2014must not\u2014_will not_ die!\u201d And\nwhile the vain words were gurgling in his throat, his head sunk back on\nthe body of a slaughtered foe, and his unwilling spirit forsook his\nshattered body.\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Journal._\n\n\n\n\n THE LADY OF WARISTOUN.\n\n\nThe estate of Waristoun, near Edinburgh, now partly covered by the\nextended streets of the metropolis on its northern side, is remarkable\nin local history for having belonged to a gentleman, who in the year\n1600, was cruelly murdered at the instigation of his wife. This\nunfortunate lady, whose name was Jean Livingstone, was descended from a\nrespectable ancestry, being the daughter of Livingstone, the laird of\nDunipace, in Stirlingshire, and at an early age was married to John\nKincaid, the laird of Waristoun, who, it is believed, was considerably\nmore advanced in years than herself. It is probable that this disparity\nof age laid the foundation of much domestic strife, and led to the\ntragical event now to be noticed. The ill-fated marriage and its results\nform the subject of an old Scottish ballad, in which the proximate cause\nof the murder is said to have been a quarrel at the dinner-table:\n\n It was at dinner as they sat,\n And when they drank the wine,\n How happy were the laird and lady\n Of bonny Waristoun!\n\n But he has spoken a word in jest;\n Her answer was not good;\n And he has thrown a plate at her,\n Made her mouth gush with blude.\n\nWhether owing to such a circumstance as is here alluded to, or a bite\nwhich the laird is said to have inflicted upon her arm, is immaterial;\nthe lady, who appeared to have been unable to restrain her malignant\npassions, conceived the diabolical design of having her husband\nassassinated. There was something extraordinary in the deliberation with\nwhich this wretched woman approached the awful gulf of crime. Having\nresolved on the means to be employed in the murder, she sent for a\nquondam servant of her father, Robert Weir, who lived in the\nneighbouring city. He came to the place of Waristoun, to see her; but it\nappeares her resolution failed, and he was not admitted. She again sent\nfor him, and he again went. Again he was not admitted. At length, on his\nbeing called a third time, he was introduced to her presence. Before\nthis time she had found an accomplice in the nurse of her child. It was\nthen arranged that Weir should be concealed in a cellar till the dead of\nnight, when he should come forth, and proceed to destroy the laird as he\nlay in his chamber. The bloody tragedy was acted precisely in accordance\nwith this plan. Weir was brought up at midnight from the cellar to the\nhall by the lady herself, and afterwards went forward alone to the\nlaird\u2019s bedroom. As he proceeded to his bloody work, she retired to her\nbed, to wait the intelligence of her husband\u2019s murder. When Weir entered\nthe chamber, Waristoun awoke with the noise, and leant inquiringly over\nthe bed. The murderer then leapt upon him. The unhappy man uttered a\ngreat cry. Weir gave him some severe blows on vital parts, particularly\none on the flank vein. But as the laird was still able to cry out, he at\nlength saw fit to take more effective measures. He seized him by the\nthroat with both hands, and, compressing that part with all his force,\nsucceeded, after a few minutes, in depriving him of life.\n\nWhen the lady heard her husband\u2019s first death-shout, she leapt out of\nbed, in an agony of mingled horror and repentance, and descended to the\nhall; but she made no effort to countermand her mission of destruction.\nShe waited patiently till Weir came down to inform her that all was\nover. Weir made an immediate escape from justice, but Lady Waristoun and\nthe nurse were apprehended before the deed was half-a-day old. Being\ncaught, as the Scottish law terms it, \u201cred-hand,\u201d\u2014that is, while still\nbearing unequivocal marks of guilt,\u2014they were immediately tried by the\nmagistrates of Edinburgh, and sentenced to be strangled and burnt at the\nstake.\n\nThe lady\u2019s father, the Laird of Dunipace, who was a favourite of King\nJames VI., made all the interest he could with his Majesty to procure a\npardon; but all that could be obtained from the king was an order that\nthe unhappy lady should be executed by decapitation, and that at such an\nearly hour in the morning as to make the affair as little of a spectacle\nas possible. The space intervening between her sentence and her\nexecution was only thirty-seven hours, yet in that little time Lady\nWaristoun contrived to become converted from a blood-stained and\nunrelenting murderess into a perfect saint on earth. One of the then\nministers of Edinburgh has left an account of her conversion, which was\nlately published, and would be extremely amusing, were it not for the\nloathing which seizes the mind on beholding such an instance of\nperverted religion. She went to the scaffold with a demeanour which\nwould have graced a martyr. Her lips were incessant in the utterance of\npious exclamations. She professed herself confident of everlasting\nhappiness. She even grudged every moment which she spent in this world\nas so much taken from that sum of eternal felicity which she was to\nenjoy in the next. The people who came to witness the last scene,\ninstead of having their minds inspired with a salutary horror for her\ncrime, were engrossed in admiration of her saintly behaviour, and\ngreedily gathered up every devout word which fell from her tongue. It\nwould almost appear, from the narrative of the clergyman, that her fate\nwas rather a matter of envy than of any other feeling. Her execution\ntook place at four in the morning of the 5th of July, at the Watergate,\nnear Holyrood-house; and at the same hour her nurse was burned on the\nCastlehill. It is some gratification to know that the actual murderer,\nWeir, was eventually seized and executed, though not till four years\nafterwards.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh Journal_, 1832.\n\n\n\n\n A TALE OF PENTLAND.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\nMr John Haliday having been in hiding on the hills, after the battle of\nPentland, became impatient to hear news concerning the sufferings of his\nbrethren who had been in arms; and in particular, if there were any\ntroops scouring the district in which he had found shelter. Accordingly,\nhe left his hiding-place in the evening, and travelled towards the\nvalley until about midnight, when, coming to the house of Gabriel\nJohnstone, and perceiving a light, he determined on entering, as he knew\nhim to be a devout man, and one much concerned about the sufferings of\nthe Church of Scotland.\n\nMr Haliday, however, approached the house with great caution, for he\nrather wondered why there should be a light there at midnight, while at\nthe same time he neither heard psalms singing nor the accents of prayer.\nSo, casting off his heavy shoes, for fear of making a noise, he stole\nsoftly up to the little window from whence the light beamed, and peeped\nin, where he saw, not Johnstone, but another man, whom he did not know,\nin the very act of cutting a soldier\u2019s throat, while Johnstone\u2019s\ndaughter, a comely girl, about twenty years of age, was standing\ndeliberately by, and holding the candle to him.\n\nHaliday was seized with an inexpressible terror; for the floor was all\nblood, and the man was struggling in the agonies of death, and from his\ndress he appeared to have been a cavalier of some distinction. So\ncompletely was the Covenanter overcome with horror, that he turned and\nfled from the house with all his might. So much had Haliday been\nconfounded that he even forgot to lift his shoes, but fled without them;\nand he had not run above half a bowshot before he came upon two men\nhastening to the house of Gabriel Johnstone. As soon as they perceived\nhim running towards them they fled, and he pursued them; for when he saw\nthem so ready to take alarm, he was sure they were some of the\npersecuted race, and tried eagerly to overtake them, exerting his utmost\nspeed, and calling on them to stop. All this only made them run faster;\nand when they came to a feal-dyke they separated, and ran different\nways, and he soon thereafter lost sight of them both.\n\nThis house, where Johnstone lived, is said to have been in a lonely\nconcealed dell, not far from West Linton, in what direction I do not\nknow, but it was towards that village that Haliday fled, not knowing\nwhether he went, till he came to the houses. Having no acquaintances\nhere whom he durst venture to call up, and the morning having set in\nfrosty, he began to conceive that it was absolutely necessary for him to\nreturn to the house of Gabriel Johnstone, and try to regain his shoes,\nas he little knew when or where it might be in his power to get another\npair. Accordingly, he hasted back by a nearer path, and coming to the\nplace before it was day, found his shoes. At the same time he heard a\nfierce contention within the house, but as there seemed to be a watch he\ndurst not approach it, but again made his escape.\n\nHaving brought some victuals along with him, he did not return to his\nhiding-place that day, which was in a wild height, south of Biggar, but\nremained in the moss of Craigengaur; and as soon as it drew dark,\ndescended again into the valley. Again he perceived a light in the\ndistance, where he thought no light should have been. But he went\ntowards it, and as he approached he heard the melody of psalm-singing\nissuing from the place, and floating far on the still breeze of the\nnight. He hurried to the spot, and found the reverend and devout Mr\nLivingston, in the act of divine worship, in an old void barn on the\nlands of Slipperfield, with a great number of serious and pious people,\nwho were all much affected both by his prayers and discourse.\n\nAfter the worship was ended, Haliday made up to the minister, among many\nothers, to congratulate him on the splendour of his discourse, and\nimplore \u201ca further supply of the same milk of redeeming grace, with\nwhich they found their souls nourished, cherished, and exalted.\u201d The\ngood man complied with the request, and appointed another meeting at the\nsame place on a future night.\n\nHaliday having been formerly well acquainted with the preacher, convoyed\nhim on his way home, where they condoled with one another on the\nhardness of their lots; and Haliday told him of the scene he had\nwitnessed at the house of Gabriel Johnstone. The heart of the good\nminister was wrung with grief, and he deplored the madness and malice of\nthe people who had committed an act that would bring down tenfold\nvengeance on the heads of the whole persecuted race. At length it was\nresolved between them that, as soon as it was day, they would go and\nreconnoitre, and if they found the case of the aggravated nature they\nsuspected, they would themselves be the first to expose it, and give the\nperpetrators up to justice.\n\nAccordingly, next morning they took another man into the secret, a\nWilliam Rankin, one of Mr Livingston\u2019s elders, and the three went away\nto Johnstone\u2019s house, to investigate the case of the cavalier\u2019s murder;\nbut there was a guard of three armed men opposed them, and neither\npromises nor threatenings, nor all the minister\u2019s eloquence, could\ninduce them to give way one inch. The men advised the intruders to take\nthemselves off, lest a worse thing should befall them; and as they\ncontinued to motion them away, with the most impatient gestures, the\nkind divine and his associates thought meet to retire, and leave the\nmatter as it was; and thus was this mysterious affair hushed up in\nsilence and darkness for that time, no tongue having been heard to\nmention it further than as above recited. The three armed men were all\nunknown to the others, but Haliday observed that one of them was the\nvery youth whom he saw cutting off the soldier\u2019s head with a knife.\n\nThe rage and cruelty of the Popish party seemed to gather new virulence\nevery day, influencing all the counsels of the king; and the persecution\nof the Nonconformists was proportionably severe. One new act of council\nwas issued after another, all tending to root the Covenanters out of\nScotland, but it had only the effect of making their tenets still dearer\nto them. The longed-for night of the meeting in the old hay-barn at\nlength arrived, and it was attended by a still greater number than on\nthe night preceding. A more motley group can hardly be conceived than\nappeared in the barn that night, and the lamps being weak and dim\nrendered the appearance of the assembly still more striking. It was,\nhowever, observed that about the middle of the service a number of\nfellows came in with broad slouch bonnets, and watch-coats or cloaks\nabout them, who placed themselves in equal divisions at the two doors,\nand remained without uncovering their heads, two of them being busily\nengaged taking notes. Before Mr Livingston began the last prayer,\nhowever, he desired the men to uncover, which they did, and the service\nwent on to the end; but no sooner had the minister pronounced the word\n_Amen_, than the group of late comers threw off their cloaks, and\ndrawing out swords and pistols, their commander, one General Drummond,\ncharged the whole congregation in the king\u2019s name to surrender.\n\nA scene of the utmost confusion ensued. The lights being extinguished,\nmany of the young men burst through the roof of the old barn in every\ndirection, and though many shots were fired at them in the dark, great\nnumbers escaped; but Mr Livingston and other eleven were retained\nprisoners, and conveyed to Edinburgh, where they were examined before\nthe council and cast into prison. Among the prisoners were Mr Haliday\nand the identical young man whom he had seen in the act of murdering the\ncavalier, and who turned out to be a Mr John Lindsay, from Edinburgh,\nwho had been at the battle of Pentland, and in hiding afterwards.\n\nGreat was the lamentation for the loss of Mr Livingston, who was so\nhighly esteemed by his hearers. The short extracts from his sermons in\nthe barn, that were produced against him on his trial, prove him to have\nbeen a man endowed with talents somewhat above the greater part of his\ncontemporaries. His text that night it appears had been taken from\nGenesis:\u2014\u201cAnd God saw the wickedness of man that it was great in the\nearth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only\nevil continually.\u201d One of the quoted passages concludes thus:\u2014\n\n\u201cLet us join together in breaking the bands of the oppressors, and\ncasting their cords from us. As for myself, as a member of this poor\npersecuted Church of Scotland, and an unworthy minister of it, I hereby\ncall upon you all, in the name of God, to set your faces, your hearts,\nand your hands against all such acts, which are or shall be passed\nagainst the covenanted work of reformation in this kingdom; that we here\ndeclare ourselves free of the guilt of them, and pray that God may put\nthis in record in heaven.\u201d\n\nThese words having been sworn to, and Mr Livingston not denying them, a\nsharp debate arose in the council what punishment to award. The king\u2019s\nadvocate urged the utility of sending him forthwith to the gallows; but\nsome friends in the council got his sentence commuted to banishment; and\nhe was accordingly banished the kingdom. Six more, against whom nothing\ncould be proven farther than their having been present at a conventicle,\nwere sentenced to imprisonment for two months; among this number,\nHaliday was one. The other five were condemned to be executed at the\ncross of Edinburgh, on the 14th of December following; and among this\nlast unhappy number was Mr John Lindsay.\n\nHaliday now tried all the means he could devise to gain an interview\nwith Lindsay, to have some explanation of the extraordinary scene he had\nwitnessed in the cottage at midnight, for it had made a fearful\nimpression upon his mind, and he never could get rid of it for a moment;\nhaving still in his mind\u2019s eye a beautiful country maiden standing with\na pleased face, holding a candle, and Lindsay in the meantime at his\nhorrid task. His endeavours, however, were all in vain, for they were in\ndifferent prisons, and the jailer paid no attention to his requests. But\nthere was a gentleman in the privy council that year, whose name, I\nthink, was Gilmour, to whose candour Haliday conceived that both he and\nsome of his associates owed their lives. To this gentleman, therefore,\nhe applied by letter, requesting a private interview with him, as he had\na singular instance of barbarity to communicate, which it would be well\nto inquire into while the possibility of doing so remained, for the\naccess to it would soon be sealed for ever. The gentleman attended\nimmediately, and Haliday revealed to him the circumstances previously\nmentioned, stating that the murderer now lay in the Tolbooth jail, under\nsentence of death.\n\nGilmour appeared much interested, as well as astonished at the\nnarrative, and taking out a note-book, he looked over some dates, and\nthen observed\u2014\u201cThis date of yours tallies exactly with one of my own,\nrelating to an incident of the same sort; but the circumstances narrated\nare so different, that I must conceive either that you are mistaken, or\nthat you are trumping up this story to screen some other guilty person\nor persons.\u201d\n\nHaliday disclaimed all such motives, and persevered in his attestations.\nGilmour then took him along with him to the Tolbooth prison, where the\ntwo were admitted to a private interview with the prisoner, and there\ncharged him with the crime of murder in such a place and on such a\nnight; but he denied the whole with disdain. Haliday told him that it\nwas in vain for him to deny it, for he beheld him in the very act of\nperpetrating the murder with his own eyes, while Gabriel Johnstone\u2019s\ndaughter stood deliberately and held the candle to him.\n\n\u201cHold your tongue, fellow!\u201d said Lindsay, disdainfully, \u201cfor you know\nnot what you are saying. What a cowardly dog you must be by your own\naccount! If you saw me murdering a gentleman cavalier, why did you not\nrush in to his assistance?\u201d\n\n\u201cI could not have saved the gentleman then,\u201d said Haliday, \u201cand I\nthought it not meet to intermeddle in such a scene of blood.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was as well for you that you did not,\u201d said Lindsay.\n\n\u201cThen you acknowledge being in the cottage of the dell that night?\u201d said\nGilmour.\n\n\u201cAnd if I was, what is that to you? Or what is it now to me or any\nperson? I _was_ there on the night specified; but I am ashamed of the\npart I there acted, and am now well requited for it. Yes, requited as I\nought to be, so let it rest; for not one syllable of the transaction\nshall any one hear from me.\u201d\n\nThus they were obliged to leave the prisoner, and forthwith Gilmour led\nHaliday up a stair to a lodging in the Parliament Square, where they\nfound a gentleman lying sick in bed, to whom Mr Gilmour said, after\ninquiring after his health, \u201cBrother Robert, I conceive that we two have\nfound out the young man who saved your life at the cottage among the\nmountains.\u201d\n\n\u201cI would give the half that I possess that this were true,\u201d said the\nsick gentleman. \u201cWho or where is he?\u201d\n\n\u201cIf I am right in my conjecture,\u201d said the privy councillor, \u201che is\nlying in the Tolbooth jail, under sentence of death, and has but a few\ndays to live. But tell me, brother, could you know him, or have you any\nrecollection of his appearance?\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas! I have none,\u201d said the other, mournfully, \u201cfor I was insensible,\nthrough the loss of blood, the whole time I was under his protection;\nand if I ever heard his name I have lost it, the whole of that period\nbeing a total blank in my memory. But he must be a hero in the first\nrank; and therefore, oh, my dear brother, save him whatever his crime\nmay be.\u201d\n\n\u201cHis life is justly forfeited to the laws of his country, brother,\u201d said\nGilmour, \u201cand he must die with the rest.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe shall not die with the rest if I should die for him,\u201d cried the sick\nman, vehemently. \u201cI will move heaven and earth before my brave deliverer\nshall die like a felon.\u201d\n\n\u201cCalm yourself, brother, and trust that part to me,\u201d said Gilmour. \u201cI\nthink my influence saved the life of this gentleman, as well as the\nlives of some others, and it was all on account of the feeling of\nrespect I had for the party, one of whom, or, rather, two of whom, acted\nsuch a noble and distinguished part toward you. But pray, undeceive this\ngentleman by narrating the facts to him, in which he cannot fail to be\ninterested.\u201d The sick man, whose name, if I remember aright, was Captain\nRobert Gilmour, of the volunteers, then proceeded as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cThere having been high rewards offered for the apprehension of some\nsouth-country gentlemen, whose correspondence with Mr Welch, and some\nother of the fanatics, had been intercepted, I took advantage of\ninformation I obtained regarding the place of their retreat, and set\nout, certain of apprehending two of them at least.\n\n\u201cAccordingly, I went off one morning about the beginning of November,\nwith only five followers, well armed and mounted. We left Gilmerton long\nbefore it was light, and having a trusty guide, rode straight to their\nhiding-place, where we did not arrive till towards the evening, when we\nstarted them. They were seven in number, and were armed with swords and\nbludgeons; but, being apprized of our approach, they fled from us, and\ntook shelter in a morass, into which it was impossible to follow them on\nhorseback. But perceiving three more men on another hill, I thought\nthere was no time to lose, so giving one of my men our horses to hold,\nthe rest of us advanced into the morass with drawn swords and loaded\nhorse-pistols. I called to them to surrender, but they stood upon their\nguard, determined on resistance; and just when we were involved to the\nknees in the mire of the morass, they broke in upon us, pell-mell, and\nfor about two minutes the engagement was very sharp. There was an old\nman struck me a terrible blow with a bludgeon, and was just about to\nrepeat it, when I brought him down with a shot from my pistol. A young\nfellow then ran at me with his sword, and as I still stuck in the moss,\nI could not ward the blow, so that he got a fair stroke at my neck,\nmeaning, without doubt, to cut off my head; and he would have done it\nhad his sword been sharp. As it was, he cut it to the bone, and opened\none of the jugular veins. I fell; but my men firing a volley in their\nfaces, at that moment they fled. It seems we did the same, without loss\nof time; for I must now take my narrative from the report of others, as\nI remember no more that passed. My men bore me on their arms to our\nhorses, and then mounted and fled, trying all that they could to stanch\nthe bleeding of my wound. But perceiving a party coming down a hill, as\nwith the intent of cutting off their retreat, and losing all hopes of\nsaving my life, they carried me into a cottage in a wild lonely retreat,\ncommended me to the care of the inmates; and after telling them my name,\nand in what manner I had received my death wound, they thought proper to\nprovide for their own safety, and so escaped.\n\n\u201cThe only inmates of that lonely house, at least at that present time,\nwere a lover and his mistress, but intercommuned Whigs; and when my men\nleft me on the floor, the blood, which they had hitherto restrained in\npart, burst out afresh and deluged the floor. The young man said it was\nbest to put me out of my pain, but the girl wept and prayed him rather\nto render me some assistance. \u2018Oh, Johnny, man, how can you speak that\ngate?\u2019 cried she. \u2018Suppose he be our mortal enemy, he is aye ane o\u2019\nGod\u2019s creatures, an\u2019 has a soul to be saved as well as either you or me;\nand a soldier is obliged to do as he is bidden. Now Johnny, ye ken ye\nwere learned to be a doctor o\u2019 physic; wad ye no rather try to stop the\nbleeding, and save the young officer\u2019s life, as either kill him, or let\nhim bleed to death on our floor, when the blame o\u2019 the murder might fa\u2019\non us!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Now, the blessing of heaven light on your head, my dear Sally!\u2019 said\nthe lover, \u2018for you have spoken the very sentiments of my heart; and,\nsince it is your desire, though we should both rue it, I here vow to you\nthat I will not only endeavour to save his life, but I will defend it\nagainst our own party to the last drop of my blood.\u2019\n\n\u201cHe then began, and, in spite of my feeble struggles, who knew not\neither what I was doing or suffering, sewed up the hideous gash in my\nthroat and neck, tying every stitch by itself; and the house not being\nable to produce a pair of scissors, it seems that he cut off all the\nodds and ends of the stitching with a large sharp gully knife, and it\nwas likely to have been during the operation that this gentleman chanced\nto look in at the window. He then bathed the wound for an hour with\ncloths dipped in cold water, dressed it with plaster of wood-betony, and\nput me to bed, expressing to his sweetheart the most vivid hopes of my\nrecovery.\n\n\u201cThese operations were scarcely finished when the maid\u2019s two brothers\ncame home from their hiding-place; and it seems they would have been\nthere much sooner had not this gentleman given them chase in the\ncontrary direction. They, seeing the floor all covered with blood,\ninquired the cause with wild trepidation of manner. Their sister was the\nfirst to inform them of what had happened, on which both the young men\ngripped to their weapons, and the eldest, Samuel, cried out with the\nvehemence of a maniac, \u2018Blessed be the righteous avenger of blood! Hoo!\nIs it then true that the Lord hath delivered our greatest enemy into our\nhands!\u2019 \u2018Hold, hold, dearest brother!\u2019 cried the maid, spreading out her\narms before him. \u2018Would you kill a helpless young man, lying in a state\nof insensibility! What! although the Almighty hath put his life in your\nhand, will He not require the blood of you, shed in such a base and\ncowardly way?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Hold your peace, foolish girl,\u2019 cried he, in the same furious strain.\n\u2018I tell you, if he had a thousand lives I would sacrifice them all this\nmoment! Wo be to this old rusty and fizenless sword that did not sever\nhis head from his body when I had a fair chance in the open field!\nNevertheless he shall die; for you do not yet know that he hath, within\nthese few hours, murdered our father, whose blood is yet warm around him\non the bleak height.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Oh! merciful heaven! killed our father!\u2019 screamed the girl, and\nflinging herself down on the resting-chair, she fainted away. The two\nbrothers regarded not, but with their bared weapons made towards the\ncloset, intent on my blood, and both vowing I should die if I had a\nthousand lives. The stranger interfered, and thrust himself into the\ncloset door before them, swearing that, before they committed so\ncowardly a murder they should first make their way through his body.\n\n\u201cSamuel retreated one step to have full sway for his weapon, and the\nfury depicted on his countenance proved his determination. But in a\nmoment his gallant opponent closed with him, and holding up his wrist\nwith his left hand, he with the right bestowed on him a blow with such\nenergy that he fell flat on the floor among the soldier\u2019s blood. The\nyoungest then ran on their antagonist with his sword and wounded him,\nbut the next moment he was lying beside his brother. As soon as her\nbrothers came fairly to their senses, the young woman and her lover\nbegan and expostulated with them, at great length, on the impropriety\nand unmanliness of the attempt, until they became all of one mind, and\nthe two brothers agreed to join in the defence of the wounded gentleman,\nfrom all of their own party, until he was rescued by his friends, which\nthey did. But it was the maid\u2019s simple eloquence that finally prevailed\nwith the fierce Covenanters.\n\n\u201cWhen my brothers came at last, with a number of my men, and took me\naway, the only thing I remember seeing in the house was the corpse of\nthe old man whom I had shot, and the beautiful girl standing weeping\nover the body; and certainly my heart smote me in such a manner that I\nwould not experience the same feeling again for the highest of this\nworld\u2019s benefits. That comely young maiden, and her brave intrepid\nlover, it would be the utmost ingratitude in me, or in any of my family,\never to forget; for it is scarcely possible that a man can ever be again\nin the same circumstances as I was, having been preserved from death in\nthe house of the man whom my hand had just deprived of life.\u201d\n\nJust as he ended, the sick nurse peeped in, which she had done several\ntimes before, and said, \u201cWill your honour soon be disengaged, d\u2019ye\nthink? for ye see because there\u2019s a lass wanting till speak till ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cA lass, nurse? what lass can have any business with me? what is she\nlike?\u201d\n\n\u201cOo, \u2019deed, sir, the lass is weel enough for that part o\u2019t, but she may\nbe nae better than she should be for a\u2019 that; ye ken, I\u2019se no answer for\nthat, for ye see because \u201clike is an ill mark\u201d; but she has been aften\nup, speiring after ye, an\u2019 gude troth she\u2019s fairly in nettle-earnest\nnow, for she winna gang awa till she see your honour.\u201d\n\nThe nurse being desired to show her in, a comely girl entered, with a\ntimid step, and seemed ready to faint with trepidation. She had a mantle\non, and a hood that covered much of her face. The privy councillor spoke\nto her, desiring her to come forward and say her errand, on which she\nsaid that \u201cshe only wanted a preevat word wi\u2019 the captain, if he was\nthat weel as to speak to ane,\u201d He looked over the bed, and desired her\nto say on, for that gentleman was his brother, from whom he kept no\nsecrets. After a hard struggle with her diffidence, but, on the other\nhand, prompted by the urgency of the case, she at last got out, \u201cI\u2019m\nunco glad to see you sae weel comed round again, though I daresay ye\u2019ll\nmaybe no ken wha I am. But it was me that nursed ye, an\u2019 took care o\u2019 ye\nin our house, when your head was amaist cuttit off.\u201d\n\nThere was not another word required to draw forth the most ardent\nexpressions of kindness from the two brothers, on which the poor girl\ntook courage, and, after several showers of tears, she said, with many\nbitter sobs, \u201cThere\u2019s a poor lad wha, in my humble opinion, saved your\nlife; an\u2019 wha is just gaun to be hanged the day after the morn. I wad\nunco fain beg your honour\u2019s interest to get his life spared.\u201d\n\n\u201cSay not another word, my dear good girl,\u201d said the councillor; \u201cfor\nthough I hardly know how I can intercede for a rebel who has taken up\narms against the government, yet, for your sake and his, my best\ninterest shall be exerted.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, ye maun just say, sir, that the poor Whigs were driven to\ndesperation, and that this young man was misled by others in the fervour\nand enthusiasm of youth. What else can ye say? But ye\u2019re good\u2014oh, ye\u2019re\nvery good! and on my knees I beg that ye winna lose ony time, for indeed\nthere is nae time to lose!\u201d\n\nThe councillor lifted her kindly by both hands, and desired her to stay\nwith his brother\u2019s nurse till his return, on which he went away to the\npresident, and in half-an-hour returned with a respite for the convict,\nJohn Lindsay, for three days, which he gave to the girl, along with an\norder for her admittance to the prisoner. She thanked him with the tears\nin her eyes, but added, \u201cOh, sir, will he and I then be obliged to part\nfor ever at the end of three days?\u201d\n\n\u201cKeep up your heart, and encourage your lover,\u201d said he, \u201cand meet me\nhere again, on Thursday, at this same hour, for, till the council meet,\nnothing further than this can be obtained.\u201d\n\nIt may well be conceived how much the poor forlorn prisoner was\nastonished when his own beloved Sally entered to him with a reprieve in\nher hand, and how much his whole soul dilated when, on the Thursday\nfollowing, she presented him with a free pardon. They were afterwards\nmarried, when the Gilmours took them under their protection. Lindsay\nbecame a highly qualified surgeon, and the descendants of this intrepid\nyouth occupy respectable situations in Edinburgh to the present day.\n\n\n\n\n GRAYSTEEL:\n _A TRADITIONARY STORY OF CAITHNESS_.\n\n\nIn a beautiful valley in the highlands of Caithness, lies embosomed a\nsmall mountain tarn, called the Loch of Ranag. The hill of Bencheildt,\nwhich ascends abruptly from the water\u2019s edge, protects it on the north.\nOn the south it is overlooked by a chain of lofty mountains,\nindividually named Scarabine, Morven, and the Pap, which form a natural\nbarrier betwixt Sutherland and Caithness. Morven, the highest in the\nrange, is nearly two thousand feet above the level of the sea, and turns\nup conspicuously over the neighbouring summits, like a huge pyramid. The\nextensive wild lying between this magnificent chain of hills and Ranag,\nis clothed in the autumnal season with rich purple heather; and here the\nplover and the grouse, the denizens of the solitary waste, live\nunmolested, except by the murderous gun of the sportsman. Near the north\nedge of the loch to which we have just alluded, there is a small island,\non which may be still seen the ruins of an old keep or castle. The last\nproprietor of this fortalice is said to have been a noted freebooter of\nthe name of Graysteel, who kept the whole county in alarm by his\npredatory incursions from the Ord to Duncansbay Head, and, like Rob Roy\nand others of the same stamp, rigorously exacted \u201cblack mail,\u201d or\nprotection money. Tradition also reports, that, besides being possessed\nof great bodily strength, he was an expert swordsman, and a person of\nsuch a jealous and tyrannical disposition, that none durst venture to\nhunt or shoot on his grounds, without being challenged to single combat;\nand it may be added, that none whom he encountered trespassing in this\nway ever escaped alive out of his hands. It happened that one of the\nfamily of Rollo, while pursuing his sport in the direction, one day\nunfortunately encroached on the sacred property of the robber. Being\ninformed by some of his retainers that a stranger was hunting on the\nwest side of the lake, Graysteel immediately sallied forth, and, running\nup towards the sportsman with menacing looks and gestures, gave him the\naccustomed challenge. Rollo saw he had no alternative but to give him\ncombat, and being a high-spirited young man, he instantly drew his\nsword; and, although he defended himself for some time with great skill\nand courage, it is needless to say that he sank at last, mortally\nwounded, under the more powerful arm of his antagonist. The ruffian\nafterwards stripped the dead body of every thing that was of any value,\nand then threw it into the loch.\n\nThe account of this melancholy occurrence, as soon as it reached the\nfamily and relatives of the unfortunate youth, plunged them into the\ndeepest distress; but none did it inspire with more poignant regret than\nthe young laird of Durie, who was his bosom friend, and had just been\naffianced to his sister, a very beautiful and interesting girl of\nsixteen. The moment he heard of Rollo\u2019s tragical death, he determined to\navenge it, although he knew he had little chance of surviving a personal\nencounter with such a desperado as Graysteel. Accordingly, having\nfurnished himself with a good Highland broadsword, and without\ncommunicating his intention to any one, he set off for the residence of\nthe freebooter. Nor was the route he had to take, any more than the\noccasion of the journey, agreeable. A trackless moor, of some miles in\nextent, lay between him and Ranag, so very bleak and barren, that, in\nthe words of the poet,\n\n The solitary bee\n Flew there on restless wing,\n Seeking in vain one blossom where to fix.\n\nHe had not gone far, however, when he was overtaken by a severe storm,\nwhich rendered it impossible for him to continue his journey. The wind,\nwhich blew at times with irresistible fury, dashed the rain in his face,\nmingled with hail, and howled like a maniac on the naked moor. Clouds of\nturbid vapour, issuing, as it were, from a vast furnace, hurried across\nthe sky; and now and then the rolling of thunder, while it\nprognosticated a continuance of the storm, added not a little to its\nterrors. Driven by the wind, and battered by the rain, our traveller\nbegan anxiously to look around him for some place of shelter. At length,\nto his great joy, he espied, a few hundred yards distant, a small\nsolitary cottage, situated on the edge of the moor. Thither he\nimmediately directed his steps, and, on entering, found its sole\noccupant to be a poor aged widow, who lived upon the gratuitous bounty\nof the public. There was something, however, in her appearance, though\nbent down with years and infirmities, that spoke of better days. On a\nsmall stool beside her lay the Bible, which she seemed to have been just\nreading. She welcomed in the stranger with a look of much cheerfulness,\nand kindly offered him such accommodation for the night as her scanty\nmeans could afford. As the storm continued to rage with unabated\nviolence, Durie gladly accepted the proffered hospitality; and, in the\nmeantime, the venerable hostess did all in her power to make him\ncomfortable, by putting an additional peat or two on the hearth, and\nfurnishing him with something to eat. On examining the scanty furniture\nof the apartment, which was now more distinctly seen by the light of a\nblazing turf-fire, he observed, in one corner, a very uncommon-looking\nsword, with the appearance of which he was not a little struck. The hilt\nand blade were covered over with a variety of strange characters and\nfantastic devices, plainly indicating that it was of foreign\nmanufacture, and belonged to a remote period. His curiosity was\npowerfully excited; and on asking the old woman how she came by such a\nmagnificent weapon, she gave him the following particulars regarding it.\nThe sword, which had originally belonged to a noble Saracen, was that of\nher deceased husband, who had been a volunteer in the regiment of\nHighlanders that had gone over to Holland under the command of Lord\nReay. He had received it as a present from a Polish Jew, whose life he\nhad saved in a moment of extreme danger. She, moreover, informed him\nthat her husband, while on his deathbed, had strictly enjoined her not\nto sell or dispose of it in any way, but to preserve it as an heirloom\nof the family. On getting this account of the sword, Durie told the\nwoman who he was, and the errand on which he was going, and begged of\nher to give him the use of it for a single day. After much entreaty, she\nat last agreed to give it, on the condition that it should be strictly\nreturned.\n\nThe storm, which was short-lived in proportion to its violence,\ngradually died away towards morning; and at the first peep of dawn our\nhero, who burned with impatience to measure weapons with the murderer of\nhis friend, was up, and, with his enchanted sword firmly girt on his\nside, pursuing his solitary route across the moors. His spirits were now\nbuoyant with hope; and he beheld with a feeling of sympathy the\nuniversal gladness which, after the late convulsion of its elements, was\ndiffused over the face of nature. Already the \u201cbird of the wilderness\u201d\nsang blithely overhead, whilst the beams of a brilliant morning sun were\nbeginning to dissipate the mists which lay thick and heavy upon the\nhills. Our traveller was not long in reaching the brow of Benchieldt;\nand scarcely had he descended half way down the side fronting the\ncastle, when he was met by Graysteel, who, as usual, challenged him for\nintruding on his grounds, and desired him to draw and defend himself.\n\u201cVillain!\u201d cried Durie, unsheathing his weapon, which flashed in his\nhand like the Scandinavian monarch\u2019s celebrated elfin sword\u2014\u201cvillain!\nyou wantonly slew my friend, and you shall this day atone for it with\nyour heart\u2019s blood!\u201d\n\nThe robber chief laughed scornfully at what he considered an empty\nbravado, and immediately made a thrust at his opponent, which the latter\nparried off with admirable dexterity. A desperate struggle now ensued.\nGraysteel fought with the fury of an enraged mastiff; but young Durie\npressed upon him so hard with his never-failing blade, that he was\nobliged to give way, and at last received a mortal wound. After this,\nthe hero of our tale went immediately home, and, having raised a body of\nstout followers, proceeded back to Ranag, took the castle, and nearly\nlevelled it with the ground.\n\nThe _denouement_ of our little story may be anticipated. After a decent\nperiod for mourning had elapsed, Durie led his beautiful bride to the\nhymeneal altar. Nor, in the midst of his happiness, did he forget his\ngood friend, the old woman of the moor. The sword, which had proved so\ninvaluable an auxiliary to him in the hour of need, he not only returned\nto her, but he took her under his protection, and kept her comfortable\nfor the rest of her days\u2014\n\n Joy seized her withered veins, and one bright gleam\n Of setting life shone on her evening hours.\n\n \u2014_John O\u2019Groat Journal_, 1836.\n\n\n\n\n THE BILLETED SOLDIER.\n\n\nIn the autumn of 1803, the Forfar and Kincardine militia,\u2014then an\ninfantry regiment of about 1000 strong,\u2014_en route_ from the south of\nScotland to Aberdeen, along the coast road, happened to perform the\nmarch between the towns of Montrose and Bervie on a Saturday. The want\nof the required accommodation in Bervie for so many men rendered it\nnecessary that a considerable portion should be billeted in the\nadjoining villages of Johnshaven and Gourdon, and on farmers and others\non the line of march. In carrying out this arrangement, it so happened\nthat one private soldier was billeted on a farmer or crofter of the name\nof Lyall, on the estate of East Mathers, situated about a mile\nnorth-west of the village of Johnshaven. David Lyall, gudeman of\nGateside, was a douce, respectable individual, a worthy member, if not\nan elder, of the secession church, Johnshaven. His wife, Mrs Lyall,\npossessed many of the good qualities of her worthy husband, whom she\nhighly venerated, and pithily described as being \u201cas gude a man as ever\nlay at a woman\u2019s side.\u201d Mrs Lyall was a rigid seceder, a strict\nSabbatarian, stern and rigorous in everything relating to the kirk and\nkirk affairs, deeply learned in polemical disquisitions, had a wondrous\n\u201cgift of gab,\u201d and by no means allowed the talent to lie idle in a\nnapkin.\n\nThe soldier produced his billet, was kindly received, treated to the\nbest as regarded bed and board, was communicative, and entered into all\nthe news of the day with the worthy couple. Everything ran smoothly on\nthe evening of Saturday, and an agreeable intimacy seemed to be\nestablished in the family; but the horror of Mrs Lyall may be conceived,\nwhen, on looking out in the morning rather early, she saw the soldier\nstripped to the shirt, switching, brushing, and scrubbing his clothes on\nan eminence in front of the house.\n\n\u201cGet up, David Lyall,\u201d she said, \u201cget up; it ill sets you to be lying\nthere snoring, an\u2019 that graceless pagan brackin\u2019 the Lord\u2019s day wi\u2019 a\u2019\nhis might, at oor door.\u201d\n\nDavid looked up, and quietly composing himself again, said, \u201cThe\narticles of war, gudewife, the articles of war; puir chiel, he canna\nhelp himsel\u2014he maun do duty Sunday as well as Saturday.\u201d\n\nThe soldier, after cleaning his clothes and taking a stroll in the\nromantic dell of Denfenella adjoining, returned in time to breakfast,\nwhich was a silent meal. With Mrs Lyall there was only \u201cmony a sad and\nsour look,\u201d and on the table being cleared, she placed on it, or rather\nthrust, the \u201cbig ha\u2019 Bible\u201d immediately in front of the soldier.\n\n\u201cWeel, mistress,\u201d said the soldier, \u201cwhat book is this?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a beuk, lad,\u201d said the gudewife, \u201cthat I muckle doubt that you\nand the like o\u2019 ye ken unco little about.\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps,\u201d was the reply; \u201cwe shall see.\u201d\n\nOn opening the book the soldier said, \u201cI have seen such a book before.\u201d\n\n\u201cGin ye\u2019ve seen sic a book before,\u201d said Mrs Lyall, \u201clet\u2019s hear gin ye\ncan read ony.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t mind though I do,\u201d said the soldier, and taking the Bible he\nread a chapter that had been marked by Mrs Lyall as one condemnatory of\nhis seeming disregard of the Sabbath. The reading of the soldier was\nperfect.\n\n\u201cThere, lad,\u201d said David Lyall, \u201cye read like a minister.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 far better than mony ane o\u2019 them,\u201d said the mistress; \u201cbut gifts\nare no graces,\u201d she continued; \u201cit\u2019s nae the readin\u2019 nor the hearin\u2019\nthat maks a gude man\u2014na, na, it\u2019s the right and proper application\u2014the\npractice, that\u2019s the real thing.\u201d\n\nDavid saw that \u201cthe mistress was aboot to mount her favourite\nhobbyhorse,\u201d and cut her lecture short by remarking that \u201cit was time to\nmake ready for the kirk.\u201d\n\n\u201cAye, ye\u2019ll gae to the kirk,\u201d said Mrs Lyall, \u201can\u2019 tak the sodger wi\u2019\nye; and see that ye fesh the sermon hame atween ye, as I am no gaun\nmysel the day.\u201d\n\nThe soldier acquiesced, and on their way to church Mr Lyall remarked,\namong other things, that \u201cthe gudewife was, if anything, precise and\nconceited about kirk matters an\u2019 keepin\u2019 the Sabbath day, but no that\nill a body, fin fouk had the git o\u2019 her and latten gang a wee thing her\nain git. I keep a calm sough mysel, for the sake o\u2019 peace, as she an\u2019\nher neebour wife, Mrs Smith, gudewife o\u2019 Jackston, count themselves the\nJachin an\u2019 Boaz o\u2019 our temple. Ye\u2019ll mind as muckle o\u2019 the sermon as ye\ncan, as depend upon it she will be speirin\u2019.\u201d The soldier said he would\ndo his best to satisfy her on that head.\n\nThe parish church of Benholm, as well as the secession church of\nJohnshaven, were that day filled to overflowing more by red coats than\nblack. On their return from church, and while dinner was discussing, Mrs\nLyall inquired about the text at David. He told her the text.\n\n\u201cA bonnie text,\u201d she said; \u201cMr Harper\u201d (the name of the minister) \u201cwould\nsay a hantle upon that; fu did he lay out his discourse?\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, gudewife,\u201d said David, \u201cI can tell ye little mair aboot it; ye\nmay speir at the sodger there. I can tell ye he held the killivine\n(pencil) gaun to some tune a\u2019 the time.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ve ta\u2019en a note o\u2019 the sermon, lad?\u201d said the mistress. \u201cI will see\nit when we get our dinner.\u201d\n\nAfter dinner, and after the soldier had read the chapter of which the\ntext formed part, in the same correct and eloquent style as he did in\nthe morning, Mrs Lyall asked him to \u201cfavour her with a sight of the\nsermon.\u201d After adjusting her spectacles, Mrs Lyall examined with seeming\nseriousness the manuscript, page after page, glancing a look now and\nthen at the soldier and her husband. She took off her specks, and\nhanding back the sheets to the soldier, said\u2014\n\n\u201cWeel, lad, ye are the best reader that ever I heard, an\u2019 the warst\nwriter I ever saw; there\u2019s naething there but dots an\u2019 strokes an\u2019\ntirliewhirlies; I canna mak a word o\u2019 sense o\u2019t; ye\u2019ve sairly neglected\nyer handwrite\u2014sairly.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat may be,\u201d replied the soldier, \u201cbut I can assure you the sermon is\nall there.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe can read it yoursel, then,\u201d said the gudewife.\n\nThe soldier took the manuscript and read, or rather re-delivered, the\nsermon, each head and particular, word for word as Mr Harper had given\nit. When he had concluded it, David Lyall, looking triumphantly at the\nmistress, said\u2014\n\n\u201cWeel, gudewife, ye\u2019ve gotten the sermon to Amen. Fat think ye o\u2019 that?\u201d\n\nShe sat in silent amazement for a considerable time, and at length\nejaculated\u2014\u201cFat do I think o\u2019 that? Fat do I think o\u2019 that? Fa\u2019 wadna\nthink o\u2019 that? I may just say this, that I never believed before that a\nred coat had sae muckle grace about it, but I\u2019ve been thinkin\u2019, lad,\nthat ye are no a sodger\u2014at ony rate if ye are ane, ye could be something\nelse,\u2014I\u2019m doon sure o\u2019 that.\u201d\n\nThe soldier stated that he was only a private soldier, that there was\nnothing extraordinary in what he had done, that all or nearly all the\nmen in his regiment could just do the same thing, and that many of them\nwere better scholars than he pretended to be; and taking from his\nknapsack a copy of the Greek New Testament, he laid it before her,\nsaying that \u201cas she had been so kind as allow him to read her Bible, he\nwould favour her with a look of his, and hoped that she would now in\nturn read for his edification.\u201d\n\nMrs Lyall examined the volume with deep attention for some time, and\nshaking her head, said\u2014\n\n\u201cNa, na, lad; they maun be deeper beuk-learned than me that read that\nbeuk; yer far ayont my thumb.\u201d\n\nHe told her what book it was, employed the afternoon or evening of that\nSabbath in reading, expounding, and giving literal translations of many\nof the passages of the New Testament that seemed doubtful or difficult\nto Mrs Lyall. She found the soldier equally conversant with all her\ntheological authors\u2014Bunyan, Baxter, Brown, and Boston, were at his\nfinger-ends; the origin and history, as well as the fathers, of the\nSecession Church were nothing new to him. The soldier conducted family\nworship that evening in a most solemn and becoming manner for David\nLyall.\n\nOn resuming his march in the morning he was urgently pressed by Mrs\nLyall to accept of some of her country cheer, such as cheese or butter;\nin fact, she would have filled his knapsack. A complete revolution had\nbeen effected in her opinion regarding the moral, religious, and\nintellectual qualities of soldiers. \u201cI aye took them for an ignorant,\ngraceless pack, the affscourings o\u2019 creation, but I now see that I have\nbeen far mista\u2019en;\u201d and until the day of her death, which occurred many\nyears afterwards, she would tolerate no insinuation in her presence to\nthe prejudice of the profession. When such was attempted in her hearing,\nshe instantly kindled up with\u2014\u201cAwa wi\u2019 yer lees an\u2019 yer havers, I\u2019ll\nhear nane o\u2019 them; there shall nae chield speak ill o\u2019 sodgers in my\npresence, na, na. Mony\u2019s the minister that I hae seen in my house,\u2014some\nbetter, some waur,\u2014but nane o\u2019 them had either the wisdom, the learning,\nthe ready unction, of a gallant single sodger.\u201d\n\nThe name of \u201cthe gallant single sodger\u201d was Robert Mudie, afterwards\neditor of the _Dundee Advertiser_ newspaper.\u2014_Eminent Men of Fife._\n\n\n\n\n BRUNTFIELD:\n _A TALE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY_.\n\n\nThe war carried on in Scotland, by the friends and enemies of Queen\nMary, after her departure into England, was productive of an almost\ncomplete dissolution of order, and laid the foundation of many feuds,\nwhich were kept up by private families and individuals long after all\npolitical cause of hostility had ceased. Among the most remarkable\nquarrels which history or tradition has recorded as arising out of that\ncivil broil, I know of none so deeply cherished or accompanied by so\nmany romantic and peculiar circumstances, as one which took place\nbetween two old families of gentry in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.\nStephen Bruntfield, laird of Craighouse, had been a zealous and\ndisinterested partisan of the queen. Robert Moubray of Barnbougle was\nthe friend successively of Murray and Morton, and distinguished himself\nvery highly in their cause. During the year 1572, when Edinburgh Castle\nwas maintained by Kirkaldy of Grange in behalf of the queen, Stephen\nBruntfield held out Craighouse in the same interest, and suffered a\nsiege from a detachment of the forces of the Regent, commanded by the\nlaird of Barnbougle. The latter baron, a man of fierce and brutal\nnature, entered life as a younger brother, and at an early period chose\nto cast his fate among the Protestant leaders, with a view of improving\nhis fortunes. The death of his elder brother in rebellion at Langside\nenabled the Regent Murray to reward his services with a grant of the\npatrimonial estate, of which he did not scruple to take possession by\nthe strong hand, to the exclusion of his infant niece, the daughter of\nthe late proprietor. Some incidents which occurred in the course of the\nwar had inspired a mutual hatred of the most intense character into the\nbreasts of Bruntfield and Moubray; and it was therefore with a feeling\nof strong personal animosity, as well as of political rancour, that the\nlatter undertook the task of watching the motions of Bruntfield at\nCraighouse. Bruntfield, after holding out for many months, was obliged,\nalong with his friends in Edinburgh Castle, to yield to the party of the\nRegent. Like Kirkaldy and Maitland of Lethington, he surrendered upon a\npromise of life and estate; but while his two friends perished, one by\nthe hand of the executioner, the other by his own hand, he fell a victim\nto the sateless spite of his personal enemy, who, in conducting him to\nEdinburgh as a prisoner, took fire at some bitter expression on the part\nof the captive, and smote him dead upon the spot.\n\nBruntfield left a widow and three infant sons. The lady of Craighouse\nhad been an intimate of the unfortunate Mary from her early years; was\neducated with her in France, in the Catholic faith; and had left her\ncourt to become the wife of Bruntfield. It was a time calculated to\nchange the natures of women, as well as of men. The severity with which\nher religion was treated in Scotland, the wrongs of her royal mistress,\nand finally the sufferings and death of her husband, acting upon a mind\nnaturally enthusiastic, all conspired to alter the character of Marie\nCarmichael, and substitute for the rosy hues of her early years the\ngloom of the sepulchre and the penitentiary. She continued, after the\nrestoration of peace, to reside in the house of her late husband; but\nthough it was within two miles of the city, she did not for many years\nre-appear in public. With no society but that of her children, and the\npersons necessary to attend upon them, she mourned in secret over past\nevents, seldom stirring from a particular apartment, which, in\naccordance with a fashion by no means uncommon, she had caused to be\nhung with black, and which was solely illuminated by a lamp. In the most\nrigorous observances of her faith she was assisted by a priest, whose\noccasional visits formed almost the only intercourse which she\nmaintained with the external world. One strong passion gradually\nacquired a complete sway over her mind,\u2014REVENGE,\u2014a passion which the\npractice of the age had invested with a conventional respectability, and\nwhich no kind of religious feeling then known was able either to check\nor soften. So entirely was she absorbed by this fatal passion, that her\nvery children at length ceased to have interest or merit in her eyes,\nexcept in so far as they appeared likely to be the means of gratifying\nit. One after another, as they reached the age of fourteen, she sent\nthem to France, in order to be educated; but the accomplishment to which\nthey were enjoined to direct their principal attention was that of\nmartial exercise. The eldest, Stephen, returned at eighteen, a strong\nand active youth, with a mind of little polish or literary information,\nbut considered a perfect adept at swordplay. As his mother surveyed his\nnoble form, a smile stole into the desert of her wan and widowed face,\nas a winter sunbeam wanders over a waste of snows. But it was a smile of\nmore than motherly pride; she was estimating the power which that frame\nwould have in contending with the murderous Moubray. She was not alone\npleased with the handsome figure of her firstborn child; but she thought\nwith a fiercer and faster joy upon the appearance which it would make in\nthe single combat against the slayer of his father. Young Bruntfield,\nwho, having been from his earliest years trained to the purpose now\ncontemplated by his mother, rejoiced in the prospect, now lost no time\nin preferring before the king a charge of murder against the laird of\nBarnbougle, whom he at the same time challenged, according to a custom\nthen not altogether abrogated, to prove his innocence in single combat.\nThe king having granted the necessary licence, the fight took place in\nthe royal park, near the palace; and to the surprise of all assembled,\nyoung Bruntfield fell under the powerful sword of his adversary. The\nintelligence was communicated to his mother at Craighouse, where she was\nfound in her darkened chamber, prostrate before an image of the Virgin.\nThe priest who had been commissioned to break the news opened his\ndiscourse in a tone intended to prepare her for the worst; but she cut\nhim short at the very beginning with a frantic exclamation,\u2014\u201cI know what\nyou would tell\u2014the murderer\u2019s sword has prevailed; and there are now but\ntwo, instead of three, to redress their father\u2019s wrongs!\u201d The melancholy\nincident, after the first burst of feeling, seemed only to have\nconcentrated and increased that passion by which she had been engrossed\nfor so many years. She appeared to feel that the death of her eldest son\nonly formed an addition to that debt which it was the sole object of her\nexistence to see discharged. \u201cRoger,\u201d she said, \u201cwill have the death of\nhis brother, as well as that of his father, to avenge. Animated by such\na double object, his arm can hardly fail to be successful.\u201d\n\nRoger returned about two years after, a still handsomer, more athletic,\nand more accomplished youth than his brother. Instead of being daunted\nby the fate of Stephen, he burned but the more eagerly to wipe out the\ninjuries of his house with the blood of Moubray. On his application for\na licence being presented to the court, it was objected by the crown\nlawyers that the case had been already closed by _mal fortune_ of the\nformer challenger. But, while this was the subject of their\ndeliberation, the applicant caused so much annoyance and fear in the\ncourt circle by the threats which he gave out against the enemy of his\nhouse, that the king, whose inability to procure respect either for\nhimself or for the law is well-known, thought it best to decide in\nfavour of his claim. Roger Bruntfield, therefore, was permitted to fight\nin barras with Moubray; but the same fortune attended him as that which\nhad already deprived the widow of her first child. Slipping his foot in\nthe midst of the combat, he reeled to the ground embarrassed by his\ncumbrous armour. Moubray, according to the barbarous practice of the\nage, immediately sprang upon and despatched him. \u201cHeaven\u2019s will be\ndone!\u201d said the widow, when she heard of the fatal incident; \u201cbut\n_gratias Deo!_ there still remains another chance.\u201d\n\nHenry Bruntfield, the third and last surviving son, had all along been\nthe favourite of his mother. Though apparently cast in a softer mould\nthan his two elder brothers, and bearing all the marks of a gentler and\nmore amiable disposition, he in reality cherished the hope of avenging\nhis father\u2019s death more deeply in the recesses of his heart, and longed\nmore ardently to accomplish that deed than any of his brothers. His\nmind, naturally susceptible of the softest and tenderest impressions,\nhad contracted the enthusiasm of his mother\u2019s wish in its strongest\nshape; as the fairest garments are capable of the deepest stain. The\nintelligence, which reached him in France, of the death of his brothers,\ninstead of bringing to his heart the alarm and horror which might have\nbeen expected, only braced him to the adventure which he now knew to be\nbefore him. From this period he forsook the elegant learning which he\nhad heretofore delighted to cultivate. His evenings were spent in poring\nover the memoirs of distinguished knights; his days were consumed in the\ntilt-yard of the sword-player. In due time he entered the French army,\nin order to add to mere science that practical hardihood, the want of\nwhich he conceived to be the cause of the death of his brothers. Though\nthe sun of chivalry was now declining far in the occident, it was not\nyet altogether set. Montmorency was but just dead; Bayard was still\nalive,\u2014Bayard, the knight of all others who has merited the motto, \u201cSans\npeur et sans reproche.\u201d Of the lives and actions of such men, Henry\nBruntfield was a devout admirer and imitator. No young knight kept a\nfirmer seat upon his horse,\u2014none complained less of the severities of\ncampaigning,\u2014none cherished lady\u2019s love with a fonder, purer, or more\ndevout sensation. On first being introduced at the court of Henry III.,\nhe had signalised, as a matter of course, Catherine Moubray, the\ndisinherited niece of his father\u2019s murderer, who had been educated in a\nFrench convent by her other relatives, and was now provided for in the\nhousehold of the queen. The connection of this young lady with the tale\nof his own family, and the circumstance of her being a sufferer in\ncommon with himself by the wickedness of one individual, would have been\nenough to create a deep interest respecting her in his breast. But when,\nin addition to these circumstances, we consider that she was beautiful,\nwas highly accomplished, and in many other respects qualified to engage\nhis affections, we can scarcely be surprised that such was the result of\ntheir acquaintance. Upon one point alone did these two interesting\npersons ever think differently. Catherine, though inspired by her\nfriends from infancy with an entire hatred of her cruel relative,\ncontemplated with fear and aversion the prospect of her lover being\nplaced against him in deadly combat, and did all in her power to\ndissuade him from his purpose. Love, however, was of little avail\nagainst the still more deeply-rooted passion which had previously\noccupied his breast. Flowers thrown upon a river might have been as\neffectual in staying its course towards the cataract, as the gentle\nentreaties of Catherine Moubray in withholding Henry Bruntfield from the\nenterprise for which his mother had reared him\u2014for which his brothers\nhad died\u2014for which he had all along moved and breathed.\n\nAt length, accomplished with all the skill which could then be acquired\nin arms, glowing with all the earnest feelings of youth, Henry returned\nto Scotland. On reaching his mother\u2019s dwelling, she clasped him, in a\ntransport of varied feeling, to her breast, and for a long time could\nonly gaze upon his elegant person. \u201cMy last and dearest,\u201d she at length\nsaid, \u201cand thou too art to be adventured upon this perilous course! Much\nhave I bethought me of the purpose which now remains to be accomplished.\nI have not been without a sense of dread lest I be only doing that which\nis to sink my soul in flames at the day of reckoning; but yet there has\nbeen that which comforts me also. Only yesternight I dreamed that your\nfather appeared before me. In his hand he held a bow and three goodly\nshafts; at a distance appeared the fierce and sanguinary Moubray. He\ndesired me to shoot the arrows at that arch traitor, and I gladly\nobeyed. A first and a second he caught in his hand, broke, and trampled\non with contempt. But the third shaft, which was the fairest and\ngoodliest of all, pierced his guilty bosom, and he immediately expired.\nThe revered shade at this gave me an encouraging smile, and withdrew. My\nHenry, thou art that _third arrow_, which is at length to avail against\nthe shedder of our blood. The dream seems a revelation, given especially\nthat I may have comfort in this enterprise, otherwise so revolting to a\nmother\u2019s feelings.\u201d\n\nYoung Bruntfield saw that his mother\u2019s wishes had only imposed upon her\nreason, but he made no attempt to break the charm by which she was\nactuated, being glad, upon any terms, to obtain her sanction for that\nadventure to which he was himself impelled by feelings considerably\ndifferent. He therefore began, in the most deliberate manner, to take\nmeasures for bringing on the combat with Moubray. The same legal\nobjections which had stood against the second duel were maintained\nagainst the third; but public feeling was too favourable to the object\nto be easily withstood. The laird of Barnbougle, though somewhat past\nthe bloom of life, was still a powerful and active man, and instead of\nexpressing any fear to meet this third and more redoubted warrior,\nrather longed for a combat which promised, if successful, to make him\none of the most renowned swordsmen of his time. He had also heard of the\nattachment which subsisted between Bruntfield and his niece; and in the\ncontemplation of an alliance which might give some force to the claims\nof that lady upon his estate, found a deeper and more selfish reason for\naccepting the challenge of his youthful enemy. King James himself\nprotested against stretching the law of the _per duellum_ so far; but,\nsensible that there would be no peace between either the parties or\ntheir adherents till it should be decided in a fair combat, he was fain\nto grant the required licence.\n\nThe fight was appointed to take place on Cramond Inch, a low grassy\nisland in the Frith of Forth, near the Castle of Barnbougle. All the\npreparations were made in the most approved manner by the young Duke of\nLennox, who had been the friend of Bruntfield in France. On a level\nspot, close to the northern beach of the islet, a space was marked off,\nand strongly secured by a paling. The spectators, who were almost\nexclusively gentlemen (the rabble not being permitted to approach), sat\nupon a rising ground beside the enclosure, while the space towards the\nsea was quite clear. At one end, surrounded by his friends, stood the\nlaird of Barnbougle, a huge and ungainly figure, whose features\ndisplayed a mixture of ferocity and hypocrisy, in the highest degree\nunpleasing. At the other, also attended by a host of family allies and\nfriends, stood the gallant Harry Bruntfield, who, if divested of his\narmour, might have realised the idea of a winged Mercury. A seat was\nerected close beside the barras for the Duke of Lennox and other\ncourtiers, who were to act as judges; and at a little distance upon the\nsea lay a small decked vessel, with a single female figure on board.\nAfter all the proper ceremonies which attended this strange legal custom\nhad been gone through, the combatants advanced into the centre, and\nplanting foot to foot, each with his heavy sword in his hand, waited the\ncommand which should let them loose against each other, in a combat\nwhich both knew would only be closed with the death of one or other. The\nword being given, the fight commenced. Moubray almost at the first pass\ngave his adversary a cut in the right limb, from which the blood was\nseen to flow profusely. But Bruntfield was enabled by this mishap to\nperceive the trick upon which his adversary chiefly depended, and, by\ntaking care to avoid it, put Moubray nearly _hors de combat_. The fight\nthen proceeded for a few minutes, without either gaining the least\nadvantage over the other. Moubray was able to defend himself pretty\nsuccessfully from the cuts and thrusts of his antagonist, but he could\nmake no impression in return. The question then became one of time. It\nwas evident that, if no lucky stroke should take effect beforehand, he\nwho first became fatigued with the exertion would be the victim. Moubray\nfelt his disadvantage as the elder and bulkier man, and began to fight\ndesperately and with less caution. One tremendous blow, for which he\nseemed to have gathered his last strength, took effect upon Bruntfield,\nand brought him upon his knee, in a half-stupified state, but the elder\ncombatant had no strength to follow up the effort. He reeled towards his\nyouthful and sinking enemy, and stood for a few moments over him, vainly\nendeavouring to raise his weapon for another and final blow. Ere he\ncould accomplish his wish, Bruntfield recovered sufficient strength to\ndraw his dagger, and thrust it up to the hilt beneath the breastplate of\nhis exhausted foe. The murderer of his race instantly lay dead beside\nhim, and a shout of joy from the spectators hailed him as the victor. At\nthe same instant a scream of more than earthly note arose from the\nvessel anchored near the island; a lady descended from its side into a\nboat, and, rowing to the land, rushed up to the bloody scene, where she\nfell upon the neck of the conqueror, and pressed him with the most\nfrantic eagerness to her bosom. The widow of Stephen Bruntfield at\nlength found the yearnings of twenty years fulfilled,\u2014she saw the\nmurderer of her husband, the slayer of her two sons, dead on the sward\nbefore her, while there still survived to her as noble a child as ever\nblessed a mother\u2019s arms. But the revulsion of feeling produced by the\nevent was too much for her strength; or, rather, Providence, in its\nrighteous judgement, had resolved that so unholy a feeling as that of\nrevenge should not be too signally gratified. She expired in the arms of\nher son, murmuring _Nunc dimittis, Domine_, with her latest breath.\n\nThe remainder of the tale of Bruntfield may be easily told. After a\ndecent interval, the young laird of Craighouse married Catherine\nMoubray; and as the king saw it right to restore that young lady to a\nproperty originally forfeited for service to his mother, the happiness\nof the parties might be considered as complete. A long life of\nprosperity and peace was granted to them by the kindness of Heaven; and\nat their death they had the satisfaction of enjoying that greatest of\nall earthly blessings, the love and respect of a numerous and virtuous\nfamily.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh Journal_, 1832.[1]\n\nFootnote 1:\n\n The tale of Bruntfield is founded upon facts alluded to in \u201cBirrel\u2019s\n Diary,\u201d \u201cAnderson\u2019s History of Scotland\u201d (MS., Advocates\u2019 Library),\n &c.\n\n\n\n\n SUNSET AND SUNRISE.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\n\u201cThis is the evening on which, a few days ago, we agreed to walk to the\nbower at the waterfall, and look at the perfection of a Scottish sunset.\nEverything on earth and heaven seems at this hour as beautiful as our\nsouls could desire. Come then, my sweet Anna, come along, for by the\ntime we have reached the bower, with your gentle steps, the great bright\norb will be nearly resting its rim on what you call the Ruby Mountain.\nCome along, and we can return before the dew has softened a single\nringlet on your fair forehead.\u201d With these words, the happy husband\nlocked kindly within his own the arm of his young English wife; and even\nin the solitude of his unfrequented groves, where no eye but his own now\nbeheld her, looked with pride on the gracefulness and beauty that seemed\nso congenial with the singleness and simplicity of her soul.\n\nThey reached the bower just as the western heaven was in all its glory.\nTo them, while they stood together gazing on that glow of fire that\nburns without consuming, and in whose mighty furnace the clouds and the\nmountaintops are but as embers, there seemed to exist no sky but that\nregion of it in which their spirits were entranced. Their eyes saw\nit\u2014their souls felt it; but what their eyes saw or their souls felt they\nknew not in the mystery of that magnificence. The vast black bars, the\npiled-up masses of burnished gold, the beds of softest saffron and\nrichest purple, lying surrounded with continually fluctuating dyes of\ncrimson, till the very sun himself was for moments unheeded in the\ngorgeousness his light had created; the show of storm, but the feeling\nof calm, over all that tumultuous, yet settled world of cloud, that had\ncome floating silently and majestically together, and yet in one little\nhour was to be no more;\u2014what might not beings endowed with a sense of\nbeauty, and greatness, and love, and fear, and terror, and eternity,\nfeel when drawing their breath together, and turning their steadfast\neyes on each other\u2019s faces, in such a scene as this?\n\nBut from these high and bewildering imaginations, their souls returned\ninsensibly to the real world in which their life lay; and, still feeling\nthe presence of that splendid sunset, although now they looked not\ntowards it, they let their eyes glide, in mere human happiness, over the\nsurface of the inhabited earth. The green fields, that in all varieties\nof form lay stretching out before them, the hedgerows of hawthorn and\nsweetbrier, the humble coppices, the stately groves, and, in the\ndistance, the dark pine-forest loading the mountain side, were all their\nown\u2014and so, too, were a hundred cottages, on height or hollow,\nshelterless or buried in shelter, and all alike dear to their humble\ninmates, on account of their cheerfulness or their repose. God had given\nto them this bright and beautiful portion of the earth, and he had given\nthem along with it hearts and souls to feel and understand in what lay\nthe worth of the gift, and to enjoy it with a deep and thoughtful\ngratitude.\n\n\u201cAll hearts bless you, Anna; and do you know that the Shepherd Poet,\nwhom we once visited in his shieling, has composed a Gaelic song on our\nmarriage, and it is now sung by many a pretty Highland girl, both in\ncottage and on hill-side? They wondered, it is said, why I should have\nbrought them an English lady; but that was before they saw your face, or\nheard how sweet may be an English voice even to a Highland ear. They\nlove you, Anna\u2014they would die for you, Anna; for they have seen you with\nyour sweet body in silk and satin, with a jewel on your forehead and\npearls in your hair, moving to music in your husband\u2019s hereditary hall;\nand they have seen you, too, in russet garb and ringlets unadorned, in\ntheir own smoky cottages, blithe and free as some native shepherdess of\nthe hills. To the joyful and the sorrowful art thou alike dear; and all\nmy tenantry are rejoiced when you appear, whether on your palfrey on the\nheather, or walking through the hay or harvest-field, or sitting by the\nbed of sickness, or welcoming, with a gentle stateliness, the old\nwithered mountaineer to his chieftain\u2019s gate.\u201d\n\nThe tears fell from the lady\u2019s eyes at these kind, loving, and joyful\nwords; and, with a sob, she leaned her cheek on her husband\u2019s bosom.\n\u201cOh! why\u2014why should I be sad in the midst of the undeserved goodness of\nGod? Since the furthest back time I recollect in the darkness of\ninfancy, I have been perfectly happy. I have never lost any dear friend,\nas so many others have done. My father and mother live, and love me\nwell; blessings be upon them now, and for ever! You love me, and that so\ntenderly, that at times my heart is like to break. But, my\nhusband\u2014forgive me\u2014pity me\u2014but upbraid me not, when I tell you that my\nsoul of late has often fainted within me, as now it does\u2014for oh!\nhusband! husband! the fear of death is upon me; and as the sun sank\nbehind the mountain, I thought that moment of a large burial-place, and\nthe vault in which I am to be interred.\u201d\n\nThese words gave a shock to her husband\u2019s heart, and for a few moments\nhe knew not how to cheer and comfort her. Almost before he could speak,\nand while he was silently kissing her forehead, his young wife, somewhat\nmore composedly, said, \u201cI strive against it\u2014I close my eyes to\ncontain\u2014to crush the tears that I feel gushing up from my stricken\nheart; but they force their way through, and my face is often ruefully\ndrenched in solitude. Well may I weep to leave this world\u2014thee\u2014my\nparents\u2014the rooms in which, for a year of perfect bliss, I have walked,\nsat, or slept in thy bosom\u2014all these beautiful woods, and plains, and\nhills, which I have begun to feel every day more and more as belonging\nunto me, because I am thy wife. But, husband! beyond, far, far beyond\nthem all, except him of whose blood it is, do I weep to leave our baby\nthat is now unborn. May it live to comfort you\u2014to gladden your eyes when\nI am gone\u2014yea, to bring tears sometimes into them, when its face or form\nmay chance to remember you of the mother who bore it, and died that it\nmight see the day.\u201d\n\nThe lady rose up with these words from her husband\u2019s bosom; and as a\nsweet balmy whispering breath of wind came from the broom on the river\u2019s\nbank, and fanned her cheeks, she seemed to revive from that desponding\ndream; and, with a faint smile, looked all round the sylvan bower. The\ncheerful hum of the bees, that seemed to be hastening their work among\nthe honey-flowers before the fall of dark\u2014the noise of the river, that\nhad been unheard while the sun was setting\u2014the lowing of the kine going\nleisurely homewards before their infant drivers\u2014and the loud lofty song\nof the blackbird in his grove\u2014these, and a thousand other mingling\ninfluences of nature, touched her heart with joy, and her eyes became\naltogether free from tears. Her husband, who had been deeply affected by\nwords so new to him from her lips, seized these moments of returning\npeace to divert her thoughts entirely from such causeless terrors. \u201cTo\nthis bower I brought you to show you what a Scottish landscape was, the\nday after our marriage; and from that hour to this, every look, smile,\nword, and deed of thine, has been after my own heart, except these\nfoolish tears. But the dew will soon be on the grass\u2014so come, my\nbeloved\u2014nay, I will not stir unless you smile. There, Anna! you are your\nbeautiful self again!\u201d And they returned, cheerful and laughing, to the\nHall; the lady\u2019s face being again as bright as if a tear had never\ndimmed its beauty. The glory of the sunset was almost forgotten in the\nsweet, fair, pensive silence of the twilight; now fast glimmering on to\none of those clear summer nights which divide, for a few hours, one day\nfrom another with their transitory pomp of stars.\n\nBefore midnight, all who slept awoke. It was hoped that an heir was\nabout to be born to that ancient house; and there is something in the\ndim and solemn reverence which invests an unbroken line of ancestry,\nthat blends easily with those deeper and more awful feelings with which\nthe birth of a human creature, in all circumstances, is naturally\nregarded. Tenderly beloved by all as this young and beautiful lady was,\nwho, coming a stranger among them, and as they felt from another land,\nhad inspired them insensibly with a sort of pity, mingling with their\npride in her loveliness and virtue, it may well be thought that now the\nhouse was agitated, and that its agitation was soon spread from cottage\nto cottage, to a great distance round. Many a prayer, therefore, was\nsaid for her; and God was beseeched soon to make her, in His mercy, a\njoyful mother. No fears, it was said, were entertained for the lady\u2019s\nlife; but after some hours of intolerable anguish of suspense, her\nhusband, telling an old servant whither he had gone, walked out into the\nopen air, and in a few minutes, sat down on a tombstone, without knowing\nthat he had entered the little churchyard, which, with the parish\nchurch, was within a few fields and groves of the house. He looked\naround him; and nothing but graves\u2014graves\u2014graves. \u201cThis stone was\nerected by her husband in memory of Agnes Ilford, an Englishwoman, who\ndied in childbed, aged nineteen.\u201d The inscription was, every letter of\nit, distinctly legible in the moonlight; and he held his eyes fixed upon\nit, reading it over and over with a shudder; and then rising up and\nhurrying out of the churchyard, he looked back from the gate, and\nthought he saw a female figure all in white, with an infant in her arms,\ngliding noiselessly over the graves and tombstones. But he looked more\nsteadfastly\u2014and it was nothing. He knew it was nothing; but he was\nterrified, and turned his face away from the churchyard. The old servant\nadvanced towards him, and he feared to look him in the face, lest he\nshould know that his wife was a corpse.\n\n\u201cLife or death?\u201d at length he found power to utter. \u201cMy honoured lady\nlives, but her son breathed only a few gasps\u2014no heir, no heir! I was\nsent to tell you to come quickly to my lady\u2019s chamber.\u201d\n\nIn a moment the old man was alone, for, recovering from the torpidity of\nfear, his master had flown off like an arrow, and now with soft\nfootsteps was stealing along the corridor towards the door of his wife\u2019s\napartment. But as he stood within a few steps of it, composing his\ncountenance, and strengthening his heart to behold his beloved Anna\nlying exhausted, and too probably ill, ill indeed,\u2014his own mother, like\na shadow, came out of the room, and not knowing that she was seen,\nclasped her hands together upon her breast, and lifting up her eyes with\nan expression of despair, exclaimed, as in a petition to God, \u201cOh! my\npoor son!\u2014my poor son! what will become of him!\u201d She looked forward, and\nthere was her son before her, with a face like ashes, tottering and\nspeechless. She embraced and supported him\u2014the old and feeble supported\nthe young and the strong. \u201cI am blind, and must feel my way; but help me\nto the bedside, that I may sit down and kiss my dead wife. I ought to\nhave been there, surely, when she died.\u201d\n\nThe lady was dying, but not dead. It was thought that she was\ninsensible, but when her husband said\u2014\u201cAnna, Anna!\u201d she fixed her\nhitherto unnoticing eyes upon his face, and moved her lips as if\nspeaking, but no words were heard. He stooped down and kissed her\nforehead, and then there was a smile over all her face, and one word,\n\u201cFarewell!\u201d At that faint and loving voice he touched her lips with his,\nand he must then have felt her parting breath; for when he again looked\non her face, the smile upon it was more deep, placid, steadfast, than\nany living smile, and a mortal silence was on her bosom that was to move\nno more.\n\nThey sat together, he and his mother, looking on the young, fair, and\nbeautiful dead. Sometimes he was distracted, and paced the room raving,\nand with a black and gloomy aspect. Then he sat down perfectly composed,\nand looked alternately on the countenance of his young wife, bright,\nblooming, and smiling in death; and on that of his old mother, pale,\nwithered, and solemn in life. As yet he had no distinct thoughts of\nhimself. Overwhelming pity for one so young, so good, so beautiful, and\nso happy, taken suddenly away, possessed his disconsolate soul; and he\nwould have wept with joy to see her restored to life, even although he\nwere to live with her no more, though she were utterly to forget him;\nfor what would that be to him, so that she were but alive! He felt that\nhe could have borne to be separated from her by seas, or by a dungeon\u2019s\nwalls; for in the strength of his love he would have been happy, knowing\nthat she was a living being beneath heaven\u2019s sunshine. But in a few days\nis she to be buried!\u2014And then was he forced to think upon himself, and\nhis utter desolation, changed in a few hours from a too perfect\nhappiness into a wretch whose existence was an anguish and a curse.\n\nAt last he could not sustain the sweet, sad, beautiful sight of that\nwhich was now lying stretched upon his marriage-bed; and he found\nhimself passing along the silent passages, with faint and distant\nlamentations meeting his ear, but scarcely recognised by his mind, until\nhe felt the fresh air, and saw the gray dawn of morning. Slowly and\nunconsciously he passed on into the woods, and walked on and on, without\naim or object, through the solitude of awakening nature. He heard or\nheeded not the wide-ringing songs of all the happy birds; he saw not the\nwild-flowers beneath his feet, nor the dew diamonds that glittered on\nevery leaf of the motionless trees. The ruins of a lonely hut on the\nhill-side were close to him, and he sat down in stupifaction, as if he\nhad been an exile in some foreign country. He lifted up his eyes, and\nthe sun was rising, so that all the eastern heaven was tinged with the\nbeautifulness of joy. The turrets of his own ancestral mansion were\nvisible among the dark umbrage of its ancient grove: fair were the lawns\nand fields that stretched away from it towards the orient light, and one\nbright bend of the river kindled up the dim scenery through which it\nrolled. His own family estate was before his eyes, and as the thought\nrose within his heart, \u201cAll that I see is mine,\u201d yet felt he that the\npoorest beggar was richer far than he, and that in one night he had lost\nall that was worth possessing. He saw the church tower, and thought upon\nthe place of graves. \u201cThere will she be buried\u2014there will she be\nburied,\u201d he repeated with a low voice, while a groan of mortal misery\nstartled the little mosswren from a crevice in the ruin. He rose up, and\nthe thought of suicide entered into his sick heart. He gazed on the\nriver, and, murmuring aloud in his hopeless wretchedness, said, \u201cWhy\nshould I not sink into a pool and be drowned? But oh! Anna, thou who\nwert so meek and pure on earth, and who art now bright and glorious in\nheaven, what would thy sainted and angelic spirit feel if I were to\nappear thus lost and wicked at the judgment-seat?\u201d\n\nA low voice reached his ear, and, looking round, he beheld his old,\nfaithful, white-headed servant on his knees\u2014him who had been his\nfather\u2019s foster-brother, and who, in the privilege of age and fidelity\nand love to all belonging to that house, had followed him unregarded\u2014had\nwatched him as he wrung his hands, and had been praying for him to God\nwhile he continued sitting in that dismal trance upon that mouldering\nmass of ruins. \u201cOh! my young master, pardon me for being here. I wished\nnot to overhear your words; but to me you have ever been kind, even as a\nson to his father. Come, then, with the old man back into the hall, and\nforsake not your mother, who is sore afraid.\u201d\n\nThey returned, without speaking, down the glens and through the old\nwoods, and the door was shut upon them. Days and nights passed on, and\nthen a bell tolled; and the churchyard, that had sounded to many feet,\nwas again silent. The woods around the hall were loaded with their\nsummer glories; the river flowed on in its brightness; the smoke rose up\nto heaven from the quiet cottages; and nature continued the same\u2014bright,\nfragrant, beautiful, and happy. But the hall stood uninhabited; the rich\nfurniture now felt the dust; and there were none to gaze on the pictures\nthat graced the walls. He who had been thus bereaved went across seas to\ndistant countries, from which his tenantry, for three springs, expected\nhis return; but their expectations were never realised, for he died\nabroad. His remains were brought home to Scotland, according to a\nrequest in his will, to be laid by those of his wife; and now they rest\ntogether, beside the same simple monument.\n\n\n\n\n MISS PEGGY BRODIE.\n\n BY ANDREW PICKEN.\n\n\n\u201cIf I were a man, instead of being a woman, as unfortunately I happen to\nbe,\u201d said Miss Peggy Brodie to me, \u201cI would call a meeting in public, on\nthe part of the ladies, to petition the king for another war; for\nreally, since the peace there is no such thing as any decent woman\ngetting a husband, nor is there so much as the least stir or stramash\nnow-a-days, even to put one in mind of such a thing. And the king, God\nbless him! is a man of sense, and understands what\u2019s what perfectly,\u201d\ncontinued Miss Peggy; \u201cand I have not the least doubt that if he were\nonly put in possession of the real state of the sex since the peace, he\nwould give us a war at once, for it is cruel to keep so many women in\nthis hopeless state.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, mem,\u201d said I, looking as wise as I was able, \u201cyou may depend\nupon it, you are under a mistake.\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t tell me, sir,\u201d replied Miss Brodie; \u201cyou men think you know\neverything. As if I did not understand politics sufficient to know that\nthe king grants all reasonable petitions. I tell you, Mr\nWhat\u2019s-your-name, that the whole sex in Glasgow, from Crossmyloof to the\nRotten Row, and from Anderston to Camlachie, are in a state of the\nutmost distress since ever the peace;\u2014and marriages may be made in\nheaven, or somewhere else that I do not know of, but there is none made\nhereaway, to my certain knowledge, since ever the sharpshooters laid\ndown their arms, the strapping fallows!\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m sure, mem,\u201d said I, \u201cfor a peaceable man, I have been sadly deaved\nabout these sharpshooters.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s no for you to speak against the sharpshooters, Mr Thingumy!\u201d said\nMiss Brodie, getting into a pet; \u201cyou that never bit a cartridge in your\nlife, I know by your look! and kens nae mair about platoon exercise, and\npoother wallets, and ramrods, than my mother does! But fair fa\u2019 the time\nwhen we had a thriving war, an\u2019 drums rattlin\u2019 at every corner, an\u2019\nfifer lads whistlin\u2019 up and down the streets on a market-day; an\u2019 spruce\nsergeants parading the Saltmarket, pipe-clayed most beautiful! Then\nthere was our ain sharpshooters, braw fallows, looking so noble in their\ngreen dresses, and lang feathers bobbing in their heads. Besides, there\nwas the cavalry, and the Merchants\u2019 corps, and the Trades\u2019 and the\nGrocers\u2019 corps. Why, every young man of the least pluck was a soldier in\nthese heartsome days, and had such speerit and such pith, and thought no\nmore of taking a wife then, than he would of killing a Frenchman before\nhis breakfast, if he could hae seen one.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Miss Brodie,\u201d said I, \u201cthey were all so busy taking wives that\nthey seem to have quite forgot to take you, in these happy times.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe needna be so very particular in your remarks, Mr Thingumy; for it\nwas entirely my own fault, an\u2019 I might hae gotten a husband any morning,\njust for going to the Green of Glasgow, where the lads were taking their\nmorning\u2019s drill; for it was there a\u2019 my acquaintances got men, to my\ncertain knowledge; and now it\u2019s naething but \u201cMistress\u201d this, an\u2019\n\u201cMistress\u201d that, wi\u2019 a\u2019 the clippy lassocks that were just bairns the\nother day; and there they go, oxtering wi\u2019 their men, to be sure, an\u2019\nlaughin\u2019 at me. Weel, it\u2019s vera provokin\u2019, sir, isn\u2019t it?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed, mem,\u201d said I, \u201cit\u2019s rather a lamentable case. But why did you\nnot catch a green sharpshooter yourself, in those blessed days?\u201d\n\n\u201cHoot, Mr Balgownie, it was quite my ain faut, as I said. I was\nperfectly ignorant of the most common principles of the art, and knew no\nmore of the way and manner o\u2019 catching a husband, no more than if I had\nnever been born in Glasgow. In fac\u2019, I was a perfect simpleton, an\u2019\nthought it the easiest matter in the warld; an\u2019 ye see, sir, I had a wee\ntrifle o\u2019 siller, besides my looks (which, ye ken, Mr Thingumbob, were\nfar from being disparageable); and so I was a perfect simple, and just\nthocht I was like the lass in the sang\u2014\n\n Set her up on Tintock tap,\n The wind\u2019ll blaw a man till her.\n\nBut ne\u2019er a man was blawn to me; an\u2019 there\u2019s a\u2019 my giggling\nacquaintances married, ane after the ither. There\u2019s Bell Mushat, an\u2019\nJeanie Doo, an\u2019 Mary Drab, an\u2019 Beanie Sma\u2019, an\u2019 Sally Daicle\u2014naething\nbut \u201cmarriet,\u201d \u201cmarriet;\u201d and here\u2019s puir me and the cat, leading a\nsingle life until this blessed day. Hochhey! isn\u2019t it very angersome,\nsir?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is really a case o\u2019 great distress, when one thinks o\u2019 your worth,\nMiss Brodie,\u201d said I, pathetically; \u201cand if I did not happen to be\nengaged myself, it\u2019s impossible to say, but\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, there it is!\u201d exclaimed Miss Peggy, \u201cthere it is! Every decent,\nsensible man like you, that sees what I am, are just married\u2014married\nthemselves, and tied up. An\u2019 so I may just sit here, and blaw my fingers\nower the fire wi\u2019 the cat. Hoch-hey!\u201d\n\n\u201cBut surely, Miss Brodie,\u201d said I, \u201cyou did not use due diligence in\ntime and season, or you would not now be left at this sorrowful pass?\u201d\n\n\u201cI let the sharpshooter times slip out o\u2019 my fingers, like a stupid\nsimpleton, as I say; but no woman could have been more diligent than I\nhae been o\u2019 late years, an\u2019 a\u2019 to no purpose. Haven\u2019t I walked the\nTrongate? Haven\u2019t I walked the Green? Haven\u2019t I gone to a\u2019 the\ntea-drinkings within five miles, where I could get a corner for mysel?\nHaven\u2019t I gone to the kirk three times every Sunday, forby fast days,\nthanksgiving days, and evening preachings? Haven\u2019t I attended a\u2019 the\nBible meetings, and missionary meetings, forby auxiliary societies, and\nbranch associations? Wasn\u2019t I a member of a\u2019 the ladies\u2019 committees, and\npenny-a-week societies, frae Cranston Hill to the East Toll? Didn\u2019t I\ngang about collecting pennies, in cauld March weather, climbin\u2019 stairs,\nand knocking at doors like a beggar, until the folk were like to put me\nout, an\u2019 the vera weans on the stairs used to pin clouts to our tails,\nan\u2019 ca\u2019 us penny-a-week auld maids? Eh! that was a sair business, sir,\nan\u2019 little thanks we got; an\u2019 I got the chilblains in the feet wi\u2019 the\ncauld, that keepit me frae sleep for three weeks.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s really lamentable; but I should have thought that the saintly plan\nwas a good one.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo it would have been, sir, if I had had more money; but, ye see, fifty\npounds a year is thought nothing o\u2019 now-a-days; an\u2019 these kinds o\u2019 people\nare terrible greedy o\u2019 siller. Na, na, sir, gie me the sharpshooters\nyet.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell now, Miss Brodie,\u201d said I, \u201cas we\u2019re on the subject, let me hear\nhow it was you lost your precious opportunities in the volunteering\ntime.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, sir, that was the time\u2014volunteering! There never was such days as\nthe volunteering days. Drums here, and bands o\u2019 music there; sodgering\nup, and sodgering down; an\u2019 then the young men looked so tall in their\nregimentals, and it was such a pleasure just to get ane o\u2019 them by the\narm, and to parade wi\u2019 them before the Tontine, an\u2019 then a\u2019 your\nacquaintances to meet you walking wi\u2019 a braw sharpshooter, and talking\nabout you after in every house; and such shaking hands in the Trongate,\nand such treating us wi\u2019 cakes in Baxter\u2019s,\u2014for the volunteering lads\nwere sae free o\u2019 their siller in thae days, puir chields! Oh, thae were\ntimes!\u201d\n\n\u201cThere are no such times now, I fear, Miss Peggy.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, no, sir. An\u2019 then the lads thought nothing to take you to the play\nat night, in thae days; and what a beautiful thing it was to sit in the\nfront o\u2019 the boxes o\u2019 the big theatre in Queen Street, wi\u2019 a red-coated,\nor a green-coated volunteer\u2014it was so showy, and such an attraction, and\na talk. To be sure, sir, it\u2019s no a\u2019thegither right to go openly to\ncommon playhouses; but a man must be got some place, an\u2019 ye ken the\nsharpshooters couldna gang to the kirk in their green dress, puir\nfallows.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut you never told me, Miss Brodie, what art or mystery there is in\nman-catching, and yet you speak as if some of your female friends had\npractised, something past the common to that intent.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s not for me to speak to you about women\u2019s affairs, Mr Balgownie;\nbut I can tell you one thing. Do you mind lang Miss M\u2018Whinnie, dochter\nof auld Willie M\u2018Whinnie, that was elder in Mr Dumdrone\u2019s kirk?\u201d\n\n\u201cI think I recollect her face,\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWeel, sir, this was the way she used to do. Ye see, she was a great\nwalker (for she was a lang-leggit lass, although her father is a wee\ngutty body), and if ye took a walk in the Green or the Trongate, ye\u2019re\nsure to meet lang-leggit Nelly M\u2018Whinnie, lamping wi\u2019 a parasol like a\nfishing-rod, simmer and winter, lookin\u2019 ower her shoulder now and then\nto see when she should _fa\u2019_ aff her feet.\u201d\n\n\u201cFall, Miss Brodie?\u2014What do you mean by falling?\u201d\n\n\u201cHoot, sir, ye ken naething. Wasn\u2019t it by fa\u2019in\u2019 that Nelly M\u2018Whinnie\ngot a man? I\u2019ll tell you how. She used to walk by hersel, an\u2019 whenever\nshe came near a handsome sharpshooter, or gentleman chield that she\nwished to pick acquaintance wi\u2019, she just pretended to gie a bit\nstumble, or to fall on one knee or so; and then, ye ken, the gentleman\ncouldna do less than rin to lift her up, and ask if she was hurt, and so\nforth; an\u2019 then she wad answer so sweet, and thank him so kindly, that\nthe man must sae something civil; and then she would say, \u2018Oh, sir, you\nare so obliging and so polite an\u2019 just in this way she made the\npleasantest acquaintances, an\u2019 got a man by it, or a\u2019 was done.\u201d\n\n\u201cHa, ha, ha! That is perfectly ridiculous, and hardly credible,\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cNa, ye needna laugh in the least,\u201d continued Miss Brodie, \u201cfor I\u2019m\ntelling you the truth; and didna the same lass break her arm wi\u2019 her\nfa\u2019ing?\u201d\n\n\u201cBreak her arm, Miss Brodie! Are you serious?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s perfectly true, Mr Balgownie. Ye see, sir, she was walking on\nspeculation, in her usual manner, in the Green o\u2019 Glasgow it was, as I\nbelieve, and somewhere near the Humanity House, by the side of the\nClyde, when she observed three strappin\u2019 fellows come blattering up\nbehind her. This was an opportunity not to be let pass, an\u2019 the day\nbeing frosty, an\u2019 the road slightly slippery, afforded an excellent\npretence for a stumble at least. Weel, sir, just when the gentlemen had\ngot within three yards o\u2019 her, Nellie gied a bit awkward sprauchle, and\nshot out a leg; but whether Nellie had mista\u2019en her distance, or whether\nthe men were up to her fa\u2019in\u2019 system, an\u2019 wadna bite, never clearly\nappeared; but they werena forward in time to catch the lassie in their\narms as she expected; an\u2019 after a sprauchle an\u2019 a stumble, down she came\nin good earnest, an\u2019 broke her arm.\u201d\n\n\u201cHa, ha, ha! I would rather hear that story than any one of Mr\nDumdrone\u2019s best discourses,\u201d said I. \u201cBut are you sure it\u2019s true?\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I no see Miss M\u2018Whinnie, the time she was laid up, wi\u2019 the broken\narm in a sling? But you see, sir, the gentlemen did gather round her\nwhen they saw she was fairly whomel\u2019t, an\u2019 gathered her up, nae doubt;\nan\u2019 as soon as she got better o\u2019 the broken arm, she took to fa\u2019in\u2019\nagain. But I believe she never gaed farther than a stoyter or a stumble\nafter that, till ance she got a man.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd so, Miss Brodie, she did fall into a marriage?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, \u2019deed did she, sir. A fallow caught her at last, as she fell; and\nthere was nae mair walking the Trongate wi\u2019 the lang parasol, like a\nbellman\u2019s staff. But in the time o\u2019 the sharpshooters and the cavalry,\nand the Merchants\u2019 corps, and a\u2019 the corps, I mind as weel as yesterday,\nhow a great illness took place among the young women, and neither pills\nnor boluses were found to be of the least service, an\u2019 the doctors were\nperfectly puzzled and perplexed, and knew not what to recommend in this\ngeneral distress. But the young women, ane and a\u2019, prescribed for\nthemselves, from an inward understanding o\u2019 their complaints, and\nnothing, they said, would cure the prevailing sickness but a walk in the\nmorning in the Green o\u2019 Glasgow. Now, sir, it happened so providential,\nthe whole time that this influenza lasted, that the Sharpshooter corps,\nand the Cavalry corps, and the Trades\u2019 corps, and the Merchants\u2019 corps,\nand the Grocers\u2019 corps, and a\u2019 the corps were exercising in the Green o\u2019\nGlasgow, where a\u2019 the young ladies were walking for their health. It was\nso beautiful and good for the ladies, when they were sick, to see thae\nsharpshooters, how they marched, wheeled, an\u2019 whooped, an\u2019 whooped, an\u2019\nran this way, and that way, an\u2019 whiles they fired on their knees, an\u2019\nthen they would clap down on their backs, and fire at us, puir chields.\nAnd then, ye see, just when we had gotten an appetite for our breakfasts\nby our walk, the corps would be dismissed, and then the volunteer lads\ncouldna but spread themselves among the ladies that were outside, just\nto spier after their complaints; an\u2019 then naething but link arm wi\u2019 the\nsharpshooters an\u2019 the other corps, dizzens in a row, an\u2019 be escorted\nhame to breakfast. Many a lass that was quite poorly and badly was\nrelieved by these morning walks, and are now married women. Ah, thae\nwere pleasant days, Mr Balgownie!\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, dear me, Miss Brodie,\u201d I said, \u201chow did it happen that you were\nallowed to remain single all this time? Had you no wooers at all?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you mean, sir, by asking me such a question? Nae wooers! I tell\nyou I had dizzens o\u2019 lads running after me night and day, in thae\npleasant times.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, but I don\u2019t mean in the common way. I mean, had you any real\nsweetheart\u2014any absolute offer?\u201d\n\n\u201cOffer, sir! Indeed I had more than one. Wasna there Peter Shanks, the\nhosier, that perfectly plagued me, the dirty body? But ye see, sir, I\ncouldna bear the creature, though he had twa houses in Camlachie; for,\nto tell you my weakness, sir, my heart was set upon\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cUpon whom, Miss Brodie? Ah, tell me!\u201d\n\n\u201cUpon a sharpshooter.\u201d\n\n\u201cBless my heart! But if you would just let me hear the tale.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, sir, it\u2019s a pitiful story,\u201d said Miss Peggy, becoming lachrymose.\n\n\u201cI delight in pitiful stories,\u201d said I, taking out my handkerchief.\n\n\u201cWeel, sir,\u2014\u2018love and grief are sair to bide,\u2019 as the sang says, and my\nheart wasna made o\u2019 the adamant rock; so ye see, sir, there was a lad\nthey ca\u2019d Pate Peters, an\u2019 he was in the sharpshooters; and he sat just\nquite near me in Mr Dumdrone\u2019s kirk, for ye see, sir, it was there we\nfell in. Oh, sir, Pate was a beautiful youth: teeth like the ivory, an\u2019\neyes as black as the slae, and cheeks as red as the rose.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, Miss Brodie, Miss Brodie!\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 when he was dressed in his sharpshooter\u2019s dress,\u2014ah, sir, but my\nheart was aye too, too susceptible. I will not trouble you, sir, wi\u2019 the\nhistory o\u2019 our love, which would have come to the most happy\ntermination, but for a forward cutty of a companion o\u2019 mine, of the name\nof Jess Barbour. But there can be nae doubt but Pate Peters was a true\nlover o\u2019 me; for he used to come hame wi\u2019 me frae Mr Dumdrone\u2019s\npreaching whenever Jess wasna there, and I\u2019m sure his heart burned wi\u2019 a\nreciprocal flame. But ae night, sir,\u2014I\u2019ll ne\u2019er forget that night!\u2014I was\ncoming hame frae a tea-drinking at Mr Warps\u2019, the manufacturer on the\nother side o\u2019 Clyde, when just as I got to the end o\u2019 the wooden brig\nnext the Green, wha does I meet but Pate Peters!\n\n\u201cWeel, sir, it was a moonlight night,\u2014just such as lovers walk about in,\nan\u2019 Pate and me linked arm-in-arm, walked and walked, round the Green o\u2019\nGlasgow. We stopped by the side o\u2019 Clyde, an\u2019 lookit up at the moon.\n\n\u201c\u2018Miss Peggy,\u2019 says he, \u2018do ye see that moon?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Yes,\u2019 says I.\n\n\u201c\u2018That changeable moon,\u2019 says he, \u2018is the emblem o\u2019 falseness in love.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Yes, Mr Peters,\u2019 said I, an\u2019 my heart was ready to melt.\n\n\u201c\u2018But I will never be false in love!\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201c\u2018I hope you will be true until death,\u2019 says I.\n\n\u201c\u2018To be sure I will, Miss Brodie,\u2019 says he; these were his very words.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, Miss Peggy,\u201d I said, as I saw she was unable to get on, \u201cthat is\nquite affecting.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut he talked so sensibly, sir,\u201d continued Miss Brodie; \u201che spoke even\nof marriage as plain as a man could speak. \u2018Miss Peggy,\u2019 said he, \u2018do\nyou remember what Mr Dumdrone, the minister, said last Sabbath? He said\nmarriage was made in heaven; and he said that Solomon, the wisest of\nmen, expressly said, in the Proverbs, he that getteth a good wife\ngetteth a good thing\u2019\u2014Was not that plain speaking, Mr Balgownie?\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing could be plainer, Miss Peggy; but I\u2019m interested in your\nstory.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, sir, he came home to the door wi\u2019 me, and\u2014it\u2019s not for me to tell\nthe endearments that passed between us!\u2014So, sir, I went to sleep wi\u2019 a\nlight heart, an\u2019 was for several days considering and contriving about\nour marriage, when\u2014what do you think?\u2014in three weeks, word was brought\nto me that the false and cruel man was married to Jess Barbour!\u201d\n\n\u201cBless me, Miss Brodie, what a woful story! It\u2019s just like a romance?\u201d\n\n\u201cSo it is, Mr Balgownie,\u201d said Miss Peggy, all blubbered with weeping.\n\u201cIt\u2019s perfect romantic. Ye see, sir, what trials I had in love! But\nyou\u2019re not going away in that manner, sir?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, yes, Miss Brodie,\u201d said I, taking my hat; \u201cI\u2019m not able to stand it\nany longer.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re a feeling man,\u201d said she, shaking me by the hand; \u201cyou\u2019re a man\no\u2019 sweet feeling, Mr Balgownie.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019re an ill-used woman, Miss Brodie!\u2014Adieu, Miss Brodie!\u201d\u2014_The\nDominie\u2019s Legacy._\n\n\n\n\n THE DEATH OF A PREJUDICE.\n\n BY THOMAS AIRD.\n\n\nAt a late hour one Saturday evening, as, I was proceeding homewards\nalong one of the crowded streets of our metropolis, I felt myself\ndistinctly tapped on the shoulder, and, on looking round, a bareheaded\nman, dressed in a nightgown, thus abruptly questioned me\u2014\n\n\u201cDid you ever, sir, thank God for preserving your reason?\u201d\n\nOn my answering in the negative\u2014\n\n\u201cThen do it now,\u201d said he, \u201cfor I have lost mine.\u201d\n\nNotwithstanding the grotesque accompaniments of the man\u2019s dress, and his\nundignified face, disfigured by a large red nose, the above appeal to me\nwas striking and sublimely pathetic; and when he bowed to me with an\nunsteady fervour and withdrew immediately, I could not resist following\nhim, which I was the more inclined to do, as he seemed to be labouring\nunder some frenzy, and might need to be looked after.\n\nThere was another reason for my being particularly interested in him: I\nhad seen him before; and his appearance and interruption had once before\ngiven me great disgust. It was thus:\u2014On my return to Scotland, after an\nabsence of five years, which I had passed in the West Indies, I found\nthe one beloved dead, for whom had been all my hopes and all my good\nbehaviour through those long years. When all the world, with the hard\nseverity of truth and prudence, frowned on the quick reckless spirit of\nmy youth, she alone had been my gentle prophetess, and sweetly told that\nmy better heart should one day, and that soon, give the lie to the cold\nprudential foreboders. For her sweet sake, I tried to be as a good man\nshould be; and when I returned to my native land, it was all for her, to\nbring her by that one dearest, closest tie, near to the heart which (I\nspeak not of my own vanity, but to her praise) she had won to manly\nbearing. O God! O God! I found her in the dust,\u2014in her early grave; no\nmore to love me, no more to give me her sweet approval. It was then my\nmelancholy pleasure to seek the place where last we parted by the burn\nin the lonely glen. As I approached the place, to throw myself down on\nthe very same green spot on which she had sat when last we met, I found\nit occupied by a stranger; I withdrew, but to return the following\nevening. I found the sacred spot again preoccupied by the same stranger,\nwho, independent of his coarse red face, his flattened, ill-shaped, bald\nhead (for he sat looking into his hat), and the undignified precaution\nof his coat-skirts carefully drawn aside, to let him sit on his\noutspread handkerchief, disgusted me by the mere circumstance of his\nunseasonable appearance in such a place, which had thus twice\ninterrupted the yearning of my heart, to rest me there one hour alone.\nThis second night also I hastily withdrew. I came a third night, and\nfound a continuance of the interruption. The same individual was on the\nsame spot, muttering to himself, and chucking pebbles into a dark pool\nof the burn immediately before him. I retired, cursing him in my heart,\nand came no more back to the place.\n\nNow, in the frenzied man who accosted me, as above-mentioned, on the\nstreet by night, I recognized at once the individual who had so\ninterrupted me some months before, in the lonely glen by the side of the\nburn; and, in addition to the reason already given for my wish now to\nfollow him, there was the superadded anxiety to be kind to a man in such\ndistress, whom, perhaps in the very beginning of his sorrows, I had\nheartily and unreasonably cursed. I was still following him, when a\nwoman, advanced in life, rushed past me, and, laying hold of him, cried\nloudly for assistance. This was easily found in such a place; and the\npoor man was, without delay, forcibly carried back to her house, where,\non my following, I learned that he was a lodger with the woman, that he\nwas sick of a brain fever, and that, during a brief interval in her\nwatching of him, he had made his escape down-stairs, and had got upon\nthe street. I was now deeply interested in the poor fellow, and\ndetermined to see him again the following morning, which I did, and\nfound him much worse. On making inquiry at the woman of the house\nrespecting him, she told me that he had no relatives in this country,\nthough he was a Scotchman; that he was a half-pay officer in his\nMajesty\u2019s service; that he did not seem to want money; that he was a\nnoble-hearted, generous man. She added, moreover, that he had lodged in\nher house two months; and that, previous to his illness, he had spoken\nof a friend whom he expected every day to visit him from a distant part\nof the country, to make arrangements for their going together to the\ncontinent.\n\nIn two days more, poor Lieutenant Crabbe (such, I learned, was his name\nand commission) died; and, by a curious dispensation of Providence, I\nordered the funeral, and laid in the grave the head of the man whom,\nonly a few months before, I had cursed as a disgusting, impertinent\nfellow. The alien-mourners had withdrawn from the sodded grave, and I\nhad just paid the sexton for this last office to poor Crabbe, when the\nwoman in whose house he had died advanced with a young man, apparently\nan officer, in whose countenance haste and unexpected affliction were\nstrongly working. \u201cThat\u2019s the gentleman, sir,\u201d said the woman, pointing\nto myself.\n\n\u201cVery well, good woman,\u201d said the stranger youth, whose tones bespoke\nhim an Englishman, and whose voice, as he spoke, seemed broken with deep\nsorrow. \u201cI will see you again, within an hour, at your house, and settle\nall matters.\u201d The woman, who had doubtless come to show him the\nchurchyard, hereupon retired; and the young Englishman, coming up to me,\ngrasped me kindly by the hand, whilst his eyes glistened with tears.\n\n\u201cSo, sir,\u201d said he, \u201cyou have kindly fulfilled my office here, which\nwould to God I had been in time to do myself for poor Crabbe! You did\nnot know him, I believe?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d I answered.\n\n\u201cBut I did,\u201d returned the youth; \u201cand a braver, nobler heart never beat\nin the frame of a man. He has been most unhappy, poor fellow, in his\nrelatives.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am sorry to hear it,\u201d I could only reply.\n\n\u201cIf I could honour you in any way, sir,\u201d rejoined the youth, \u201cwhich your\nheart cares for, beyond its own noble joy, in acting the manly and\nhumane part which you have acted towards my poor friend, I would delight\nto honour you. You are at least entitled to some information about the\ndeceased, which I may give you in a way which will best show the praise\nand the heart of poor Crabbe. I have some letters here in my pocket,\nwhich I brought with me, alas! that he might explain something to me,\nwhich they all, more or less contain, relative to a piece of special\nbusiness; from one of them I shall read an extract, relative to his\nearly history, and the miserable occasion on which he found his\nlong-lost father, whom, after long and patient efforts to trace his\nparents, he was at length directed to seek in one of your villages in\nthe south of Scotland.\u201d\n\nThe particular letter was selected, and the young Englishman, over the\ngrave of his friend, read as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cI could have wept tears of blood, on finding things as they are with\nthe unhappy old man who is indeed my father. I shall speak to you now as\nI would commune with my own heart; but yet it must be in mild terms,\nlest I be wickedly unfilial. Is not this awful? From the very little\nwhich I knew of myself ere I came to this country, and from information\nwhich I have gathered within these two weeks from the old clergyman of\nthis village, it appears that my mother had died a few days after giving\nme birth, and that my uncle, who had never been satisfied with the\nmarriage, took me, when very young, from my father, whose unhappy\npeculiarities led him readily to resign me; gave me my mother\u2019s name,\nand carried me with him to Holland, where he was a merchant. He was very\nkind to me in my youth; and, when I was of proper age, bought me a\ncommission in the British army, in which I have served, as you know, for\nnearly ten years, and which, you also know, I was obliged to leave, in\nconsequence of a wound in one of my ankles, which, subject to occasional\nswelling, has rendered me quite unfit for travel. My uncle died about\nthree years ago, and left me heir to his effects, which were\nconsiderable. Nothing in his papers led me to suppose that my father\nmight yet be living, but I learned the fact from a confidential friend\nof his, who communicated it to me, not very wisely, perhaps, since he\ncould not tell me even my real name. Bitterly condemning my uncle\u2019s\ncruel policy, which had not allowed him to hold any intercourse whatever\nwith my father, and which had cut me off from the natural guardian of my\nlife, I hasted over to this country, with no certain hope of success in\nfinding out whose I was, beyond what my knowledge that I bore my\nmother\u2019s name led me to entertain. I had my own romance connected with\nthe pursuit. I said to myself, that I might have little sisters, who\nshould be glad to own me, unworthy though I was; I might bring comfort\nto a good old man, whose infirmities of age were canonized by the\nrespect due to his sanctity; who, in short, had nothing of age but its\nreverence; and who, like another patriarch, was to fall upon my neck,\nand weep for joy like a little child. Every night I was on board,\nhasting to this country, I saw my dream-sisters, so kind, so beautiful:\nthey washed my feet; they looked at the scars of my wounds; they were\nproud of me for having been a soldier, and leaned on my arm as we went\nto church, before all the people, who were lingering in the sunny\nchurchyard; and the good old man went before, looking oft back to see\nthat we were near behind, accommodating his step to show that he too was\none of the party, though he did his best to appear self-denied.\n\n\u201cAfter getting the clue, as mentioned in my last letter to you, I took a\nseat in the mail, which I was told would pass at a little distance from\nthe village whither I was bound. Would to God I had set out the day\nbefore, that so I might have prevented a horrid thing! The coach was\nstopped for me at a little bridge, that I might get out; the village,\nabout a mile off, was pointed out to me; and I was advised to follow a\nsmall foot-path, which led along by a rivulet, as being the nearest way\nto the place in question. Twilight was now beginning to deepen among the\nelms that skirted the path into which I had struck; and in this softest\nhour of nature, I had no other thought than that I was drawing near a\nhome of peace. I know not whether the glen which I was traversing could\nhave roused such indescribable emotions within me, had I not guessed\nthat scenes were before me which my childhood must have often seen; but\nevery successive revelation of the pass up which I was going,\u2014pool after\npool ringed by night insects, and shot athwart on the surface by those\nunaccountable diverging lines, so fine, so rapid, which may be the sport\ntoo of invisible insects,\u2014stream after stream, with its enamelled manes\nof cool green velvet, which anon twined themselves out of sight beneath\nthe rooted brakes,\u2014one shy green nook in the bank after another,\noverwaved by the long pensile boughs of trees, and fringed with many a\nfairy mass of blent wild flowers;\u2014all these made me start, as at the\nmelancholy recurrence of long-forgotten dreams. And when the blue heron\nrose from the stream where he had been wading, and with slow flagging\nwing crossed and re-crossed the water, and then went up the darkened\nvalley to seek his lone haunt by the mountain spring, I was sure I had\nseen the very same scene, and the very same bird, some time in my life\nbefore. My dear Stanley, you cannot guess why I dwell so long on these\ncircumstances! For it enters my very heart with anguish, to tell the\nmoral contrast to my hopes, and to these peaceful accompaniments of\noutward nature. It must be told. Listen to what follows.\n\n\u201cI had not walked more than a quarter of a mile up the valley, when I\nheard feeble cries for assistance, as of some one in the last extremity,\ndrowning in the stream. I made what haste I could, and, on getting round\na sloping headland of the bank, which shot forward to the edge of the\nrounding water, I found myself close upon a company of fellows, habited\nlike Christmas mummers, apparently amusing themselves with the struggles\nof a person in the water, who, even as he secured a footing, and got his\nhead above, was again pushed down by his cruel assailants. I was upon\nthem ere they were aware, and reached one fellow, who seemed\nparticularly active, an excellent thwack with my ratan, from which,\nhowever, recovering, he took to his heels, followed by his associates.\nMy next business was to relieve the object of their cruelty; but this\nwas no easy task; for, being probably by this time quite exhausted, he\nhad yielded to the current; and, ere I could reach him, was rolled down\ninto a large black pool. He was on the point of sinking for ever, when I\ncaught hold of him\u2014good God! an old man\u2014by his gray hair, and hauled him\nout upon the bank, where he lay to all appearance quite dead. Using such\nmeans as were in my power to assist in restoring suspended animation, I\nsucceeded so well, that ere long the poor old man showed symptoms of\nreturning life. I looked round me in this emergency, but there was\nneither house nor living person to be seen; so what could I do, but take\nthe old, bare headed man on my back, and carry him to the village, which\nI knew was not far off. And there, God in heaven! who should I find him\nto be, but my own father!\n\n\u201cTo you, Stanley, I can say everything which I dare whisper to my own\nheart; but this is a matter which even my own private bosom tries to\neschew. It seems\u2014it seems that the unhappy old man is narrow-hearted\u2014a\nmiser, as they term it here; and that for some low petty thefts he was\nsubjected by some fellows of the village to the above ducking. I know\nwell, Stanley, you will not despise me for all this, nor because I must\nnow wear my own name of Crabbe, which I am determined, in justice to\nthat unhappy old father, henceforth to do. On the contrary, you will\nonly advise me well how to win upon his harder nature, and bring him\nround to more liberal habits. Listen to the following scheme of my own\nfor the same purpose, which struck me one evening as I sat \u2018chewing the\ncud of sweet and bitter fancy,\u2019 beside the pool whence I rescued the\npoor old man. For indeed\u2014indeed, I must grapple with the realities of\nthe moral evil, however painful or disgusting. That being is my father;\nand no one can tell how much his nature may have been warped and kept\nperverse by the loss of the proper objects of natural affection. Is it\nnot my bounden duty, then, to be found to him, and by my constant\npresence, to open his heart, which has been too much constringed by his\nlonely situation? I shall hedge him round, in the first place, from\ninsults; I shall live with him, in his own house, all at my expense; and\nour household economy shall be as liberal as my finances will permit. I\nshall give much money in charity, and make him the dispenser of it; for\nour best feelings are improved by outward practice. Whenever I may be\nhonoured by an invitation to a good man\u2019s table, the slightest hint to\nbring him with me shall be taken advantage of; and he _shall_ go, that\nthe civilities of honourable men may help his self-respect, and thereby\nhis virtue. Now, may God aid me in this moral experiment, to try it with\ndiscretion, to make the poor old man doubly mine own!\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom this extract,\u201d said the young Englishman, carefully folding up his\ndeceased friend\u2019s letter, \u201cyou will see something of the exalted nature\nof poor Ramsay\u2014Crabbe, I should say, according to his own decided wish.\nI may here mention, that the death of the old man, which took place not\nmany weeks after the above brutalities were inflicted upon him, and\nwhich, in all likelihood, was hastened by the unhappy infliction, never\nallowed his son to put in practice those noble institutes of moral\ndiscipline, which he had devised, to repair and beautify the degraded\nfountain of his life. I doubt not that this miserable end of his old\nparent, and the sense of his own utter loneliness, in respect of\nkindred, preyed upon the generous soldier, and helped to bring on that\nfrenzy of fever, which so soon turned his large, his noble heart, into\ndust and oblivion. Peace be with his ashes; and everlasting honour wait\nupon his name!\u2014To-morrow morning, sir,\u201d continued the youth, \u201cI set out\nagain for England, and I should like to bear your name along with me,\ncoupled with the memory which shall never leave me, of your\ndisinterested kindness towards my late friend. I talk little of thanks;\nfor I hold you well repaid, by the consciousness of having done the last\nduties of humanity for a brave and good man.\u201d\n\nAccording to the Englishman\u2019s request, I gave him my name, and received\nhis in return; and, shaking hands over the grave of poor Crabbe, we\nparted.\n\n\u201cGood God!\u201d said I to myself, as I left the churchyard, \u201cit appears,\nthen, that at the very moment when this generous soldier was meditating\na wise and moral plan to win his debased parent to honour and\nsalvation\u2014at that very moment I was allowing my heart to entertain a\ngroundless feeling of dislike to him.\u201d My second more pleasing\nreflection was, that this unmanly prejudice had easily given way. How\ncould it last, under the awful presence of Death, who is the great\napostle of human charity? Moreover, from the course of incidents above\nmentioned, I have derived this important lesson for myself:\u2014Never to\nallow a hasty opinion, drawn from a man\u2019s little peculiarities of manner\nor appearance, particularly from the features of his face, or the shape\nof his head, as explained by the low quackeries of Lavater and\nSpurzheim, to decide unfavourably against a man, who, for aught I truly\nknow, may be worthy of unqualified esteem.\n\n\n\n\n ANENT AULD GRANDFAITHER, AUNTIE BELL, MY AIN FAITHER, &c.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR.\n\n The sun rises bright in France,\n And fair sets he;\n But he has tint the blithe blink he had\n In my ain countree.\n _Allan Cunningham._\n\n\nAuld Grandfaither died when I was a growing callant, some seven or aught\nyear auld; yet I mind him full weel; it being a curious thing how early\nsuch matters take haud of ane\u2019s memory. He was a straught, tall, auld\nman, with a shining bell-pow, and reverend white locks hinging down\nabout his haffets; a Roman nose, and twa cheeks blooming through the\nwinter of his lang age like roses, when, puir body, he was sand-blind\nwith infirmity. In his latter days he was hardly able to crawl about\nalane; but used to sit resting himself on the truff seat before our\ndoor, leaning forit his head on his staff, and finding a kind of\npleasure in feeling the beams of God\u2019s ain sun beaking on him. A\nblackbird, that he had tamed, hung above his head in a whand cage of my\nfaither\u2019s making; and he had taken a pride in learning it to whistle twa\nor three turns of his ain favourite sang, \u201cOwer the Water to Charlie.\u201d\n\nI recollect, as well as yesterday, that on the Sundays he wore a braid\nbannet with a red worsted cherry on the tap o\u2019t; and had a\nsingle-breasted coat, square in the tails, of light Gilmerton blue, with\nplaited white buttons, bigger than crown pieces. His waistcoat was low\nin the neck, and had flap pouches, wherein he kept his mull for rappee,\nand his tobacco box. To look at him, wi\u2019 his rig-and-fur Shetland hose\npulled up ower his knees, and his big glancing buckles in his shoon,\nsitting at our doorcheek, clean and tidy as he was kept, was just as if\none of the ancient patriarchs had been left on earth, to let succeeding\nsurvivors witness a picture of hoary and venerable eld. Puir body, mony\na bit Gibraltar-rock and gingerbread did he give to me, as he would pat\nme on the head, and prophesy that I would be a great man yet; and sing\nme bits of auld sangs, about the bloody times of the Rebellion and\nPrince Charlie. There was nothing that I liked so well as to hear him\nset a-going with his auld warld stories and lilts; though my mother used\nsometimes to say, \u201cWheesht, grandfaither, ye ken it\u2019s no canny to let\nout a word of thae things; let byganes be byganes, and forgotten.\u201d He\nnever liked to gie trouble, so a rebuke of this kind would put a tether\nto his tongue for a wee; but when we were left by ourselves, I used aye\nto egg him on to tell me what he had come through in his far-away\ntravels beyond the broad seas; and of the famous battles he had seen and\nshed his precious blood in; for his pinkie was hacked off by a dragoon\nof Cornel Gardiner\u2019s down by at Prestonpans, and he had catched a bullet\nwith his ankle over in the north at Culloden. So it was no wonder that\nhe liked to crack about these times, though they had brought him muckle\nand no little mischief, having obliged him to skulk like another Cain\namong the Highland hills and heather, for many a long month and day,\nhomeless and hungry. Not dauring to be seen in his own country, where\nhis head would have been chacked off like a sybo, he took leg-bail in a\nship, over the sea, among the Dutch folk; where he followed out his\nlawful trade of a cooper, making girrs for the herring barrels, and so\non; and sending, when he could find time and opportunity, such savings\nfrom his wages as he could afford, for the maintenance of his wife and\nsmall family of three helpless weans, that he had been obliged to leave,\ndowie and destitute, at their native home of pleasant Dalkeith.\n\nAt lang and last, when the breeze had blown ower, and the feverish pulse\nof the country began to grow calm and cool, auld grandfaither took a\nlonging to see his native land; and, though not free of jeopardy from\nking\u2019s cutters on the sea, and from spies on shore, he risked his neck\nover in a sloop from Rotterdam to Aberlady, that came across with a\nvaluable cargo of smuggled gin. When grandfaither had been obliged to\ntake the wings of flight for the preservation of his life and liberty,\nmy faither was a wean at grannie\u2019s breast: so, by her fending,\u2014for she\nwas a canny, industrious body, and kept a bit shop, in the which she\nsold oatmeal and red herrings, needles and prins, potaties and tape, and\ncabbage, and what not,\u2014he had grown a strapping laddie of eleven or\ntwelve, helping his two sisters, one of whom perished of the measles in\nthe dear year, to gang errands, chap sand, carry water, and keep the\nhousie clean. I have heard him say, when auld granfaither came to their\ndoor at the dead of night, tirling, like a thief o\u2019 darkness, at the\nwindow-brod to get in, that he was so altered in his voice and lingo,\nthat no living soul kenned him, not even the wife of his bosom; so he\nhad to put grannie in mind of things that had happened between them,\nbefore she would allow my faither to lift the sneck, or draw the bar.\nMany and many a year, for gude kens how long after, I\u2019ve heard tell that\nhis speech was so Dutchified as to be scarcely kenspeckle to a Scotch\nEuropean; but Nature is powerful, and in the course of time he came in\nthe upshot to gather his words together like a Christian.\n\n * * * * *\n\nOf my auntie Bell, that, as I have just said, died of measles in the\ndear year, at the age of fourteen, I have no story to tell but one, and\nthat a short one, though not without a sprinkling of interest.\n\nAmong her other ways of doing, grannie kept a cow, and sold the milk\nround about to the neighbours in a pitcher, whiles carried by my\nfaither, and whiles by my aunties, at the ransom of a ha\u2019penny the\nmutchkin. Well, ye observe, that the cow ran yield, and it was as plain\nas pease that the cow was with calf;\u2014Geordie Drowth, the horse-doctor,\ncould have made solemn affidavy on that head. So they waited on, and\nbetter waited on, for the prowie\u2019s calving, keeping it upon draff and\naitstrae in the byre; till one morning every thing seemed in a fair way,\nand my auntie Bell was set out to keep watch and ward.\n\nSome of her companions, howsoever, chancing to come by, took her out to\nthe back of the house to have a game at the pallall; and, in the\ninterim, Donald Bogie, the tinkler from Yetholm, came and left his\nlittle jackass in the byre, while he was selling about his crockery of\ncups and saucers and brown plates, on the auld ane, through the town, in\ntwo creels.\n\nIn the middle of auntie Bell\u2019s game, she heard an unco noise in the\nbyre; and, kenning that she had neglected her charge, she ran round the\ngable, and opened the door in a great hurry; when, seeing the beastie,\nshe pulled it to again, and fleeing, half out of breath, into the\nkitchen, cried, \u201cCome away, come away, mother, as fast as ye can. Eh,\nlyst, the cow\u2019s cauffed,\u2014and it\u2019s a cuddie!\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n The weaver he gaed up the stair,\n Dancing and singing;\n A bunch o\u2019 bobbins at his back,\n Rattling and ringing.\n _Old Song._\n\nMy own faither, that is to say, auld Mansie Wauch, with regard to\nmyself, but young Mansie, with reference to my grandfaither, after\nhaving run the errands, and done his best to grannie during his early\nyears, was, at the age of thirteen, as I have heard him tell, bound a\n\u2019prentice to the weaver trade, which, from that day and date, for better\nfor worse, he prosecuted to the hour of his death;\u2014I should rather have\nsaid to within a fortnight o\u2019t, for he lay for that time in the mortal\nfever, that cut through the thread of his existence. Alas! as Job says,\n\u201cHow time flies like a weaver\u2019s shuttle!\u201d\n\nHe was a tall, thin, lowering man, blackaviced, and something in the\nphysog like myself, though scarcely so weel-faured; with a kind of\nblueness about his chin, as if his beard grew of that colour,\u2014which I\nscarcely think it would do, but might arise either from the dust of the\nblue cloth, constantly flying about the shop, taking a rest there, or\nfrom his having a custom of giving it a rub now and then with his finger\nand thumb, both of which were dyed of that colour, as well as his apron,\nfrom rubbing against and handling the webs of checkit claith in the\nloom.\n\nIll would it become me, I trust a dutiful son, to say that my faither\nwas anything but a decent, industrious, hardworking man, doing\neverything for the good of his family, and winning the respect of all\nthat kenned the value of his worth. As to his decency, few\u2014very few\nindeed\u2014laid beneath the mools of Dalkeith kirkyard, made their beds\nthere, leaving a better name behind them; and as to industry, it is but\nlittle to say that he toiled the very flesh off his bones, ca\u2019ing the\nshuttle from Monday morning till Saturday night, from the rising up of\nthe sun even to the going down thereof; and whiles, when opportunity led\nhim, or occasion required, digging and delving away at the bit\nkail-yard, till moon and stars were in the lift, and the dews of heaven\nthat fell on his head were like the oil that flowed from Aaron\u2019s beard,\neven to the skirts of his garment. But what will ye say there? Some are\nborn with a silver spoon in their mouths, and others with a\nparritch-stick. Of the latter was my faither, for, with all his\nfechting, he never was able much more than to keep our heads above the\nocean of debt. Whatever was denied him, a kind Providence, howsoever,\nenabled him to do that; and so he departed this life, contented, leaving\nto my mother and me, the two survivors, the prideful remembrance of\nbeing, respectively, she the widow, and me the son, of an honest man.\nSome left with twenty thousand cannot boast so much; so ilka ane has\ntheir comforts.\n\nHaving never entered much into public life, further than attending the\nkirk twice every Sabbath, and thrice when there was evening service, the\ndays of my faither glided over like the waters of a deep river that make\nlittle noise in their course; so I do not know whether to lament or\nrejoice at having almost nothing to record of him. Had Bonaparte as\nlittle ill to account for, it would be well this day for him; but, losh\nme! I had amaist skipped ower his wedding.\n\nIn the five-and-twentieth year of his age, he had fallen in love with my\nmother, Marion Laverock, at the christening of a neebour\u2019s bairn, where\nthey both happened to forgather, little, I daresay, jalousing, at the\ntime their een first met, that fate had destined them for a pair, and to\nbe the honoured parents of me, their only bairn. Seeing my father\u2019s\nheart was catched as in the net of the fowler, she took every lawful\nmeans, such as adding another knot to her cockernony, putting up her\nhair in screw curls, and so on, to follow up her advantage; the result\nof all which was, that after three months\u2019 courtship, she wrote a letter\nout to her friends at Loanhead, telling them of what was more than\nlikely to happen, and giving a kind invitation to such of them as might\nthink it worth their whiles, to come in and be spectators of the\nceremony. And a prime day I am told they had of it, having, by advice of\nmore than one, consented to make it a penny wedding; and hiring Deacon\nLawrie\u2019s malt-barn at five shillings for the express purpose.\n\nMany yet living, among whom James Batter, who was the best man, and\nDuncan Imrie, the heel-cutter in the Fleshmarket Close, are yet\naboveboard to bear solemn testimony to the grandness of the occasion,\nand the uncountable numerousness of the company, with such a display of\nmutton broth, swimming thick with raisins,\u2014and roasted jiggets of\nlamb,\u2014to say nothing of mashed turnips and champed potatoes,\u2014as had not\nbeen seen in the wide parish of Dalkeith in the memory of man. It was\nnot only my faither\u2019s bridal day, but it brought many a lad and lass\ntogether by way of partners at foursome reels and Hieland jigs, whose\ncourtship did not end in smoke, couple above couple dating the day of\ntheir happiness from that famous forgathering. There were no less than\nthree fiddlers, two of them blind with the sma\u2019-pox, and one naturally,\nand a piper with his drone and chanter, playing as many pibrochs as\nwould have deaved a mill-happer,\u2014all skirling, scraping, and bumming\naway throughither, the whole afternoon and night, and keeping half the\ncountry-side dancing, capering, and cutting, in strathspey step and\nquick time, as if they were without a weary, or had not a bone in their\nbodies. In the days of darkness the whole concern would have been\nimputed to magic and glamour; and douce folk, finding how they were\ntransgressing over their usual bounds, would have looked about them for\nthe wooden pin that auld Michael Scott the warlock drave in behind the\ndoor, leaving the family to dance themselves to death at their leisure.\n\nHad the business ended in dancing, so far well, for a sound sleep would\nhave brought a blithe wakening, and all be tight and right again; but,\nalas and alackaday! the violent heat and fume of foment they were all\nthrown into caused the emptying of so many ale-tankers, and the\nswallowing of so muckle toddy, by way of cooling and refreshing the\ncompany, that they all got as fou as the Baltic; and many ploys, that\nshall be nameless, were the result of a sober ceremony, whereby two\ndouce and decent people, Mansie Wauch, my honoured faither, and Marion\nLaverock, my respected mother, were linked together, for better for\nworse, in the lawful bonds of honest wedlock.\n\nIt seems as if Providence, reserving every thing famous and remarkable\nfor me, allowed little or nothing of consequence to happen to my\nfaither, who had few crooks in his lot; at least, I never learned,\neither from him or any other body, of any adventures likely seriously to\ninterest the world at large. I have heard tell, indeed, that he once got\na terrible fright by taking the bounty, during the American war, from an\nEirish corporal, of the name of Dochart O\u2019Flaucherty, at Dalkeith fair,\nwhen he was at his \u2019prenticeship; he, not being accustomed to\nmalt-liquor, having got fouish and frisky\u2014which was not his natural\ndisposition\u2014over half-a-bottle of porter. From this it will easily be\nseen, in the first place, that it would be with a fecht that his master\nwould get him off, by obliging the corporal to take back the trepan\nmoney; in the second place, how long a date back it is since the Eirish\nbegan to be the death of us; and in conclusion, that my honoured faither\ngot such a fleg as to spane him effectually, for the space of ten years,\nfrom every drinkable stronger than good spring-well water. Let the\nunwary take caution; and may this be a wholesome lesson to all whom it\nmay concern.\n\nIn this family history it becomes me, as an honest man, to make passing\nmention of my faither\u2019s sister, auntie Mysie, that married a carpenter\nand undertaker in the town of Jedburgh; and who, in the course of nature\nand industry, came to be in a prosperous and thriving way; indeed so\nmuch so, as to be raised from the rank of a private head of a family,\nand at last elected, by a majority of two votes over a famous\ncow-doctor, a member of the town-council itself.\n\nThere is a good story, howsoever, connected with this business, with\nwhich I shall make myself free to wind up this somewhat fusty and\nfuzzionless chapter.\n\nWell, ye see, some great lord,\u2014I forget his name, but no matter,\u2014that\nhad made a most tremendous sum of money, either by foul or fair means,\namong the blacks in the East Indies, had returned before he died, to lay\nhis bones at home, as yellow as a Limerick glove, and as rich as Dives\nin the New Testament. He kept flunkies with plush small-clothes, and\nsky-blue coats with scarlet-velvet cuffs and collars,\u2014lived like a\nprincie, and settled, as I said before, in the neighbourhood of\nJedburgh.\n\nThe body, though as brown as a toad\u2019s back, was as pridefu\u2019 and full of\npower as auld king Nebuchadneisher; and how to exhibit all his purple\nand fine linen, he aye thought and better thought, till at last the\nhappy determination came ower his mind like a flash of lightning, to\ninvite the bailies, deacons, and town-council, all in a body, to come in\nand dine with him.\n\nSave us! what a brushing of coats, such a switching of stoury trousers,\nand bleaching of white cotton stockings, as took place before the\ncatastrophe of the feast, never before happened since Jeddart was a\nburgh. Some of them that were forward, and geyan bold in the spirit,\ncrawed aloud for joy at being able to boast that they had received an\ninvitation letter to dine with a great lord; while others, as proud as\npeacocks of the honour, yet not very sure as to their being up to the\ntrade of behaving themselves at the tables of the great, were mostly\ndung stupid with not kenning what to think. A council meeting or two was\nheld in the gloamings, to take such a serious business into\nconsideration; some expressing their fears and inward down-sinking,\nwhile others cheered them up with a fillip of pleasant consolation.\nScarcely a word of the matter for which they were summoned together by\nthe town-offisher\u2014and which was about the mending of the old\nbell-rope\u2014was discussed by any of them. So, after a sowd of toddy was\nswallowed, with the hopes of making them brave men, and good soldiers of\nthe magistracy, they all plucked up a proud spirit, and, do or die,\ndetermined to march in a body up to the gate, and forward to the table\nof his lordship.\n\nMy uncle, who had been one of the ringleaders of the chicken-hearted,\ncrap away up among the rest, with his new blue coat on, shining fresh\nfrom the ironing of the goose, but keeping well among the thick, to be\nas little kenspeckle as possible; for all the folk of the town were at\ntheir doors and windows to witness the great occasion of the\ntown-council going away up like gentlemen of rank to take their dinner\nwith his lordship. That it was a terrible trial to all cannot be for a\nmoment denied; yet some of them behaved themselves decently; and if we\nconfess that others trembled in the knees, as if they were marching to a\nfield of battle, it was all in the course of human nature.\n\nYet ye would wonder how they came on by degrees; and, to cut a long tale\nshort, at length found themselves in a great big room, like a palace in\na fairy tale, full of grand pictures with gold frames, and\nlooking-glasses like the side of a house, where they could see down to\ntheir very shoes. For a while they were like men in a dream, perfectly\ndazzled and dumfoundered; and it was five minutes before they could\neither see a seat, or think of sitting down. With the reflection of the\nlooking-glasses, one of the bailies was so possessed within himself that\nhe tried to chair himself where chair was none, and landed, not very\nsoftly, on the carpet; while another of the deacons, a fat and dumpy\nman, as he was trying to make a bow, and throw out his leg behind him,\ntramped on a favourite Newfoundland dog\u2019s tail, that, wakening out of\nhis slumbers with a yell that made the roof ring, played drive against\nmy uncle, who was standing abaft, and wheeled him like a butterflee,\nside foremost, against a table with a heap o\u2019 flowers on\u2019t, where, in\ntrying to kep himself, he drove his head, like a battering ram, through\na looking-glass, and bleached back on his hands and feet on the carpet.\n\nSeeing what had happened, they were all frightened; but his lordship,\nafter laughing heartily, was politer, and kent better about manners than\nall that; so, bidding the flunkies hurry away with the fragments of the\nchina jugs and jars, they found themselves, sweating with terror and\nvexation, ranged along silk settees, cracking about the weather and\nother wonderfuls.\n\nSuch a dinner! The fume of it went round about their hearts like myrrh\nand frankincense. The landlord took the head of the table, the bailies\nthe right and left of him; the deacons and councillors were ranged along\nthe sides like files of sodgers; and the chaplain, at the foot, said\ngrace. It is entirely out of the power of man to set down on paper all\nthat they got to eat and drink; and such was the effect of French\ncookery, that they did not ken fish from flesh. Howsoever, for all that,\nthey laid their lugs in everything that lay before them, and what they\ncould not eat with forks, they supped with spoons; so it was all to one\npurpose.\n\nWhen the dishes were removing, each had a large blue glass bowl full of\nwater, and a clean calendered damask towel, put down by a smart flunkey\nbefore him; and many of them that had not helped themselves well to the\nwine while they were eating their steaks and French frigassees, were now\nvexed to death on that score, imagining that nothing remained for them\nbut to dight their nebs and flee up.\n\nIgnorant folk should not judge rashly, and the worthy town-council were\nhere in error; for their surmises, however feasible, did the landlord\nwrong. In a minute they had fresh wine decanters ranged down before\nthem, filled with liquors of all variety of colours, red, green, and\nblue; and the table was covered with dishes full of jargonelles and\npippins, raisins and almonds, shell walnuts and plum-damases, with\nnutcrackers, and everything else they could think of eating; so that\nafter drinking \u201cThe King, and long life to him,\u201d and \u201cThe constitution\nof the country at home and abroad,\u201d and \u201cSuccess to trade,\u201d and \u201cA good\nharvest,\u201d and \u201cMay ne\u2019er waur be among us,\u201d and \u201cBotheration to the\nFrench,\u201d and \u201cCorny toes and short shoes to the foes of old Scotland,\u201d\nand so on, their tongues began at length not to be so tacked; and the\nweight of their own dignity, that had taken flight before his lordship,\ncame back and rested on their shoulders.\n\nIn the course of the evening, his lordship whispered to one of the\nflunkies to bring in some things\u2014they could not hear what\u2014as the company\nmight like them. The wise ones thought within themselves that the best\naye comes hindmost; so in brushed a powdered valet, with three dishes on\nhis arm of twisted black things, just like sticks of Gibraltar-rock, but\ndifferent in the colour.\n\nBailie Bowie helped himself to a jargonelle, and Deacon Purves to a\nwheen raisins; and my uncle, to show that he was not frightened, and\nkent what he was about, helped himself to one of the long black things,\nwhich, without much ceremony, he shoved into his mouth, and began to.\nTwo or three more, seeing that my uncle was up to trap, followed his\nexample, and chewed away like nine-year olds.\n\nInstead of the curious-looking black thing being sweet as honey,\u2014for so\nthey expected,\u2014they soon found they had catched a Tartar; for it had a\nconfounded bitter tobacco taste. Manners, however, forbade them laying\nit down again, more especially as his lordship, like a man dumfoundered,\nwas aye keeping his eye on them. So away they chewed, and better chewed,\nand whammelled them round in their mouths, first in one cheek, and then\nin the other, taking now and then a mouthful of drink to wash the trash\ndown, then chewing away again, and syne another whammel from one cheek\nto the other, and syne another mouthful, while the whole time their een\nwere staring in their heads like mad, and the faces they made may be\nimagined, but cannot be described. His lordship gave his eyes a rub, and\nthought he was dreaming, but no\u2014there they were bodily, chewing and\nwhammelling, and making faces; so no wonder that, in keeping in his\nlaugh, he sprung a button from his waistcoat, and was like to drop down\nfrom his chair, through the floor, in an ecstasy of astonishment, seeing\nthey were all growing sea-sick, and as pale as stucco-images.\n\nFrightened out of his wits at last, that he would be the death of the\nwhole council, and that more of them would poison themselves, he took up\none of the cigars,\u2014every one knows cigars now, for they are fashionable\namong the very sweeps,\u2014which he lighted at the candle, and commenced\npuffing like a tobacco-pipe.\n\nMy uncle and the rest, if they were ill before, were worse now; so when\nthey got to the open air, instead of growing better, they grew sicker\nand sicker, till they were waggling from side to side like ships in a\nstorm; and, no kenning whether their heels or heads were uppermost, went\nspinning round about like peeries.\n\n\u201cA little spark may make muckle wark.\u201d It is perfectly wonderful what\ngreat events spring out of trifles, or what seem to common eyes but\ntrifles. I do not allude to the nine days\u2019 deadly sickness, that was the\nlegacy of every one that ate his cigar, but to the awful truth, that at\nthe next election of councillors, my poor uncle Jamie was completely\nblackballed\u2014a general spite having been taken to him in the townhall, on\naccount of having led the magistracy wrong, by doing what he ought to\nhave let alone, thereby making himself and the rest a topic of amusement\nto the world at large, for many and many a month.\n\nOthers, to be sure, it becomes me to mention, have another version of\nthe story, and impute the cause of his having been turned out to the\nimplacable wrath of old Bailie Bogie, whose best black coat, square in\nthe tails, that he had worn only on the Sundays for nine years, was\ntotally spoiled, on their way home in the dark from his lordship\u2019s, by a\ntremendous blash that my unfortunate uncle happened, in the course of\nnature, to let flee in the frenzy of a deadly upthrowing.\u2014_The Life of\nMansie Wauch, Tailor in Dalkeith._\n\n\n\n\n JOHN BROWN;\n _OR, THE HOUSE IN THE MUIR_.\n\n\nJohn Brown, the Ayr, or as he was more commonly designated by the\nneighbours, the Religious, Carrier, had been absent, during the month of\nJanuary (1685), from his home in the neighbourhood of Muirkirk, for\nseveral days. The weather, in the meantime, had become extremely stormy,\nand a very considerable fall of snow had taken place. His only daughter,\na girl of about eleven years of age, had frequently, during the\nafternoon of Saturday, looked out from the cottage door into the drift,\nin order to report to her mother, who was occupied with the nursing of\nan infant brother, the anxious occurrences of the evening. \u201cHelp,\u201d too,\nthe domestic cur, had not remained an uninterested spectator of the\ngeneral anxiety, but by several fruitless and silent excursions into the\nnight, had given indisputable testimony that the object of his search\nhad not yet neared the solitary shieling. It was a long, and a wild\nroad, lying over an almost trackless muir, along which John Brown had to\ncome; and the cart track, which even in better weather, and with the\nadvantage of more daylight, might easily be mistaken, had undoubtedly,\nere this, become invisible. Besides, John had long been a marked bird,\nhaving rendered himself obnoxious to the \u201cpowers that were,\u201d by his\nadherence to the Sanquhar declaration, his attending field-preachings,\nor as they were termed \u201cconventicles,\u201d his harbouring of persecuted\nministers, and, above all, by a moral, a sober, and a proverbially\ndevout and religious conduct.\n\nIn an age when immorality was held to be synonymous with loyalty, and\nirreligion with non-resistance and passive obedience, it was exceedingly\ndangerous to wear such a character, and, accordingly, there had not been\nwanting information to the prejudice of this quiet and godly man.\nClavers, who, ever since the affair of Drumclog, had discovered more of\nthe merciless and revengeful despot than of the veteran or hero, had\nmarked his name, according to report, in his black list; and when once\nClavers had taken his resolution and his measures, the Lord have mercy\nupon those against whom these were pointed! He seldom hesitated in\ncarrying his plans into effect, although his path lay over the trampled\nand lacerated feelings of humanity. Omens, too, of an unfriendly and\nevil-boding import, had not been wanting in the cottage of John to\nincrease the alarm. The cat had mewed suspiciously, had appeared\nrestless, and had continued to glare in hideous indication from beneath\nthe kitchen bed. The death-watch, which had not been noticed since the\ndecease of the gudeman\u2019s mother, was again, in the breathless pause of\nlistening suspense, heard to chick distinctly; and the cock, instead of\ncrowing, as on ordinary occasions, immediately before day-dawn, had\noriginated a sudden and alarming flap of his wings, succeeded by a\nfearful scream, long before the usual bedtime.\n\nIt was a gloomy crisis; and after a considerable time spent in dark and\ndespairing reflection, the evening lamp was at last trimmed, and the\npeat fire repaired into something approaching to a cheerful flame. But\nall would not do; for whilst the soul within is disquieted and in\nsuspense, all external means and appliances are inadequate to procure\ncomfort, or impart even an air of cheerfulness. At last Help suddenly\nlifted his head from the hearth, shook his ears, sprung to his feet, and\nwith something betwixt a growl and a bark, rushed towards the door, at\nwhich the yird drift was now entering copiously. It was, however, a\nfalse alarm. The cow had moved beyond the \u201challan,\u201d or the mice had come\ninto sudden contact, and squeaked behind the rafters. John, too, it was\nreasoned betwixt mother and daughter, was always so regular and pointed\nin his arrivals, and this being Saturday night, it was not a little or\nan insignificant obstruction that could have prevented him from being\nhome, in due time, at least, for family worship. His cart, in fact, had\nusually been pitched up, with the trams supported against the\npeat-stack, by two o\u2019clock in the afternoon; and the evening of his\narrival from his weekly excursion to Ayr was always an occasion of\naffectionate intercourse, and more than ordinary interest. Whilst his\ndisconsolate wife, therefore, turned her eyes towards her husband\u2019s\nchair, and to the family Bible, which lay in a \u201cbole\u201d within reach of\nhis hand, and at the same time listened to the howling and intermitting\ngusts of the storm, she could not avoid\u2014it was not in nature that she\nshould\u2014contrasting her present with her former situation; thus imparting\neven to objects of the most kindly and comforting association, all the\nlivid and darkening hues of her disconsolate mind. But there is a depth\nand a reach in true and genuine piety, which the plummet of sorrow may\nnever measure. True religion sinks into the heart as the refreshing dew\ndoes into the chinks and the crevices of the dry and parched soil; and\nthe very fissures of affliction, the cleavings of the soul, present a\nmore ready and inviting, as well as efficient access, to the softening\ninfluence of piety.\n\nThis poor woman began gradually to think less of danger, and more of\nGod\u2014to consider as a set-off against all her fruitless uneasiness, the\nvigilance and benevolence of that powerful Being, to whom, and to whose\nwill, the elements, in all their combinations and relations, are\nsubservient; and having quieted her younger child in the cradle, and\nintimated her intention by a signal to her daughter, she proceeded to\ntake down the family Bible, and to read out in a soft, and subdued, but\nmost devout and impressive voice, the following lines:\u2014\n\n I waited for the Lord my God,\n And patiently did bear;\n At length to me he did incline\n My voice and cry to hear.\n\nThese two solitary worshippers of Him whose eyes are on the just, and\nwhose ear is open to their cry, had proceeded to the beginning of the\nfourth verse of this psalm, and were actually employed in singing with\nan increased and increasing degree of fervour and devotion, the\nfollowing trustful and consolatory expressions\u2014\n\n O blessed is the man whose trust\n Upon the Lord relies,\n\nwhen the symphony of another and a well-known voice was felt to be\npresent, and they became at once assured that the beloved object of\ntheir solicitude had joined them, unseen and unperceived, in the\nworship. This was felt by all to be as it ought to have been; nor did\nthe natural and instinctive desire to accommodate the weary and\nsnow-covered traveller with such conveniences and appliances as his\npresent condition manifestly demanded, prevent the psalm-singing from\ngoing on, and the service from being finished with all suitable decency.\nHaving thus, in the first instance, rendered thanks unto God, and\nblessed and magnified that mercy which pervades, and directs, and\nover-rules every agent in nature, no time was lost in attending to the\nsecondary objects of inquiry and manifestation, and the kind heart\noverflowed, whilst the tongue and the hand were busied in \u201canswer meet\u201d\nand in \u201caccommodation suitable.\u201d\n\nIn all the wide range of Scotland\u2019s muirs and mountains, straths and\nglens, there was not to be found this evening a happier family than that\nover which John Brown, the religious carrier, now presided. The\naffectionate inquiries and solicitous attentions of his wife,\u2014of his\npartner trusty and tried, not only under the cares and duties of life,\nbut in the faith, in the bonds of the covenant, and in all the\nsimilarity of sentiment and apprehension upon religious subjects,\nwithout which no matrimonial union can possibly ensure happiness,\u2014were\ndeeply felt and fully appreciated. They two had sat together in the\n\u201cTorwood,\u201d listening to the free and fearless accents of\nexcommunication, as they rolled in dire and in blasting destiny from the\nhalf-inspired lips of the learned and intrepid Mr Donald Cargill. They\nhad, at the risk of their lives, harboured for a season, and enjoyed the\ncomfortable communion and fellowship of Mr Richard Cameron, immediately\nprevious to his death in the unfortunate rencounter at \u201cAirsmoss.\u201d They\nhad followed into and out the shire of Ayr, the zealous and eloquent Mr\nJohn King, and that even in spite of the interdict of council, and after\nthat a price had been set upon the preacher\u2019s head. Their oldest child\nhad been baptised by a Presbyterian and ejected minister under night,\nand in the midst of a wreath of snow, and the youngest was still\nawaiting the arrival of an approven servant of God, to receive the same\nsanctified ordinance. And if at times a darker thought passed suddenly\nacross the disc of their sunny hearts, and if the cause of a poor\npersecuted remnant, the interests of a reformed, and suffering, and\nbleeding church, supervened in cloud upon the general quietude and\nacquiescence of their souls, this was instantly relieved and dispersed\nby a deeper, and more sanctified and more trustful tone of feeling;\nwhilst amidst the twilight beams of prophecy, and the invigorating\nexercise of faith, the heart was disciplined and habituated into hope,\nand reliance, and assurance. And if at times the halloo, and the yells,\nand the clatter of persecution, were heard upon the hill-side, or up the\nglen, where the Covenanters\u2019 Cave was discovered, and five honest men\nwere butchered under a sunny morning, and in cold blood,\u2014and if the\nvoice of Clavers, or of his immediate deputy in the work of bloody\noppression, \u201cRed Rob,\u201d came occasionally in the accents of vindictive\nexclamation, upon the breeze of evening; yet hitherto the humble\n\u201cCottage in the Muir\u201d had escaped notice, and the tread and tramp of man\nand horse had passed mercifully, and almost miraculously by. The general\ncurrent of events closed in upon such occasional sources of agitation\nand alarm, leaving the house in the muir in possession of all that\ndomestic happiness, and even quietude, which its retirement and its\ninmates were calculated to ensure and to participate.\n\nEarly next morning the cottage of John Brown was surrounded by a troop\nof dragoons, with Clavers at their head. John, who had probably a\npresentiment of what might happen, urged his wife and daughter to remain\nwithin doors, insisting that as the soldiers were, in all likelihood, in\nsearch of some other individual, he should soon be able to dismiss them.\nBy this time the noise, occasioned by the trampling and neighing of\nhorses, commingled with the hoarse and husky laugh and vociferations of\nthe dragoons, had brought John, half-dressed and in his night-cap, to\nthe door. Clavers immediately accosted him by name; and in a manner\npeculiar to himself, intended for something betwixt the expression of\nfun and irony, he proceeded to make inquiries respecting one \u201cSamuel\nAitkin, a godly man, and a minister of the word, one outrageously\naddicted to prayer, and occasionally found with the sword of the flesh\nin one hand, and that of the spirit in the other, disseminating\nsedition, and propagating disloyalty among his Majesty\u2019s lieges.\u201d\n\nJohn admitted at once that the worthy person referred to was not unknown\nto him, asserting, however, at the same time, that of his present\nresidence or place of hiding he was not free to speak. \u201cNo doubt, no\ndoubt,\u201d rejoined the questioner, \u201cyou, to be sure, know nothing!\u2014how\nshould you, all innocence and ignorance as you are? But here is a little\nchip of the old block, which may probably recollect better, and save us\nthe trouble of blowing out her father\u2019s brains, just by way of making\nhim remember a little more accurately.\u201d \u201cYou, my little farthing\nrush-light,\u201d continued \u201cRed Rob,\u201d[2] alighting from his horse, and\nseizing the girl rudely, and with prodigious force by the wrists,\u2014\u201cyou\nremember an old man with a long beard and a bald head, who was here a\nfew days ago, baptizing your sister, and giving many good advices to\nfather and mother, and who is now within a few miles of this house, just\nup in a nice snug cave in the glen there, to which you can readily and\ninstantly conduct us, you know?\u201d The girl looked first at her mother,\nwho had now advanced into the doorway, then at her father, and latterly\ndrooped her head, and continued to preserve a complete silence.\n\nFootnote 2:\n\n \u201cRed Rob,\u201d the \u201cBothwell,\u201d probably, of \u201cOld Mortality,\u201d was, in fact,\n the right hand man of Clavers on all occasions, and has caused himself\n long to be remembered amidst the peasantry of the West of Scotland,\n not only by the dragoon\u2019s red cloak, which he wore, but still more by\n his hands, crimsoned in the blood of his countrymen!\n\n\u201cAnd so,\u201d continued the questioner, \u201cyou are dumb; you cannot speak;\nyour tongue is a little obstinate or so, and you must not tell family\nsecrets. But what think you, my little chick, of speaking with your\nfingers, of having a pat and a proper and a pertinent answer just ready,\nmy love, at your finger ends, as one may say. As the Lord lives, and as\nmy soul lives, but this will make a dainty nosegay\u201d (displaying a\nthumbikin or fingerscrew) \u201cfor my sweet little Covenanter; and then\u201d\n(applying the instrument of torture, meanwhile, and adjusting it to the\nthumb) \u201cyou will have no manner of trouble whatever in recollecting\nyourself; it will just come to you like the lug of a stoup, and don\u2019t\nknit your brows so\u201d (for the pain had become insufferable); \u201cthen we\nshall have you quite chatty and amusing, I warrant.\u201d The mother, who\ncould stand this no longer, rushed upon the brutal executioner, and with\nexpostulations, threats, and the most impassioned entreaties,\nendeavoured to relax the questioner\u2019s twist.\n\n\u201cCan _you_, mistress, recollect anything of this man we are in quest\nof?\u201d resumed Clavers, haughtily. \u201cIt may save us _both_ some trouble,\nand your daughter a continuance and increase of her present suffering,\nif you will just have the politeness to make us acquainted with what you\nhappen to know upon the subject.\u201d The poor woman seemed for an instant\nto hesitate; and her daughter looked most piteously and distractedly\ninto her countenance, as if expectant and desirous of respite, through\nher mother\u2019s compliance. \u201cWoman!\u201d exclaimed the husband, in a tone of\nindignant surprise, \u201chast thou so soon forgot thy God? And shall the\nfear of anything which man can do induce thee to betray innocent blood?\u201d\nHe said no more; but he had said enough, for from that instant the whole\ntone of his wife\u2019s feelings was changed, and her soul was wound up as if\nby the hand of Omnipotence, into resolution and daring. \u201cBravo!\u201d\nexclaimed the arch persecutor, \u201cBravo! old Canticles; thou word\u2019st it\nwell; and so you three pretty innocents have laid your holy heads\ntogether, and you have resolved to die, should it so please God and us,\nwith a secret in your breast, and a lie in your mouth, like the rest of\nyour psalm-singing, hypocritical, canting sect, rather than discover\ngude Mr Aitken!\u2014pious Mr Aitken!\u2014worthy Mr Aitken! But we shall try what\nlight this little telescope of mine will afford upon the subject,\u201d\npointing at the same time to a carabine or holster pistol, which hung\nsuspended from the saddle of his horse. \u201cThis cold frosty morning,\u201d\ncontinued Clavers, \u201crequires that one should be employed, were it for no\nother purpose than just to gain heat by the exercise. And so, old\npragmatical, in order that you may not catch cold, by so early an\nexposure to the keen air, we will take the liberty,\u201d (hereupon the whole\ntroop gathered round, and presented muskets), \u201cfor the benefit of\nsociety, and for the honour and safety of the King, never to speak of\nthe glory of God and the good of souls,\u2014simply and unceremoniously, and\nin the neatest and most expeditious manner imaginable, to _blow out your\nbrains_.\u201d John Brown dropped down instantly, and as it were\ninstinctively, upon his knees, whilst his wife stood by in seeming\ncomposure, and his daughter had happily become insensible to all\nexternal objects and transactions whatever. \u201cWhat!\u201d exclaimed Clavers,\n\u201cand so you must pray too, to be sure, and we shall have a last speech\nand a dying testimony lifted up in the presence of peat-stack and clay\nwalls and snow wreaths; but as these are pretty staunch and confirmed\nloyalists, I do not care though we entrust you with five minutes of\ndevotional exercise, provided you steer clear of King, Council, and\nRichard Cameron,\u2014so proceed, good John, but be short and pithy. My lambs\nare not accustomed to long prayers, nor will they readily soften under\nthe pathetic whining of your devotions.\u201d But in this last surmise\nClavers was for once mistaken; for the prayer of this poor and\nuneducated man ascended that morning in expressions at once so earnest,\nso devout, and so overpoweringly pathetic, that deep silence succeeded\nat last to oaths and ribaldry; and as the following concluding sentences\nwere pronounced, there were evident marks of better and relenting\nfeelings:\u2014\u201cAnd now, gude Lord,\u201d continued this death-doomed and truly\nChristian sufferer, \u201csince Thou hast nae mair use for Thy servant in\nthis world, and since it is Thy good and rightful pleasure that I should\nserve Thee better and love Thee more elsewhere, I leave this puir widow\nwoman, with the helpless and fatherless children, upon Thy hands. We\nhave been happy in each other here, and now that we are to part for\nawhile, we maun e\u2019en look forward to a more perfect and enduring\nhappiness hereafter. As for the puir blindfolded and infatuated\ncreatures, the present ministers of Thy will, Lord, reclaim them from\nthe error and the evil of their courses ere it be too late; and may they\nwho have sat in judgment and in oppression in this lonely place, and on\nthis blessed morning, and upon a puir weak defenceless fellow-creature,\nfind that mercy at last from Thee which they have this day refused to\nThy unworthy but faithful servant.\u201d \u201cNow, Isbel,\u201d continued this\ndefenceless and amiable martyr, \u201cthe time is come at last, of which, you\nknow, I told you on that day when first I proposed to unite hand and\nheart with yours; and are you willing, for the love of God and His\nrightful authority, to part with me thus?\u201d To which the poor woman\nreplied with perfect composure, \u201cThe Lord gave, and He taketh away. I\nhave had a sweet loan of you, my dear John, and I can part with you for\nHis sake, as freely as ever I parted with a mouthful of meat to the\nhungry, or a night\u2019s lodging to the weary and benighted traveller.\u201d So\nsaying, she approached her still kneeling and blindfolded husband,\nclasped him round the neck, kissed and embraced him closely, and then\nlifting up her person into an attitude of determined endurance, and\neyeing from head to foot every soldier who stood with his carabine\nlevelled, she retired slowly and firmly to the spot which she had\nformerly occupied. \u201cCome, come, let\u2019s have no more of this whining\nwork,\u201d interrupted Clavers suddenly. \u201cSoldiers! do your duty.\u201d But the\nwords fell upon a circle of statues; and though they all stood with\ntheir muskets presented, there was not a finger which had power to draw\nthe fatal trigger. Then ensued an awful pause, through which a \u201cGod\nAlmighty bless your tender hearts,\u201d was heard coming from the lips of\nthe _now_ agitated and almost distracted wife. But Clavers was not in\nthe habit of giving his orders twice, or of expostulating with\ndisobedience. So, extracting a pistol from the holster of his saddle, he\nprimed and cocked it, and then walking firmly and slowly up through the\ncircle close to the ear of his victim.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThere was a momentary murmur of discontent and of disapprobation amongst\nthe men as they looked upon the change which a single awful instant had\neffected; and even \u201cRed Rob,\u201d though a Covenanting slug still stuck\nsmarting by in his shoulder, had the hardihood to mutter, loud enough to\nbe heard, \u201cBy God, this is too bad!\u201d The widow of John Brown gave one,\nand but one shriek of horror as the fatal engine exploded; and then,\naddressing herself leisurely, as if to the discharge of some ordinary\ndomestic duty, she began to unfold a napkin from her neck. \u201cWhat think\nye, good woman, of your bonny man now?\u201d vociferated Clavers, returning,\nat the same time, the pistol, with a plunge, into the holster from which\nit had been extracted. \u201cI had always good reason,\u201d replied the woman\nfirmly and deliberately, \u201cto think weel o\u2019 him, and I think mair o\u2019 him\nnow than ever. But how will Graham of Claverhouse account to God and man\nfor this morning\u2019s work?\u201d continued the respondent firmly. \u201cTo man,\u201d\nanswered the ruffian, \u201cI can be answerable; and as to God, I will take\nHim in my own hands.\u201d He then marched off, and left her with the corpse.\nShe spread the napkin leisurely upon the snow, gathered up the scattered\nfragments of her husband\u2019s head, covered his body with a plaid, and\nsitting down with her youngest and yet unbaptised infant, wept bitterly.\n\nThe cottage, and the kail-yard, and the peat-stack, and the whole little\nestablishment of John Brown, the religious carrier, have long\ndisappeared from the heath and the muir; but the little spot, within one\nof the windings of the burn, where the \u201cHouse in the Muir\u201d stood, is\nstill green amidst surrounding heath; and in the very centre of that\nspot there lies a slab, or flat stone, now almost covered over with\ngrass, upon which, with a little clearing away of the moss from the\nfaded characters, the following rude but expressive lines may still be\nread:\u2014\n\n Clavers might murder godly Brown,\n But could not rob him of his crown;\n Here in this place from earth he took departure,\n Now he has got the garland of the martyr.\n _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_, 1822.\n\n\n\n\n TRADITIONS OF THE OLD TOLBOOTH OF EDINBURGH.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nWhosoever is fortunate enough to have seen Edinburgh previous to the\nyear 1817\u2014when as yet the greater part of its pristine character was\nentire, and before the stupendous grandeur, and dense old-fashioned\nsubstantiality, which originally distinguished it, had been swept away\nby the united efforts of fire and foolery\u2014must remember the Old\nTolbooth. At the north-west corner of St Giles\u2019s Church, and almost in\nthe very centre of a crowded street, stood this tall, narrow, antique,\nand gloomy-looking pile, with its black stancheoned windows opening\nthrough its dingy walls, like the apertures of a hearse, and having its\nwestern gable penetrated by sundry suspicious-looking holes, which\noccasionally served\u2014_horresco referens_\u2014for the projection of the\ngallows. The fabric was four stories high, and might occupy an area of\nfifty feet by thirty. At the west end there was a low projection of\nlittle more than one story, surmounted by a railed platform, which\nserved for executions. This, as well as other parts of the building,\ncontained shops.\n\nOn the north side, there remained the marks of what had once been a sort\nof bridge communicating between the Tolbooth and the houses immediately\nopposite. This part of the building got the name of the \u201cPurses,\u201d on\naccount of its having been the place where, in former times, on the\nKing\u2019s birthday, the magistrates delivered donations of as many pence as\nthe King was years old to the same number of beggars or \u201cblue-gowns.\u201d\nThere was a very dark room on this side, which was latterly used as a\nguard-house by the right venerable military police of Edinburgh, but\nwhich had formerly been the fashionable silk-shop of the father of the\ncelebrated Francis Horner. At the east end there was nothing remarkable,\nexcept an iron box, attached to the wall, for the reception of small\ndonations in behalf of the poor prisoners, over which was a painted\nboard, containing some quotations from Scripture. In the lower flat of\nthe south and sunny side, besides a shop, there was a den for the\naccommodation of the outer door-keeper, and where it was necessary to\napply when admission was required, and the old gray-haired man was not\nfound at the door. The main door was at the bottom of the great turret\nor turnpike stair, which projected from the south-east corner. It was a\nsmall but very strong door, full of large headed nails, and having an\nenormous lock, with a flap to conceal the keyhole, which could itself be\nlocked, but was generally left open.\n\nOne important feature in the externals of the Tolbooth was, that about\none third of the building, including the turnpike, was of ashlar\nwork\u2014that is, smooth freestone\u2014while the rest seemed of coarser and more\nmodern construction, besides having a turnpike about the centre, without\na door at the bottom. The floors of the \u201cwest end,\u201d as it was always\ncalled, were somewhat above the level of those in the \u201ceast end,\u201d and in\nrecent times the purposes of these different quarters was quite\ndistinct\u2014the former containing the debtors, and the latter the\ncriminals. As the \u201ceast end\u201d contained the hall in which the Scottish\nParliament formerly met, we may safely suppose it to have been the\noldest part of the building\u2014an hypothesis which derives additional\ncredit from the various appearance of the two quarters\u2014the one having\nbeen apparently designed for a more noble purpose than the other. The\neastern division must have been of vast antiquity, as James the Third\nfenced a Parliament in it, and the magistrates of Edinburgh let the\nlower flat for booths or shops, so early as the year 1480.\n\nOn passing the outer door, where the rioters of 1736 thundered with\ntheir sledge-hammers, and finally burnt down all that interposed between\nthem and their prey, the keeper instantly involved the entrant in\ndarkness by reclosing the gloomy portal. A flight of about twenty steps\nthen led to an inner door, which, being duly knocked, was opened by a\nbottle-nosed personage denominated \u201cPeter,\u201d who, like his sainted\nnamesake, always carried two or three large keys. You then entered \u201cthe\nhall,\u201d which, being free to all the prisoners except those of the \u201ceast\nend,\u201d was usually filled with a crowd of shabby-looking, but very merry\nloungers. This being also the chapel of the jail, contained an old\npulpit of singular fashion,\u2014such a pulpit as one could imagine John Knox\nto have preached from; which, indeed, he was traditionally said to have\nactually done. At the right-hand side of the pulpit was a door leading\nup the large turnpike to the apartments occupied by the criminals, one\nof which was of plate-iron. This door was always shut, except when food\nwas taken up to the prisoners.\n\nOn the north side of the hall was the \u201cCaptain\u2019s Room,\u201d a small place\nlike a counting-room, but adorned with two fearful old muskets and a\nsword, together with the sheath of a bayonet, and one or two bandeliers,\nalike understood to hang there for the defence of the jail. On the west\nend of the hall hung a board, on which\u2014the production, probably, of some\ninsolvent poetaster\u2014were inscribed the following emphatic lines:\u2014\n\n A prison is a house of care,\n A place where none can thrive,\n A touchstone true to try a friend,\n A grave for men alive\u2014\n Sometimes a place of right,\n Sometimes a place of wrong,\n Sometimes a place for jades and thieves,\n And honest men among.\n\nThe historical recollections connected with \u201cthe hall\u201d ought not to be\npassed over. Here Mary delivered what Lindsay and other old historians\ncall her \u201cpainted orations.\u201d Here Murray wheedled, and Morton frowned.\nThis was the scene of Charles\u2019s ill-omened attempts to revoke the\npossessions of the Church; and here, when his commissioner, Nithsdale,\nwas deputed to urge that measure, did the Presbyterian nobles prepare to\nset active violence in opposition to the claims of right and the royal\nwill. On that occasion, old Belhaven, under pretence of infirmity, took\nhold of his neighbour, the Earl of Dumfries, with one hand, while with\nthe other he grasped a dagger beneath his clothes, ready, in case the\nact of revocation were passed, to plunge it into his bosom.\n\nFrom the hall a lobby extended to the bottom of the central staircase\nalready mentioned, which led to the different apartments\u2014about twelve in\nnumber\u2014appropriated to the use of the debtors. This stair was narrow,\nspiral, and steep\u2014three bad qualities, which the stranger found but\nimperfectly obviated by the use of a greasy rope that served by way of\nbalustrade. This nasty convenience was not rendered one whit more\ncomfortable by the intelligence, usually communicated by some of the\ninmates, that it had hanged a man! In the apartments to which this stair\nled, there was nothing remarkable, except that in one of them part of\nthe wall seemed badly plastered. This was the temporary covering of the\nsquare hole through which the gallows-tree was planted. We remember\ncommuning with a person who lodged in this room at the time of an\nexecution. He had had the curiosity, in the impossibility of seeing the\nexecution, to try if he could feel it. At the time when he heard the\npsalms and other devotions of the culprit concluded, and when he knew,\nfrom the awful silence of the crowd, that the signal was just about to\nbe given, he sat down upon the end of the beam, and soon after\ndistinctly felt the motion occasioned by the fall of the unfortunate\nperson, and thus, as it were, played at \u201csee-saw\u201d with the criminal.\n\nThe annals of crime are of greater value than is generally supposed.\nCriminals form an interesting portion of mankind. They are entirely\ndifferent from _us_\u2014divided from us by a pale which we will not, dare\nnot overleap, but from the safe side of which we may survey, with\ncurious eyes, the strange proceedings which go on beyond. They are\ninteresting, often, on account of their courage\u2014on account of their\nhaving dared something which we timorously and anxiously avoid. A\nmurderer or a robber is quite as remarkable a person, for this reason,\nas a soldier who has braved some flesh-shaking danger. He must have\ngiven way to some excessive passion; and all who have ever been\ntransported beyond the bounds of reason by the violence of any passion\nwhatever, are entitled to the wonder, if not the admiration, of the rest\nof the species. Among the inmates of the Old Tolbooth, some of whom had\ninhabited it for many years, there were preserved a few legendary\nparticulars respecting criminals of distinction, who had formerly been\nwithin its walls. Some of these I have been fortunate enough to pick up.\n\nOne of the most distinguished traits in the character of the Old\nTolbooth was, that it had no power of retention over people of quality.\nIt had something like that faculty which Falstaff attributes to the lion\nand himself\u2014of knowing men who ought to be respected on account of their\nrank. Almost every criminal of more than the ordinary rank ever yet\nconfined in it, somehow or other contrived to get free. An insane peer,\nwho, about the time of the Union, assassinated a schoolmaster that had\nmarried a girl to whom he had paid improper addresses, escaped while\nunder sentence of death. We are uncertain whether the following curious\nfact relates to that nobleman, or to some other titled offender. It was\ncontrived that the prisoner should be conveyed out of the Tolbooth in a\ntrunk, and carried by a porter to Leith, where some sailors were to be\nready with a boat to take him aboard a vessel about to leave Scotland.\nThe plot succeeded so far as the escape from jail was concerned, but was\nknocked on the head by an unlucky and most ridiculous _contretemps_. It\nso happened that the porter, in arranging the trunk upon his back,\nplaced the end which corresponded with the feet of the prisoner\n_uppermost_. The head of the unfortunate nobleman was therefore pressed\nagainst the lower end of the box, and had to sustain the weight of the\nwhole body. The posture was the most uneasy imaginable. Yet life was\npreferable to ease. He permitted himself to be taken away. The porter\ntrudged along the Krames with the trunk, quite unconscious of its\ncontents, and soon reached the High Street, which he also traversed. On\nreaching the Netherbow, he met an acquaintance, who asked him where he\nwas going with that large burden. To Leith, was the answer. The other\nenquired if the job was good enough to afford a potation before\nproceeding farther upon so long a journey. This being replied to in the\naffirmative, and the carrier of the box feeling in his throat the\nphilosophy of his friend\u2019s enquiry, it was agreed that they should\nadjourn to a neighbouring tavern. Meanwhile, the third party, whose\ninclinations had not been consulted in this arrangement, felt in his\nneck the agony of ten thousand decapitations, and almost wished that it\nwere at once well over with him in the Grassmarket. But his agonies were\nnot destined to be of long duration. The porter, in depositing him upon\nthe causeway, happened to make the end of the trunk come down with such\nprecipitation, that, unable to bear it any longer, the prisoner fairly\nroared out, and immediately after fainted. The consternation of the\nporter, on hearing a noise from his burden, was of course excessive; but\nhe soon acquired presence of mind enough to conceive the occasion. He\nproceeded to unloose and to burst open the trunk, when the hapless\nnobleman was discovered in a state of insensibility; and as a crowd\ncollected immediately, and the City Guard were not long in coming\nforward, there was of course no farther chance of escape. The prisoner\ndid not revive from his swoon till he had been safely deposited in his\nold quarters. But, if we recollect aright, he eventually escaped in\nanother way.\n\nOf Porteous, whose crime\u2014if crime existed\u2014was so sufficiently atoned for\nby the mode of his death, an anecdote which has the additional merit of\nbeing connected with the Old Tolbooth, may here be acceptable. One day,\nsome years before his trial, as he was walking up Liberton\u2019s Wynd, he\nencountered one of the numerous hens, which, along with swine, then\nhaunted the streets of the Scottish capital. For some reason which has\nnot been recorded, he struck this hen with his cane, so that it\nimmediately died. The affair caused the neighbours to gather round, and\nit was universally thought that the case was peculiarly hard, inasmuch\nas the bird was a \u201cclocker,\u201d and left behind it a numerous brood of\norphan chickens. Before the captain had left the spot, the proprietrix\nof the hen, an old woman who lived in the upper flat of a house close\nby, looked over her window, and poured down upon the slayer\u2019s head a\nwhole \u201cgardeloo\u201d of obloquy and reproach, saying, among other things,\nthat \u201cshe wished he might have as many witnesses present at his\nhinder-end as there were feathers in that hen.\u201d[3]\n\nFootnote 3:\n\n It is but charity to suppose Porteous might, in this case, be only\n endeavouring to introduce a better system of street police than had\n formerly prevailed. It is not many years since the magistrates of a\n southern burgh drew down the unqualified wrath of all the good women\n there by attempting to confiscate and remove the filth which had been\n privileged to grace the causeway from time immemorial.\n\nPorteous went away, not unaffected, as it would appear, by these idle\nwords. On the night destined to be his last on earth, he told the story\nof the hen to the friends who then met in the jail to celebrate his\nreprieve from the execution which was to have taken place that day; and\nthe prophetess of Liberton\u2019s Wynd was honoured with general ridicule for\nthe failure of her imprecation. Before the merry-meeting, however, was\nover, the sound of the \u201cdeaddrum,\u201d beat by the approaching rioters, fell\nupon their ears, and Porteous, as if struck all at once with the\ncertainty of death, exclaimed, \u201cD\u2014\u2014n the wife! she is right yet!\u201d Some\nof his friends suggested that it might be the firedrum; but he would not\ngive ear to such consolations, and fairly abandoned all hope of life.\nBefore another hour had passed, he was in eternity.\n\nNicol Brown, a butcher, executed in 1753 for the murder of his wife, was\nnot the least remarkable tenant of the Tolbooth during the last century.\nA singular story is told of this wretched man. One evening, long before\nhis death, as he was drinking with some other butchers in a tavern\nsomewhere about the Grassmarket, a dispute arose about how long it might\nbe allowable to keep flesh before it was eaten. From less to more, the\nargument proceeded to bets; and Brown offered to eat a pound of the\noldest and \u201cworst\u201d flesh that could be produced, under the penalty of a\nguinea. A regular bet was taken, and a deputation of the company went\naway to fetch the stuff which should put Nicol\u2019s stomach to the test. It\nso happened that a criminal\u2014generally affirmed to have been the\ncelebrated Nicol Muschat\u2014had been recently hung in chains at the\nGallowlee, and it entered into the heads of these monsters that they\nwould apply in that quarter for the required flesh. They accordingly\nprovided themselves with a ladder and other necessary articles, and,\nthough it was now near midnight, had the courage to go down that still\nand solitary road which led towards the gallows, and violate the\nterrible remains of the dead, by cutting a large collop from the\nculprit\u2019s hip. This they brought away, and presented to Brown, who was\nnot a little shocked to find himself so tasked. Nevertheless, getting\nthe dreadful \u201cpound of flesh\u201d roasted after the manner of a beefsteak,\nand adopting a very strong and drunken resolution, he set himself down\nto his horrid mess, which, it is said, he actually succeeded in\ndevouring. This story, not being very effectually concealed, was\nrecollected when he afterwards came to the same end with Nicol Muschat.\nHe lived in the Fleshmarket Close, as appears from the evidence on his\ntrial. He made away with his wife by burning her, and said that she had\ncaught fire by accident. But, as the door was found locked by the\nneighbours who came on hearing her cries, and he was notorious for\nabusing her, besides the circumstance of his not appearing to have\nattempted to extinguish the flames, he was found guilty and executed. He\nwas also hung in chains at the Gallowlee, where Muschat had hung thirty\nyears before. He did not, however, hang long. A few mornings after\nhaving been put up, it was found that he had been taken away during the\nnight. This was supposed to have been done by the butchers of the\nEdinburgh market, who considered that a general disgrace was thrown upon\ntheir fraternity by his ignominious exhibition there. They were said to\nhave thrown his body into the Quarry Holes.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nThe case of Katherine Nairne, in 1766, excited, in no small degree, the\nattention of the Scottish public. This lady was allied, both by blood\nand marriage, to some highly respectable families. Her crime was the\ndouble one of poisoning her husband, and having an intrigue with his\nbrother, who was her associate in the murder. She was brought from the\nnorth country into Leith harbour in an open boat, and as fame had\npreceded her, thousands of people flocked to the shore to see her. She\nhas been described to us as standing erect in the boat, dressed in a\nriding-habit, and having a switch in her hand, with which she amused\nherself. Her whole bearing betrayed so much levity, or was so different\nfrom what had been expected, that the mob raised a general howl of\nindignation, and were on the point of stoning her to death, when she was\nwith some difficulty rescued from their hands by the public authorities.\nIn this case the Old Tolbooth found itself, as usual, incapable of\nretaining a culprit of condition. Sentence had been delayed by the\njudges, on account of her pregnancy. The midwife employed at her\naccouchement (who, by-the-by, continued to practise in Edinburgh so\nlately as the year 1805) had the address to achieve a jail-delivery\nalso. For three or four days previous to that concerted for the escape,\nshe pretended to be afflicted with a prodigious toothache; went out and\nin with her head enveloped in shawls and flannels; and groaned as it she\nhad been about to give up the ghost. At length, when all the janitory\nofficials were become so habituated to her appearance, as not to heed\nher \u201cexits and her entrances\u201d very much, Katherine Nairne one evening\ncame down in her stead, with her head wrapped all round with the shawls,\nuttering the usual groans, and holding down her face upon her hands, as\nwith agony, in the precise way customary with the midwife. The inner\ndoor-keeper, not quite unconscious, it is supposed, of the trick, gave\nher a hearty thump upon the back as she passed out, calling her at the\nsame time a howling old Jezebel and wishing she would never come back to\nannoy his ears, and those of the other inmates, in such an intolerable\nway. There are two reports of the proceedings of Katherine Nairne after\nleaving the prison. One bears that she immediately left the town in a\ncoach, to which she was handed by a friend stationed on purpose. The\ncoachman, it is said, had orders from her relations, in the event of a\npursuit, to drive into the sea and drown her\u2014a fate which, however\ndreadful, was considered preferable to the ignominy of a public\nexecution. The other story runs, that she went up the Lawnmarket to the\nCastlehill, where lived a respectable advocate, from whom, as he was her\ncousin, she expected to receive protection. Being ignorant of the town,\nshe mistook the proper house, and, what was certainly remarkable,\napplied at that of the crown agent, who was assuredly the last man in\nthe world that could have done her any service. As good luck would have\nit, she was not recognised by the servant, who civilly directed her to\nher cousin\u2019s house, where it is said she remained concealed many weeks.\nIn addition to these reports, we may mention that we have seen an attic\npointed out in St Mary\u2019s Wynd, as the place where Katherine Nairne found\nconcealment between the period of her leaving the jail and that of her\ngoing abroad. Her future life, it has been reported, was virtuous and\nfortunate. She was married to a French gentleman, was the mother of a\nlarge and respectable family, and died at a good old age. Meanwhile,\nPatrick Ogilvie, her associate in the dark crime which threw a shade\nover her younger years, suffered in the Grassmarket. This gentleman, who\nhad been a lieutenant in the \u2014\u2014 regiment, was so much beloved by his\nfellow-soldiers, who happened to be stationed at that time in Edinburgh\nCastle, that the public authorities judged it necessary to shut them up\nin that fortress till the execution was over, lest they might have\nattempted, what they had been heard to threaten, a rescue.\n\nThe Old Tolbooth was the scene of the suicide of Mungo Campbell, while\nunder sentence of death for shooting the Earl of Eglintoune. In the\ncountry where this memorable event took place, it is somewhat remarkable\nthat the fate of the murderer was more generally lamented than that of\nthe murdered person. Campbell, as we have heard, though what was called\n\u201ca graceless man,\u201d and therefore not much esteemed by the Auld Light\npeople, who there abound, was rather popular in his profession of\nexciseman, on account of his rough, honourable spirit, and his lenity in\nthe matter of smuggling. Lord Eglintoune, on the contrary, was not\nliked, on account of the inconvenience which he occasioned to many of\nhis tenants by newfangled improvements, and his introduction into the\ncountry of a generally abhorred article, denominated rye-grass, which,\nfor some reason we are not farmer enough to explain, was fully as\nunpopular a measure as the bringing in of Prelacy had been a century\nbefore. Lord Eglintoune was in the habit of taking strange crotchets\nabout his farms\u2014crotchets quite at variance with the old-established\nprejudices of his tenantry. He sometimes tried to rouse the old stupid\nfarmers of Kyle from their negligence and supineness, by removing them\nto other farms, or causing two to exchange their possessions, in order,\nas he jocularly alleged, to prevent their furniture from getting mouldy,\nby long standing in particular damp corners. Though his lordship\u2019s\nprojects were all undertaken in the spirit of improvement, and though\nthese emigrations were doubtless salutary in a place where the people\nwere then involved in much sloth and nastiness, still they were\npremature, and carried on with rather a harsh spirit. They therefore\nexcited feelings in the country people not at all favourable to his\ncharacter. These, joined to the natural eagerness of the common people\nto exult over the fall of tyranny, and the puritanical spirit of the\ndistrict, which disposed them to regard his lordship\u2019s peccadilloes as\ndownright libertinism, altogether conspired against him, and tended to\nthrow the glory and the pity of the occasion upon his lordship\u2019s slayer.\nEven Mungo\u2019s poaching was excused, as a more amiable failing than the\nexcessive love of preserving game, which had always been the unpopular\nmania of the Eglintoune family. Mungo Campbell was a man respectably\nconnected, the son of a provost of Ayr; had been a dragoon in his youth,\nwas eccentric in his manner, a bachelor, and was considered at Newmills,\nwhere he resided, as an austere and unsocial, but honourable, and not\nimmoral man. There can be no doubt that he rose on his elbows and fired\nat his lordship, who had additionally provoked him by bursting into a\nlaugh at his awkward fall. The Old Tolbooth was supposed by many, at the\ntime, to have had her usual failing in Mungo\u2019s case. The Argyll interest\nwas said to have been employed in his favour, and the body, which was\nfound suspended over the door, instead of being his, was thought to be\nthat of a dead soldier from the castle, substituted in his place. His\nrelations, however, who are very respectable people in Ayrshire, all\nacknowledge that he died by his own hand; and this was the general idea\nof the mob of Edinburgh, who, getting the body into their hands, trailed\nit down the street to the King\u2019s Park, and inspired by different\nsentiments from those of the Ayrshire people, were not satisfied till\nthey got it up to the top of Salisbury Crags, from which they\nprecipitated it down the \u201cCat Nick.\u201d Aged people in Ayrshire still\nremember the unwonted brilliancy of the aurora borealis on the midnight\nof Lord Eglintoune\u2019s death. Strange and awful whispers then went through\nthe country, in correspondence, as it were, with the streamers in the\nsky, which were considered by the superstitious as expressions on the\nface of heaven of satisfied wrath in the event.\n\nOne of the most remarkable criminals ever confined in the Old Tolbooth\nwas the celebrated William Brodie. As may be generally known, this was a\nman of respectable connexions, and who had moved in good society all his\nlife, unsuspected of any criminal pursuits. It is said that a habit of\nfrequenting cock-pits was the first symptom he exhibited of a\ndefalcation from virtue. His ingenuity as a joiner gave him a fatal\nfacility in the burglarious pursuits to which he afterwards addicted\nhimself. It was then customary for the shopkeepers of Edinburgh to hang\ntheir keys upon a nail at the back of their doors, or at least to take\nno pains in concealing them during the day. Brodie used to take\nimpressions of them in putty or clay, a piece of which he would carry in\nthe palm of his hand. He kept a blacksmith in his pay, of the name of\nSmith, who forged exact copies of the keys he wanted, and with these it\nwas his custom to open the shops of his fellow-tradesmen during the\nnight. He thus found opportunities of securely stealing whatsoever he\nwished to possess. He carried on his malpractices for many years. Upon\none shop in particular he made many severe exactions. This was the shop\nof a company of jewellers, in the North Bridge Street, namely, that at\nthe south-east corner, where it joins the High Street. The unfortunate\ntradesmen from time to time missed many articles, and paid off one or\ntwo faithful shopmen, under the impression of their being guilty of the\ntheft. They were at length ruined. Brodie remained unsuspected, till\nhaving committed a daring robbery upon the Excise-office in Chessel\u2019s\nCourt, Canongate, some circumstances transpired, which induced him to\ndisappear from Edinburgh. Suspicion then becoming strong, he was pursued\nto Holland, and taken at Amsterdam, standing upright in a press or\ncupboard. At his trial, Henry Erskine, his counsel, spoke very\neloquently in his behalf, representing in particular, to the jury, how\nstrange and improbable a circumstance it was, that a man whom they had\nthemselves known from infancy as a person of good repute, should have\nbeen guilty of such practices as those with which he was charged. He\nwas, however, found guilty, and sentenced to death, along with his\naccomplice Smith. At the trial he had appeared in a fine full-dress suit\nof black clothes, the greater part of which was of silk, and his\ndeportment throughout the whole affair was completely that of a\ngentleman. He continued during the period which intervened between his\nsentence and execution to dress himself well and to keep up his spirits.\nA gentleman of our acquaintance, calling upon him in the condemned room,\nwas astonished to find him singing the song from the Beggar\u2019s Opera,\n\u201c\u2019Tis woman seduces all mankind.\u201d Having contrived to cut out the figure\nof a draught-board on the stone floor of his dungeon, he amused himself\nby playing with any one who would join him, and, in default of such,\nwith his right hand against his left. This diagram remained in the room\nwhere it was so strangely out of place, till the destruction of the\njail. His dress and deportment at the gallows were equally gay with\nthose which he assumed at his trial. As the Earl of Morton was the first\nman executed by the \u201cMaiden,\u201d so was Brodie the first who proved the\nexcellence of an improvement he had formerly made on the apparatus of\nthe gibbet. This was the substitution of what was called the \u201cdrop,\u201d for\nthe ancient practice of the double ladder. He inspected the thing with a\nprofessional air, and seemed to view the result of his ingenuity with a\nsmile of satisfaction. When placed on that terrible and insecure\npedestal, and while the rope was adjusted round his neck by the\nexecutioner, his courage did not forsake him. On the contrary, even\nthere, he exhibited a sort of joyful levity, which, though not exactly\ncomposure, seemed to the spectators as more indicative of indifference;\nhe shuffled about, looked gaily around, and finally went out of the\nworld with his hand stuck carelessly into the open front of his vest.\n\nThe Tolbooth, in its old days, as its infirmities increased, showed\nitself now and then incapable of retaining prisoners of very ordinary\nrank. Within the recollection of many people yet alive, a youth named\nReid, the son of an innkeeper in the Grassmarket, while under sentence\nof death for some felonious act, had the address to make his escape.\nEvery means was resorted to for recovering him, by search throughout the\ntown, vigilance at all the ports, and the offer of a reward for his\napprehension, yet he contrived fairly to cheat the gallows. The whole\nstory of his escape is exceedingly curious. He took refuge in the great\ncylindrical mausoleum of Sir George Mackenzie, in the Greyfriars\nchurchyard of Edinburgh. This place, besides its discomfort, was\nsupposed to be haunted by the ghost of the persecutor\u2014a circumstance of\nwhich Reid, an Edinburgh boy, must have been well aware. But he braved\nall these horrors for the sake of his life. He had been brought up in\nthe Hospital of George Heriot, in the immediate neighbourhood of the\nchurchyard, and had many boyish acquaintances still residing in that\nmunificent establishment. Some of these he contrived to inform of his\nsituation, enjoining them to be secret, and beseeching them to assist\nhim in his distress. The Herioters of those days had a very clannish\nspirit, insomuch, that to have neglected the interests or safety of any\nindividual of the community, however unworthy he might be of their\nfriendship, would have been looked upon by them as a sin of the deepest\ndye. Reid\u2019s confidants, therefore, considered themselves bound to assist\nhim by all means in their power against that general foe, the public.\nThey kept his secret most faithfully, spared from their own meals as\nmuch food as supported him, and ran the risk of severe punishment, as\nwell as of seeing ghosts, by visiting him every night in his horrible\nabode. They were his only confidants, his very parents, who lived not\nfar off, being ignorant of his place of concealment. About six weeks\nafter his escape from jail, when the hue and cry had in a great measure\nsubsided, he ventured to leave the tomb, and it was afterwards known\nthat he escaped abroad.\n\nThe subsequent history of the Old Tolbooth contains little that is very\nremarkable. It has passed away with many other venerable relics of the\nolden time, and we now look in vain for the many antique associations\nwhich crowded round the spot it once occupied.\n\n\n\n\n THE LOVER\u2019S LAST VISIT.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nThe window of the lonely cottage of Hilltop was beaming far above the\nhighest birchwood, seeming to travellers at a distance in the long\nvalley below, who knew it not, to be a star in the sky. A bright fire\nwas in the kitchen of that small tenement; the floor was washed, swept\nand sanded, and not a footstep had marked its perfect neatness; a small\ntable was covered, near the ingle, with a snow-white cloth, on which was\nplaced a frugal evening meal; and in happy but pensive mood sat there\nall alone the woodcutter\u2019s only daughter, a comely and gentle creature,\nif not beautiful\u2014such a one as diffuses pleasure round her hay-field,\nand serenity over the seat in which she sits attentively on the Sabbath,\nlistening to the word of God, or joining with mellow voice in His praise\nand worship. On this night she expected a visit from her lover, that\nthey might fix their marriage-day; and her parents, satisfied and happy\nthat their child was about to be wedded to a respectable shepherd, had\ngone to pay a visit to their nearest neighbour in the glen.\n\nA feeble and hesitating knock was at the door, not like the glad and\njoyful touch of a lover\u2019s hand; and cautiously opening it, Mary Robinson\nbeheld a female figure wrapped up in a cloak, with her face concealed in\na black bonnet. The stranger, whoever she might be, seemed wearied and\nworn out, and her feet bore witness to a long day\u2019s travel across the\nmarshy mountains. Although she could scarcely help considering her an\nunwelcome visitor at such an hour, yet Mary had too much disposition\u2014too\nmuch humanity,\u2014not to request her to step forward into the hut; for it\nseemed as if the wearied woman had lost her way, and had come towards\nthe shining window to be put right upon her journey to the low country.\n\nThe stranger took off her bonnet on reaching the fire; and Mary Robinson\nbeheld the face of one whom, in youth, she had tenderly loved; although\nfor some years past, the distance at which they lived from each other\nhad kept them from meeting, and only a letter or two, written in their\nsimple way, had given them a few notices of each other\u2019s existence. And\nnow Mary had opportunity, in the first speechless gaze of recognition,\nto mark the altered face of her friend,\u2014and her heart was touched with\nan ignorant compassion. \u201cFor mercy\u2019s sake! sit down Sarah, and tell me\nwhat evil has befallen you; for you are as white as a ghost. Fear not to\nconfide anything to my bosom: we have herded sheep together on the\nlonesome braes;\u2014we have stripped the bark together in the more lonesome\nwoods;\u2014we have played, laughed, sung, danced together;\u2014we have talked\nmerrily and gaily, but innocently enough surely, of sweethearts\ntogether; and, Sarah, graver thoughts, too, have we shared, for when\nyour poor brother died away like a frosted flower, I wept as if I had\nbeen his sister; nor can I ever be so happy in this world as to forget\nhim. Tell me, my friend, why are you here? and why is your sweet face so\nghastly?\u201d\n\nThe heart of this unexpected visitor died within her at these kind and\naffectionate inquiries; for she had come on an errand that was likely to\ndash the joy from that happy countenance. Her heart upbraided her with\nthe meanness of the purpose for which she had paid this visit; but that\nwas only a passing thought; for was she, innocent and free from sin, to\nsubmit, not only to desertion, but to disgrace, and not trust herself\nand her wrongs, and her hopes of redress, to her whom she loved as a\nsister, and whose generous nature, she well knew, not even love, the\nchanger of so many things, could change utterly, though, indeed, it\nmight render it colder than of old to the anguish of a female friend?\n\n\u201cOh! Mary, I must speak\u2014yet must my words make you grieve, far less for\nme than for yourself. Wretch that I am, I bring evil tidings into the\ndwelling of my dearest friend! These ribbons, they are worn for his\nsake\u2014they become well, as he thinks, the auburn of your bonny hair;\u2014that\nblue gown is worn to-night because he likes it;\u2014but, Mary, will you\ncurse me to my face, when I declare before the God that made us, that\nthat man is pledged unto me by all that is sacred between mortal\ncreatures; and that I have here in my bosom written promises and oaths\nof love from him, who, I was this morning told, is in a few days to be\nthy husband? Turn me out of the hut now, if you choose, and let me, if\nyou choose, die of hunger and fatigue in the woods where we have so\noften walked together; for such death would be mercy to me, in\ncomparison with your marriage with him who is mine for ever, if there be\na God who heeds the oaths of the creatures He has made.\u201d\n\nMary Robinson had led a happy life, but a life of quiet thoughts,\ntranquil hopes, and meek desires. Tenderly and truly did she love the\nman to whom she was now betrothed; but it was because she had thought\nhim gentle, manly, upright, sincere, and one that feared God. His\ncharacter was unimpeached\u2014to her his behaviour had always been fond,\naffectionate, and respectful; that he was a fine-looking man, and could\nshow himself among the best of the country round at church, and market,\nand fair-day, she saw and felt with pleasure and with pride. But in the\nheart of this poor, humble, contented, and pious girl, love was not a\nviolent passion, but an affection sweet and profound. She looked forward\nto her marriage with a joyful sedateness, knowing that she would have to\ntoil for her family, if blest with children; but happy in the thought of\nkeeping her husband\u2019s house clean, of preparing his frugal meals, and\nwelcoming him when wearied at night to her faithful, and affectionate,\nand grateful bosom.\n\nAt first, perhaps, a slight flush of anger towards Sarah tinged her\ncheek; then followed in quick succession, or all blended together in one\nsickening pang, fear, disappointment, the sense of wrong, and the cruel\npain of disesteeming and despising one on whom her heart had rested with\nall its best and purest affections. But though there was a keen struggle\nbetween many feelings in her heart, her resolution was formed during\nthat very conflict, and she said within herself, \u201cIf it be even so,\nneither will I be so unjust as to deprive poor Sarah of the man who\nought to marry her, nor will I be so mean and low-spirited, poor as I\nam, and dear as he has been unto me, as to become his wife.\u201d\n\nWhile these thoughts were calmly passing in the soul of this magnanimous\ngirl, all her former affection for Sarah revived; and, as she sighed for\nherself, she wept aloud for her friend. \u201cBe quiet, be quiet, Sarah, and\nsob not so as if your heart were breaking. It need not be thus with you.\nOh, sob not so sair! You surely have not walked in this one day from the\nheart of the parish of Montrath?\u201d\u2014\u201cI have indeed done so, and I am as\nweak as the wreathed snaw. God knows, little matter if I should die\naway; for, after all, I fear he will never think of me for his wife, and\nyou, Mary, will lose a husband with whom you would have been happy, I\nfeel, after all, that I must appear a mean wretch in your eyes.\u201d\n\nThere was silence between them; and Mary Robinson, looking at the clock,\nsaw that it wanted only about a quarter of an hour from the time of\ntryst. \u201cGive me the oaths and promises you mentioned, out of your bosom,\nSarah, that I may show them to Gabriel when he comes. And once more I\npromise, by all the sunny and all the snowy days we have sat together in\nthe same plaid on the hillside, or in the lonesome charcoal plots and\nnests o\u2019 green in the woods, that if my Gabriel\u2014did I say my\nGabriel?\u2014has forsaken you and deceived me thus, never shall his lips\ntouch mine again\u2014never shall he put ring on my finger\u2014never shall this\nhead lie in his bosom\u2014no, never, never; notwithstanding all the happy,\ntoo happy, hours and days I have been with him, near or at a distance\u2014on\nthe corn-rig\u2014among the meadow hay, in the singing-school\u2014at\nharvest-home\u2014in this room, and in God\u2019s own house. So help me God, but I\nwill keep this vow!\u201d\n\nPoor Sarah told, in a few hurried words, the story of her love and\ndesertion\u2014how Gabriel, whose business as a shepherd often took him into\nMontrath parish, had wooed her, and fixed everything about their\nmarriage, nearly a year ago. But that he had become causelessly jealous\nof a young man whom she scarcely knew; had accused her of want of\nvirtue, and for many months had never once come to see her. \u201cThis\nmorning, for the first time, I heard for a certainty, from one who knew\nGabriel well and all his concerns, that the banns had been proclaimed in\nthe church between him and you; and that in a day or two you were to be\nmarried. And though I felt drowning, I determined to make a struggle for\nmy life\u2014for oh! Mary, Mary, my heart is not like your heart; it wants\nyour wisdom, your meekness, your piety; and if I am to lose Gabriel,\nwill I destroy my miserable life, and face the wrath of God sitting in\njudgment upon sinners.\u201d\n\nAt this burst of passion Sarah hid her face with her hands, as if\nsensible that she had committed blasphemy. Mary, seeing her wearied,\nhungry, thirsty, and feverish, spoke to her in the most soothing manner,\nled her into the little parlour called the spence, then removed into it\nthe table, with the oaten cakes, butter, and milk; and telling her to\ntake some refreshment, and then lie down in the bed, but on no account\nto leave the room till called for, gave her a sisterly kiss, and left\nher. In a few minutes the outer door opened, and Gabriel entered.\n\nThe lover said, \u201cHow is my sweet Mary?\u201d with a beaming countenance; and\ngently drawing her to his bosom, he kissed her cheek. Mary did not\u2014could\nnot\u2014wished not\u2014at once to release herself from his enfolding arms.\nGabriel had always treated her as the woman who was to be his wife; and\nthough, at this time, her heart knew its own bitterness, yet she\nrepelled not endearments that were so lately delightful, and suffered\nhim to take her almost in his arms to their accustomed seat. He held her\nhand in his, and began to speak in his usual kind and affectionate\nlanguage. Kind and affectionate it was, for though he ought not to have\ndone so, he loved her, as he thought, better than his life. Her heart\ncould not, in one small short hour, forget a whole year of bliss. She\ncould not yet fling away with her own hand what, only a few minutes ago,\nseemed to her the hope of paradise. Her soul sickened within her, and\nshe wished that she were dead, or never had been born.\n\n\u201cO Gabriel! Gabriel! well indeed have I loved you; nor will I say, after\nall that has passed between us, that you are not deserving, after all,\nof a better love than mine. Vain were it to deny my love, either to you\nor to my own soul. But look me in the face\u2014be not wrathful\u2014think not to\nhide the truth either from yourself or me, for that now is\nimpossible\u2014but tell me solemnly, as you shall answer to God at the\njudgment-day, if you know any reason why I must not be your wedded\nwife.\u201d She kept her mild moist eyes fixed upon him; but he hung down his\nhead and uttered not a word, for he was guilty before her, before his\nown soul, and before God.\n\n\u201cGabriel, never could we have been happy; for you often, often told me,\nthat all the secrets of your heart were known unto me, yet never did you\ntell me this. How could you desert the poor innocent creature that loved\nyou; and how could you use me so, who loved you perhaps as well as she,\nbut whose heart God will teach, not to forget you, for that may I never\ndo, but to think on you with that friendship and affection which\ninnocently I can bestow upon you, when you are Sarah\u2019s husband. For,\nGabriel, I have this night sworn, not in anger or passion\u2014no, no\u2014but in\nsorrow and pity for another\u2019s wrongs\u2014in sorrow also, deny it will I not,\nfor my own\u2014to look on you from this hour, as on one whose life is to be\nled apart from my life, and whose love must never more meet with my\nlove. Speak not unto me\u2014look not on me with beseeching eyes. Duty and\nreligion forbid us ever to be man and wife. But you know there is one,\nbesides me, whom you loved before you loved me, and, therefore, it may\nbe better too; and that she loves you, and is faithful, as if God had\nmade you one, I say without fear\u2014I who have known her since she was a\nchild, although, fatally for the peace of us both, we have long lived\napart. Sarah is in the house; I will bring her unto you in tears, but\nnot tears of penitence, for she is as innocent of that sin as I am, who\nnow speak.\u201d\n\nMary went into the little parlour, and led Sarah forward in her hand.\nDespairing as she had been, yet when she had heard from poor Mary\u2019s\nvoice speaking so fervently, that Gabriel had come, and that her friend\nwas interceding in her behalf, the poor girl had arranged her hair in a\nsmall looking-glass\u2014tied it up with a ribbon which Gabriel had given\nher, and put into the breast of her gown a little gilt brooch, that\ncontained locks of their blended hair. Pale but beautiful\u2014for Sarah\nPringle was the fairest girl in all the country\u2014she advanced with a\nflush on that paleness of reviving hope, injured pride, and love that\nwas ready to forgive all and forget all, so that once again she could be\nrestored to the place in his heart that she had lost. \u201cWhat have I ever\ndone, Gabriel, that you should fling me from you? May my soul never live\nby the atonement of my Saviour, if I am not innocent of that sin, yea,\nof all distant thought of that sin, with which you, even you, have in\nyour hard-heartedness charged me. Look me in the face, Gabriel, and\nthink of all I have been unto you, and if you say that before God, and\nin your own soul, you believe me guilty, then will I go away out into\nthe dark night, and, long before morning, my troubles will be at an\nend.\u201d\n\nTruth was not only in her fervent and simple words, but in the tone of\nher voice, the colour of her face, and the light of her eyes. Gabriel\nhad long shut up his heart against her. At first, he had doubted her\nvirtue, and that doubt gradually weakened his affection. At last he\ntried to believe her guilty, or to forget her altogether, when his heart\nturned to Mary Robinson, and he thought of making her his wife. His\ninjustice\u2014his wickedness\u2014his baseness\u2014which he had so long concealed, in\nsome measure, from himself, by a dim feeling of wrong done him, and\nafterwards by the pleasure of a new love, now appeared to him as they\nwere, and without disguise. Mary took Sarah\u2019s hand and placed it within\nthat of her contrite lover; for had the tumult of conflicting passions\nallowed him to know his own soul, such at that moment he surely was,\nsaying with a voice as composed as the eyes with which she looked upon\nthem, \u201cI restore you to each other; and I already feel the comfort of\nbeing able to do my duty. I will be bride\u2019s-maid. And I now implore the\nblessing of God upon your marriage. Gabriel, your betrothed will sleep\nthis night in my bosom. We will think of you, better, perhaps, than you\ndeserve. It is not for me to tell you what you have to repent of. Let us\nall three pray for each other this night, and evermore, when we are on\nour knees before our Maker. The old people will soon be at home.\nGoodnight, Gabriel.\u201d He kissed Sarah; and, giving Mary a look of shame,\nhumility, and reverence, he went home to meditation and repentance.\n\nIt was now midsummer; and before the harvest had been gathered in\nthroughout the higher valleys, or the sheep brought from the\nmountain-fold, Gabriel and Sarah were man and wife. Time passed on, and\na blooming family cheered their board and fireside. Nor did Mary\nRobinson, the Flower of the Forest (for so the woodcutter\u2019s daughter was\noften called), pass her life in single blessedness. She, too, became a\nwife and mother; and the two families, who lived at last on adjacent\nfarms, were remarkable for mutual affection throughout all the parish,\nand more than one intermarriage took place between them, at a time when\nthe worthy parents had almost forgotten the trying incident of their\nyouth.\n\n\n\n\n MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS AND CHATELAR;\n _OR, TWILIGHT MUSINGS IN HOLYROOD_.\n\n\nThere are no mysteries into which we are so fond of prying as the\nmysteries of the heart. The hero of the best novel in the world, if he\ncould not condescend to fall in love, might march through his three\nvolumes and excite no more sensation than his grandmother; and a\nnewspaper without a breach of promise of marriage is a thing not to be\nendured.\n\nIt is not my intention to affect any singular exception from this\nnatural propensity, and I am ready to confess that the next best thing\nto being in love oneself, is to speculate on the hopes, and fears, and\nfates of others. How truly interesting are the little schemes and\nsubterfuges, the romancing and story-telling of our dove-eyed and\ngentle-hearted playfellows! I have listened to a lame excuse for a\nstolen ride in a tilbury, or a duet in the woods, with wonderful\nsensibility; and have witnessed the ceremony of cross-questioning with\nas much trepidation as I could have felt had I been the culprit myself.\nIt is not, however, to be maintained that the love adventures of the\npresent age can, in any way, compete with the enchantment of days agone;\nwhen tender souls were won by tough exploits, and Cupid\u2019s dart was a\ntwenty-foot lance, ordained only to reach the lady\u2019s heart through the\nribs of the rival. This was the golden age of love, albeit I am not one\nto lament it, thinking, as I do, that it is far more sensible to aid and\nabet my neighbour in toasting the beauty of his mistress, than to caper\nabout with him in the lists, for contradiction\u2019s sake, to the imminent\ndanger and discomfort of us both. After this came the middle or dark\nages of love, when it had ceased to be a glory, but had lost nothing of\nits fervour as a passion. If there is here less of romance than in the\ntilting days, there is considerably more of interest, because there is\nmore of mystery. In the one, the test of true love was to make boast, in\nthe other it was to keep secret. Accordingly, for an immense space of\ntime, we have nothing but such fragments of adventures as could be\ngathered by eavesdroppers, who leave us to put head and tail to them as\nbest suits our fancy; and the loves of Queen Elizabeth, who lived, as it\nwere, only yesterday, are less known than the loves of queen Genevra,\nwho perhaps never lived at all.\n\nThese amatory reflections occurred to me some little time ago, during a\ntwilight reverie in the long, gloomy banqueting-room of Holyrood. It was\nthe very land of love and mystery, for there was scarcely one of the\ngrim visages which glared upon the walls, but had obtained his share of\ncelebrity in lady\u2019s bower, as well as in tented field; and of scarcely\none of whom any certain and defined adventures have been handed down. I\ncontinued speculating through this line of kings, blessing the mark and\nconfounding the painter, who has given us so little of their history in\ntheir faces, till I grew quite warm upon the subject, and found myself\nuniting and reasoning upon the few facts of which we are in possession,\ntill I fancied I could penetrate through two or three centuries at\nleast, and had a pretty shrewd idea as to who and who had been together.\n\nScotland has, I think, in spite of its sober, money-making character,\nalways excited a more romantic curiosity than England. This, perhaps, is\nmore owing to its peculiar misfortunes than to any particular difference\nof disposition. English heroes have been as brave, and no doubt as\nloving, but they do not walk under such a halo of pity; and whilst we\npry with eagerness into the secrets of the gallant Jameses, we suffer\nthose of their English contemporaries to be \u201cinterred with their bones.\u201d\nI have always felt this strongly, and at the time of which I speak, I\nfelt it stronger than ever. I was treading upon the very boards which\nhad bounded to their manly steps, and was surrounded by the very walls\nwhich possessed the secret whisperings of their hearts. From that\nidentical window, perhaps, had the first James gazed upon the moon,\nwhich I saw rising, and fancied that he almost held commune with the\neyes of his English beauty. There, perhaps, had the royal poet entwined\nher name with the choicest hopes of his bosom, and woven a tale of\nhappiness which concealed but too securely the assassin and the dagger\nbehind it. There, too, might the courteous and courageous victims of\nFlodden Field and Solway Moss have planned the loves which characterised\ntheir lives, and the wars which concluded them, almost at the same\nmoment. And there might the hapless Mary have first listened to the\npoisonous passion of a Darnley, or a Bothwell, and afterwards shed the\ntears of bitterness and self-reproach.\n\nI paced this sad-looking room of rejoicing quite unconscious of the\nhours that were passing; for I was alone, and in a train of thought\nwhich nothing but a hearty shake could have interrupted. Mary, and all\nher beauty, and talents, and acquirements, continued floating before me.\nHer world of lovers and admirers, who, for the most part, were sleeping\nin a bloody bed, seemed rising one by one to my view, and I wandered\nwith them through their hopes, and their fears, and their sorrows, even\nto the scaffold, as though I had been the ghost of one of them myself,\nand were possessed of secrets of which there is no living record.\n\nMany of these ill-fated hearts have, by their nobility, or their\nexploits, or by the caprice of historians, received full meed of\napplause and pity; many, no doubt, have sunk into oblivion; and some, in\naddition to their misfortunes, have left their memories to combat with\nthe censure which has been thought due to their presumption;\u2014of these\nlast I have always considered the unfortunate Chatelar to have been the\nmost hardly used, and in the course of my musings I endeavoured to\npuzzle out something satisfactory to myself upon his dark and distorted\nhistory.\n\nThe birth of Chatelar, if not noble, was in no common degree honourable,\nfor he was great-nephew to the celebrated Bayard, _le Chevalier sans\npeur et sans tache_. It is said that he likewise bore a strong\nresemblance to him in person, possessing a handsome face and graceful\nfigure; and equally in manly and elegant acquirements, being an expert\nsoldier and an accomplished courtier. In addition to this, says\nBrantome, who knew him personally, he possessed a most elegant mind, and\nspoke and wrote, both in prose and poetry, as well as any man in France.\n\nDangerous indeed are these advantages; and Chatelar\u2019s first meeting with\nMary was under circumstances calculated to render them doubly dangerous.\nAlone, as she conceived herself, cast off from the dearest ties of her\nheart, the land which she had learnt to consider her native land fading\nfast from her eyes, and the billows bearing her to the banishment of one\nwith which, as it contained none that she loved, she could feel no\nsympathy;\u2014in this scene of wailing and tears, the first tones of the\npoet were stealing upon her ear with the spirit of kindred feelings and\nkindred pursuits. We are to consider that Mary at this time had obtained\nbut little experience, and was probably not overstocked with prudence,\nhaving scarcely attained the age of nineteen years. Not only, are we\ntold, did she listen with complacency and pleasure to Chatelar\u2019s warm\nand romantic praises of her beauty, but employed her poetic talent in\napproving and replying to them; putting herself upon a level with her\ngifted companion, a course which was morally certain to convert his\nveneration into feelings more nearly allied to his nature. Had he not\nbeen blamed for his presumption, it is probable that he would have been\ncondemned for his stoicism; and his luckless passion is by no means a\nsingular proof that where hearts are cast in kindred moulds, it is\ndifficult to recognise extrinsic disparities. Chatelar saw the woman,\nand forgot the queen; Mary felt the satisfaction, and was blind to the\nconsequences.\n\nIt is much to be lamented by the lovers of truth, that none of the\npoetical pieces which are said to have passed between Mary and Chatelar\nhave been handed down to us. One song would have been a more valuable\ndocument in the elucidation of their history than all the annals we\npossess, and would have taught us at once the degree of encouragement\nand intimacy which was permitted. Whatever it was, it was such as to\nrivet the chains which had been so readily and unadvisedly put on; and\nfrom the period of their first meeting, we may consider him the most\nenthusiastic of her lovers.\n\nHow long he continued the admiration and the favourite of Holyrood does\nnot, I believe, appear. It could not, however, be any considerable time\nere he was compelled to return with his friend and patron, Damville, to\nFrance, with full reason to lament his voyage to Scotland, and with,\nprobably, a firm determination to revisit it whenever opportunity should\npermit. This opportunity his evil stars were not long in bringing about.\nThe projected war of faith between Damville\u2019s party and the Huguenots\nafforded him a fair pretext for soliciting a dispensation of his\nservices. Of the first he was a servant, of the last he was a disciple.\nIt was therefore contrary to his honour and inclinations to fight\nagainst either of them, and, accordingly, in about fifteen months, we\nfind him again at Holyrood.\n\nMary, it may reasonably be inferred, from her extreme love of France,\nand unwillingness to leave it, was not very speedily to be reconciled to\nher change of scene and society; a face, therefore, from the adopted\nland of her affections, and a tongue capable of gratifying them with the\nminutest accounts of the beloved objects it contained, must, at this\ntime, have been acquisitions of no small interest. Chatelar, too, had\nalready worked a welcome on his own account.\n\nFew of my readers need be reminded how insensibly and certainly the\ntongue which speaks of that which is dear to our hearts is stored up\nwith it in the same treasury. The tale and the teller of it,\u2014the leaf\nand the wave it falls upon,\u2014arrive at the same time at the same\ndestination. Histories, for the most part, insinuate that Mary\u2019s\ncarriage towards Chatelar was merely that of kindness and courtesy; but\nthis, I think, is an inference not warranted by the various facts which\nthey have been unable to repress, and not even the silence of the\ninveterate John Knox upon this head can convince me that Chatelar had\nnot reason to believe himself beloved.\n\nLet us then imagine, if we can, what was likely to be the intoxication\nproduced in the brain as well as the bosom of a man of an enthusiastic\ntemperament by a free and daily intercourse, during three months, with\nthe fascinations of a creature like Mary. What tales could that old\nmisshapen boudoir\u2014famous only, in common estimation, for the murder of\nRizzio and the boot of Darnley\u2014tell of smiles and tears over the\nfortunes of dear and distant companions of childhood, as narrated by the\nvoice of one to whom, perhaps, they were equally dear! What tales could\nit tell of mingling music, and mingling poetry, and mingling looks, and\nvain regrets, and fearful anticipations! Here had the day been passed in\nlistening to the praises of each other, from lips in which praise was a\ntalent and a profession; and here had the twilight stolen upon them when\nnone were by, and none could know how deeply the truth of those praises\nwas acknowledged. Let us imagine all this, and, likewise, how Chatelar\nwas likely to be wrought upon by the utter hopelessness of his case.\n\nHad the object of his passion been upon anything like a level with\nhim,\u2014had there been the most remote possibility of a chance of its\nattainment,\u2014his subsequent conduct would, most likely, not have been\nsuch as to render it a subject for investigation. But Mary must have\nbeen as inaccessible to him as the being of another world. The devotion\nwhich he felt for her was looked upon by the heads of her court as a\nspecies of sacrilege; and he was given to believe, that each had a plan\nfor undermining his happiness and removing him from her favour. If this\ncould not be effected, it was a moral certainty that Mary, in the bloom\nof her youth and the plentitude of her power, must become to some one of\nher numerous suitors all which it was impossible that she could ever\nbecome to him. Of these two cases, perhaps, the one was as bad as the\nother, and Chatelar was impelled to an act of desperation, which, in\nthese matter-of-fact days, can scarcely be conceived. On the night of\nthe 12th of February, 1563, he was found concealed in the young queen\u2019s\nbed-chamber.\n\nIt would, I fear, be a difficult undertaking, in the eyes of\ndispassionate and reasoning persons, to throw a charitable doubt upon\nthe motives of this unseasonable intrusion. The fair and obvious\ninference is, that he depended upon the impression he had made upon\nMary\u2019s heart, and the impossibility of their lawful union. In some\ndegree, too, he might have been influenced by the perilous consequences\nof a discovery, to which he possibly thought her love would not permit\nher to expose him. The propriety of this argument, if he made use of it,\nwas not put to the test, for his discovery fell to the lot of Mary\u2019s\nfemale attendants before she retired.\n\nThere is, however, another class of readers who will give him credit for\nother thoughts. I mean those best of all possible judges of\nlove-affairs, in whom the commonplaces of life have not entirely\ndestroyed that kindly feeling of romance which Nature thought it\nnecessary to implant in them, and which the usage of modern days renders\nit necessary for them to be ashamed of. The readers of whom I speak will\ndecide more from the heart than the head; and then what an interminable\nfield of defence is laid open! What strange feelings and unaccountable\nexploits might be furnished from the catalogue of love vagaries! Were\nChatelar to be judged by other examples, the simple circumstance of his\nsecreting himself for the mere purpose of being in the hallowed\nneighbourhood of his mistress, and without the most distant idea of\nmaking her acquainted with it, would appear a very commonplace and very\npardonable occurrence. And if we keep in mind his poetical character and\nchivalrous education, this belief is materially strengthened.\n\nOn the following morning the affair was made known to the Queen by her\nladies. Had they been wise enough to hold their peace, it is odds but\nthe lover\u2019s taste for adventure would have been satisfied by the first\nessay. Instead of this, being forbidden all future access to her\npresence, he became more desperate than ever. His motives had been\nmisconstrued; his actions, he thought, had been misrepresented; he was\nbent on explanation, and he hoped for pardon. Thus it was that when\nMary, on the same day, quitted Edinburgh, her disgraced admirer executed\nhis determination of following her, and, on the night of the 14th,\nseized the only opportunity of an interview by committing the very same\noffence for which he was then suffering: Mary had no sooner entered her\nchamber than Chatelar stood before her.\n\nWhatever her feelings may have been towards him, it is not surprising\nthat this sudden apparition should have proved somewhat startling, and\nhave produced an agitation not very favourable to his cause. It may be\npresumed that she was not mistress of her actions, for certain it is,\nthat she did that which, if she possessed one half of the womanly\ntenderness for which she has credit, must have been a blight and a\nbitterness upon her after life. Chatelar comes, wounded to the quick, to\nsupplicate a hearing, and the Queen, it is said, \u201cwas fain to cry for\nhelp,\u201d and desire Murray, who came at her call, to \u201cput his dagger into\nhim.\u201d\n\nThus, by dint of unnecessary terrors and unmeaning words, was Chatelar\ngiven over to an enemy who had always kept a jealous eye upon him, and\nto justice, which seemed determined to strain a point for his sake, and\ngive him something more than his due. In a few days he was tried, and\nexperienced the usual fate of favourites by being condemned to death.\n\nAlas! how bitter is the recollection of even trifling injuries towards\nthose who loved and are lost to us! Yet what had this been in\ncounterpoise to the reflections of Mary? She had given over a fond and a\nfervent heart to death for no fault but too much love, and any attempt\nto recall the deed might have afforded a colour to the aspersions which\nmalignant persons were ever ready to cast upon her character, but could\nhave availed no further.\n\nFor Chatelar there was little leisure for reflection. The fever of the\nfirst surprise,\u2014the strange, the appalling conviction as to the hand\nwhich hurled him to his fate,\u2014the shame, the humiliation, the\nindignation, had scarce time to cool in his forfeit blood, before he was\nbrought out to die the death of a culprit upon the scaffold.\n\nIt has been the fashion for writers upon this subject, in the quiet and\nsafety of their firesides, to exclaim against his want of preparation\nfor his transit; but, under such circumstances, I cannot much wonder\nthat he should rather rebel against the usual ceremonies of\npsalm-singing and last speeches. If he chose to nerve himself for death\nby reading Ronsard\u2019s hymn upon it, it is no proof that he looked with\nirreverence upon what was to follow it. His last words are extremely\ntouching; for they prove that, though he considered that Mary had\nremorselessly sacrificed his life, his sorrow was greater than his\nresentment, and his love went with him to the grave. \u201cAdieu,\u201d he said,\nturning to the quarter in which he supposed her to be, \u201cadieu, most\nbeautiful and most cruel princess in the world!\u201d and then submitting\nhimself to the executioner, he met the last stroke with a courage\nconsistent with his character.\n\nOf Mary\u2019s behaviour on this event, history, I believe, gives no account.\n\nMy ponderings upon this singular story had detained me long. The old\npictures on the walls glistened and glimmered in the moonshine like a\nband of spectres; and, at last, I fairly fancied that I saw one grisly\ngentleman pointing at me with his truncheon, in the act of directing his\nFuries to \u201cseize on me and take me to their torments.\u201d It was almost\ntime to be gone, but the thought of Chatelar seemed holding me by the\nskirts. I could not depart without taking another look at the scene of\nhis happiest hours, and I stole, shadow-like, with as little noise as I\ncould, through the narrow passages and staircases, till I stood in\nMary\u2019s little private apartment. As I passed the antechamber, the light\nwas shining only on the stain of blood; the black shadows here and\nelsewhere made the walls appear as though they had been hung with\nmourning. I do not know that ever I felt so melancholy; and had not the\nowl just then given a most dismal whoop, there is no telling but that I\nmight have had courage and sentiment enough to have stayed until I had\nbeen locked up for the night. I passed by the low bed, under which\nChatelar is said to have hidden himself. It must have cost him some\ntrouble to get there! I glanced hastily at the faded tambour work,\nwhich, it is possible, he might have witnessed in its progress; and I\nshook my head with much satisfaction to think that I had a head to\nshake. \u201cIf,\u201d said I, \u201cthere is more interest attached to the old times\nof love, it is, after all, in some degree, counterbalanced by the safety\nof the present; and I know not whether it is not better to be born in\nthe age when racks and torments are used metaphorically, than in those\nin which it is an even chance that I might have encountered the\nreality.\u201d\u2014_Literary Souvenir_, 1825.\n\n\n\n\n A NIGHT IN DUNCAN M\u2018GOWAN\u2019S.\n\n\nAfter traversing a bleak and barren track of moorland country, I\nunexpectedly arrived at the village of Warlockheugh, a few hours before\nthe sun had set upon the cheerless and level horizon of that desolate\nregion. A scene so bleak and solitary had engendered a vague and\nmelancholy feeling of individual helplessness and desertion; the morning\nbuoyancy of my spirits had settled down into dull and dejected sympathy\nwith the exhausted members of my body; the sharp, clear air that blew\nacross the moor had whetted my appetite to an exquisite degree of\nkeenness, so that I was not a little disposed to mingle once more with\nhuman society, to invigorate my limbs with another night\u2019s repose, and\nto satisfy the cravings of hunger with some necessary refreshment. I\ntherefore entered the village at a quicker pace than I had exerted for\nthe last ten or twelve miles of my journey.\n\nIt is situated in a narrow valley, which slopes away from the moorland\nside, and is surrounded by a ridge of rocks that rise around it like an\niron barrier, and frown defiance to the threatened encroachments of the\nocean. A dark brown stream floats along the moor with a lazy and silent\ncurrent, bursts with a single leap over a precipice at the upper end of\nthe village, thunders along a broken, rocky channel, and spouts a\nroaring cataract, sheer down through the rifted chasm that opens towards\nthe coast, and affords the villagers a view of ocean, which, environed\non all sides by tumultuous ranges of rugged mountains, expands its sheet\nof blue waters like an inland lake.\n\nHaving entered the village of Warlockheugh, I was attracted by the Red\nLion that blazes on the sign of Duncan M\u2018Gowan, who kept then, and, as I\nunderstand, still keeps, \u201cexcellent entertainment for men and horses.\u201d I\nwas shown into Duncan\u2019s best apartment, but had little leisure and no\ninclination to make an inventory of its contents. Hunger is an urgent\ncreditor, and not to be reasoned with, so I ordered the landlord to\nfetch me some refreshment. My order was immediately succeeded by a most\ndelightful concert of culinary implements, whose risp and clank, and\nclatter, and jingle, mingling harmoniously with the squirt and buzz of a\nfrying-pan, engendered a hearty and haggis-like hodge-podge of\nsubstantial and delectable associations. The table was soon covered with\nthat plain and solid sort of food which is generally to be found in the\ntemporary halting places of such wayfaring men as coach-drivers and\ncarriers, who are no mean connoisseurs in the more rational part of good\nliving. Having done ample justice to the landlord\u2019s good cheer, I laid\nmyself back in my chair, in that state of agreeable languor which\ngenerally succeeds sudden rest after violent exertion, and abundant\nrefreshment after long fasting. My imagination, struggling between the\nbenumbing influence of sated appetite, and the exhilarating novelty of\nmy present situation, floated dimly and drowsily over the various\noccurrences of life, till the iris-coloured texture of existence\nsaddened into a gray heaviness of eye, whose twilight vision grew darker\nand darker, till the ill-defined line of connexion, with which\nconsciousness divided the waking from the slumbering world, was\nswallowed up in the blackness of a profound sleep. And there, as we may\nsuppose, I sat twanging, through the trumpet of my nose, my own lullaby,\nand rivalling the sonorous drone of M\u2018Glashan the piper\u2019s bagpipe, who,\nwhen I came in, was sitting on a stone at the door, piping his\ndiabolical music to the happy villagers.\n\nI had not long remained in this \u201cpleasing land of drowsyhead,\u201d when my\nslumbers were violently broken by a tumultuous uproar coming down from\nthe upper end of the village. I started from my seat in that state of\ngiddiness and stupor which one generally feels when roused from sleep by\nviolent and alarming sounds. My whole frame was benumbed by the\nuneasiness of my dozing position, and it was with the utmost pain and\ndifficulty I could prevail upon my limbs to carry me to the window, to\nascertain the cause of the uproarious din, which every moment grew\nlouder and louder. The first objects that caught my attention were some\nstraggling villagers, sweeping down the lane with desperate speed of\nfoot, and dismal looks of consternation. I made towards the door, but\nthe passage was choked full of alarmed and breathless fugitives, whose\napprehensions had driven them to the first asylum which opportunity\npresented. Ejaculations and exclamations of all sorts were gasped forth\nby the multitude in the passage. Some swore in wrath, some laughed in\nself-congratulation, while others clamorously bewailed those of their\nkindred who might yet be exposed to the approaching danger. I inquired\nat a composed-looking middle-aged personage who stood beside me, the\ncause of this uncommon and alarming occurrence. \u201cOu,\u201d said he, coolly,\n\u201cM\u2018Harrigle\u2019s bull\u2019s run wud, and he\u2019s gaun to take the command o\u2019 the\ntown till we get a new magistrate; for, as ye maun understand, sir,\nBailie Brodie died yesterday.\u201d The inhabitants rushed by in greater\nnumbers, the sounds grew numerous, louder and more intelligible, as the\nhuddling multitude approached; and I distinctly heard several voices\nbawling out, \u201cRin, ye deevil, or ye\u2019ll be torn to \u2019coupins!\u2014Lord\npreserve us! he\u2019ll be ower the brae face\u2014there he goes\u2014confound ye!\nrin\u2014mercy on us! sic a race!\u201d The uproar and clamour, already run into\nutter confusion, turned fiercer and more riotous as a knot of people\nflew suddenly past the window, and left a space behind them that was\nimmediately occupied by the bull, tumbling his huge unwieldy carcass\ndown the lane, followed by an immense crowd of men, women, and children,\nand curs of every denomination. The hoarse bawling of the men, the\nscreams of the women, and the clear treble of the children, the barking\nof curs, from the gruff big bow-wow of the mastiff down to the\nnyiff-nyaff and yelp-yelp of the terrier, along with the boo-baloo and\nbellow of the bull, formed a wild and savage uproar that was truly\ndeafening. I dashed up the window and looked out. The enraged animal\nlumbered along, and heaved his ponderous bulk into fantastical\nattitudes, with his posterior appendage projecting straight out like a\npole and tassel, his back raised, and his head ploughing on between his\nfore-feet. He hobbled, and hurled, and tumbled along with as blind an\nimpulse as if he had been a mass of destructive machinery driven\nheadlong by the mad impetus of some terrible and ungovernable energy.\nAway he went. The last sight I saw of him was as he entangled his horns\nin a thick stunted bush that grew on the top of a bank at some distance.\nThe bush withstood the violence of his shock, and he tumbled with his\nfeet uppermost. He struggled for a few moments; at length succeeded in\ntearing it out by the roots, vanished over the precipice, and went\nbellowing down the waterfall, amidst the shouts of the multitude who\npursued him.\n\nA group of people, very closely wedged together, moved slowly up the\nvillage. They were carrying some individual who had suffered from the\nfury of the enraged animal. They shouldered on towards M\u2018Gowan\u2019s in\nmournful procession. All seemed extremely anxious to obtain a look of\nthe unhappy sufferer. Those who were near pressed more closely towards\nthe centre of the crowd, while those on the outside, excited by\nsympathetic curiosity, were leaping up round about, asking all the while\nthe name of the person, and inquiring what injury he had sustained.\n\u201cHe\u2019s no sair hurt, I hope,\u201d said one. \u201cIs he dead?\u201d said another of\nlivelier apprehensions and quicker sensibility. \u201cIt\u2019s auld Simon Gray,\u201d\nsaid a young man, who came running up out of breath to M\u2018Gowan\u2019s door.\n\u201cSimon Gray\u2019s dead!\u201d \u201cSimon Gray dead!\u201d cried M\u2018Gowan; \u201cGod forbid!\u201d So\nsaying, out at the door he rushed to ascertain the truth of the mournful\nintelligence. \u201cWae\u2019s me,\u201d said Dame M\u2018Gowan, \u201cbut this is a sair heart\nto us a\u2019,\u201d as she sank down in a chair, and cried for water to her only\ndaughter, who stood sorrowfully beside her mother, alternately wringing\nher hands and plaiting the hem of her white muslin apron over her finger\nin mute affliction.\n\nSimon Gray the dominie was brought into M\u2018Gowan\u2019s. He was bleeding at\nthe nose and mouth, but did not appear to have received any very serious\ninjury. Cold water was dashed on his face, his temples were bathed with\nvinegar, and the occasional opening and shutting of the eye, accompanied\nwith a laboured heaving of the breast, gave evidence that the dominie\nwas not yet destined to be gathered to his fathers. The inquiries of the\nmultitude round the door were numerous, frequent, and affectionate. The\nchildren were loud and clamorous in their grief, all except one little\nwhite-headed, heavy-browed, sun-burned vagabond, who, looking over the\nshoulder of a neighbour urchin, asked if there would be \u201cony schulin\u2019\nthe morn;\u201d and upon an answer being sobbed out in the negative, the\nroguish truant sought the nearest passage out of the crowd, and ran up\nthe lane whistling \u201cOwer the water to Charlie,\u201d till his career of\nunseasonable mirth was checked by a stout lad, an old student of\nSimon\u2019s, who was running without hat and coat to inquire the fate of his\nbeloved preceptor, and who, when he witnessed the boy\u2019s heartlessness,\ncould not help lending him a box on the ear, which effectually converted\nhis shrill whistle of delight into a monotonous grumble, accompanied by\nthe common exclamation of wonderment, \u201cWhat\u2019s that for, ye muckle\nbrute?\u201d and a half hesitating stooping for a stone, which the lad who\nbowled on towards M\u2018Gowan\u2019s took no notice of till the messenger of the\nboy\u2019s indignation lighted at his heels, and bounded on the road before\nhim.\n\nBy the affectionate attention of his friends Simon was soon able to\nspeak to those around him, but still felt so weak that he requested to\nbe put to bed. His revival was no sooner announced at the door of the\ninn than a loud and tumultuous burst of enthusiastic feeling ran through\nthe crowd, which immediately dispersed amidst clapping of hands, loud\nlaughs, and hearty jokes.\n\nThe landlord, after ministering to the necessities of the dominie, came\ninto the apartment where I was sitting. \u201cSurely, landlord,\u201d said I,\n\u201cthis old man Simon Gray is a great favourite among you.\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth, sir, it\u2019s nae wonder,\u201d was the reply to my observation. \u201cHe has\ngien the villagers of Warlockheugh their lear, and keepit them lauchin\u2019,\nfor five-and-twenty years back. He\u2019s a gude-hearted carle too; he downa\nsee a puir body in want, and rather than let the bairns grow up in\nidleness and ignorance, he\u2019ll gie them their lear for naething. A\u2019body\u2019s\nfond o\u2019 Simon, and the lasses especially, though he ne\u2019er maks love to\nane o\u2019 them. They say some flirt o\u2019 a lady disappointed him when he was\nat the college, and he vowed ne\u2019er to mak love to anither. But I daur\nsay there\u2019s some o\u2019 our lasses vain eneugh to think they\u2019ll be able to\ngar him brak his promise. It\u2019ll no do,\u2014he\u2019s ower auld a cat to draw a\nstrae afore.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s a real auld bachelor in his way of leevin\u2019. He maks and mends his\nain claes too, clouts his ain shoon, darns his ain stockings, and keeps\na lot o\u2019 tools for a\u2019 crafts. His kitchen\u2019s a no-that-ill-red-up place;\nbut if ye saw his study, sir, as he ca\u2019s\u2019t, it\u2019s the queerest,\nhiggledy-piggledy, odds-and-ends sort o\u2019 place ye ever saw in your life.\nIt\u2019s eneugh to turn your brain just to look intil\u2019t. His pianoforte and\nhis tables a\u2019 covered wi\u2019 a confused heap o\u2019 books, writings, musical\ninstruments, colours, oil-paintings, and loose fragments o\u2019 rough\ndesigns, made wi\u2019 black and white caulk on a nankeen-coloured kind o\u2019\npaper. The wa\u2019 is stuck fu\u2019 o\u2019 brass-headed nails that he hings his\nfollies and his nonsense on. He has a muckle ill-faured image yonder,\nthat he ca\u2019s an Indian god, standing on his mantelpiece, wi\u2019 lang teeth\nmade o\u2019 fish-banes, and twa round bits o\u2019 white airn, with big\nblack-headed tackets driven through the middle o\u2019 them for een, and a\nqueer crown on its head, made o\u2019 split quills, plait strae, and\npeacocks\u2019 feathers. It\u2019s eneugh to gar a body a\u2019 grue just to look at\nit. He has bears\u2019 and teegers\u2019 heads girnin\u2019 on the wa\u2019, and slouched\nhats, swords, dirks, and rusty rapiers o\u2019 every kind. He has twa or\nthree things yonder that he ca\u2019s Roman helmets (though the maist o\u2019 folk\nwould reckon them nae ither than barbers\u2019 basins), forby some imitations\no\u2019 auld coats o\u2019 mail, made o\u2019 painted pasteboard. Na, faith, the deil\nhae me,\u201d continued Duncan, laughing at the whimsical character of the\nplace he was describing, \u201cif I dinna whiles think the body\u2019s out o\u2019 his\nwits. But he canna be that, either, for they\u2019re great folks ca\u2019ing upon\nhim, baith far and near, and he cracks to them whiles in strange\ntongues, that nane in the kintra-side kens but himsel and the minister.\nNa, troth, sir, they say that our Mess John, wha\u2019s no a lame hand\nhimsel, is just a bairn to him. \u2019Od he\u2019s a droll, ready-handed body. He\nmaks a\u2019thing himsel. He has some orra time on his hand, ye see; and he\u2019s\neither crooning ower some auld Scotch songs, or fiddling some outlandish\ntunes; and, my faith! he can twine them out frae the grist o\u2019 a common\nstrae-rape to the fineness o\u2019 a windle-strae. He shakes and dirls sae\nwonderfully too, that ye wad think his fiddle\u2019s no a thing o\u2019 timmer and\ncatgut at a\u2019, but some droll musical creature o\u2019 flesh and blood. Eh, my\ncertie! it gars a body\u2019s bowels a\u2019 tremble wi\u2019 gladness whiles to hear\nhim. He\u2019ll come in here at an antrin time, ca\u2019 for his gill o\u2019 gin, and\nno a living creature wi\u2019 him, and sit ower\u2019t for twa or three hours,\ncrackin\u2019 to himsel, and laughin\u2019 as loudly and heartily at his ain queer\nstories, as if he had a dizzen o\u2019 merry cronies at his elbow. He ne\u2019er\nforgets when he\u2019s takin\u2019 his drams to wish himsel weel; for at every\nsip, he says, \u2018Here\u2019s to ye, Simon\u2014thanks to ye, Mr Gray;\u2019 and so on he\ngoes the whole night, as if he were a kind of a twafauld body. Ae night\nwhen he sat in my back-room and loosed his budget of jokes, and laughed\nand roared wi\u2019 himsel for twa hours, I laid my lug to the key-hole o\u2019\nthe door, and owerheard the following dialogue.\u201d\n\nAt this part of mine host\u2019s narrative the rattling of a wheeled vehicle\nwas heard, and ceased immediately upon reaching the door of the inn. Mr\nCleekum, the village lawyer, had come in a few minutes before, and was\nsitting beside us, laughing at M\u2018Gowan\u2019s narrative, of the latter part\nof which he also had been an auditory witness. M\u2018Gowan\u2019s loquacity\nceased when he heard the vehicle at the door; he looked out at the\nwindow, turned round to me, and said hastily, \u201cMaister Cleekum \u2019ll tell\nye a\u2019 about it, sir,\u2014he heard it as weel as me.\u2014Excuse me, there\u2019s a gig\nat the door. We maun mind our ain shop, ye ken, and a rider\u2019s penny\u2019s\nworth a gangrel\u2019s groat ony day.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he hurried out, leaving the lawyer to gratify my curiosity by\nthe sequel of the dominie\u2019s solitary dialogue.\n\n\u201cM\u2018Gowan\u2019s description, sir, of this eccentric being is by no means\nexaggerated,\u201d said Mr Cleekum; \u201cand if it can afford you any amusement,\nI shall relate the remainder of Mr Gray\u2019s dialogue, which I am the\nbetter enabled to do, from having put myself to the trouble of noting\ndown the particulars, at the recital of which old Simon and myself have\nsince laughed very heartily. You need not be surprised at his broad\nScotch accent; he has such a decided partiality for it, that he is\ncommonly averse to using any other tongue, though no man speaks more\npolitely than himself when he is so disposed, and when the persons he\nconverses with render it necessary.\u2014After having finished his first\nmeasure of indulgence, Mr Gray proceeded thus:\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Come now, Sir Simon, and I\u2019ll help ye hame, ye auld rogue.\u2014I am much\nobliged to you, Mr Gray, but I\u2019ll try to gar my ain shanks serve my ain\nturn, and ye may e\u2019en put your ain hand to your ain hasp, my friend.\u2014If\nye like, we\u2019ll have anither gill, and then toddle thegither.\u2014Beware o\u2019\ndram-drinking, Sir Simon; ye\u2019ll get an evil name in the clachan.\u2014I beg\nyour pardon, Mr Gray; I have been a riddle to the folks ower lang\nalready, and as I ne\u2019er do aucht in a corner, but what I may do on the\ncausey, everybody kens he\u2019ll no mak onything mair or less o\u2019 me by being\ninquisitive. Na, na, Mr Gray, ye\u2019re a\u2019 out there; there is no ane in the\nparish would hear an ill word o\u2019 Simon.\u2014But ye\u2019re an auld man, sir, and\nset an evil example to others.\u2014Ne\u2019er a ane do I set an evil example to\nbut yoursel, Mr Gray; and for a\u2019 your cant about sobriety, ye take your\ndrams as regularly as I do; and I defy you\u2014I defy you or ony other man\nto say ye e\u2019er saw me the waur o\u2019 liquor in your life. Besides, Mr Gray,\nthe progress of human life is like a journey from the equator to the\nnorth pole. We commence our career with the heat of passion and the\nlight of hope, and travel on, till passion is quenched by indulgence,\nand hope, flying round the ball of life which is blackening before us,\nseems to come up behind us, mingled with dim and regretted reminiscences\nof things hoped for, obtained, enjoyed, and lost for ever but to memory:\n\n Oh! age has weary days,\n And nights of sleepless pain.\n\nYouth needs no stimulus, it is too hot already; but when a man is\nshuffling forward into the Arctic circle of old age, he requires a warm\npotation to thaw the icicles that crust around his heart, and freeze up\nthe streams of his affections. There\u2019s for you, Mr Gray; what do you\nthink of that?\u2014Why, I think, Sir Simon, we\u2019ll tell Duncan to fill\u2019t\nagain.\u2014That now, that now, is friendly;\u2019 and so saying, he rung for the\nlandlord to fetch him the means of prolonging his solitary conviviality.\n\n\u201cThis is that portion of Mr Gray\u2019s dialogue with himself which M\u2018Gowan\nand myself, perhaps officiously, listened to; but as we are upon the\nsubject of our venerable friend\u2019s peculiarities, it may not be out of\nplace to recite a little poetical work, which he composed some time\nago.\u201d Having signified the pleasure I should derive from being favoured\nwith the recital of a work from the pen of so eccentric a humorist as\nthe dominie, Mr Cleekum proceeded to draw forth from his pocket and to\nread:\u2014\n\n\n THE MINISTER\u2019S MARE.\n\n The minister\u2019s mare was as gude a gray mare\n As ever was saddled, or bridled, or shod;\n Be\u2019t foul or be\u2019t fair, be\u2019t late or be\u2019t air,\n She nichered aye gladly when takin\u2019 the road.\n\n The minister late in the e\u2019ening cam hame,\n And stabled his marie, and heapit her heck,\n And gae her a forpit o\u2019 oats to her wame,\n And theekit her cozily wi\u2019 an auld sack.\n\n And the minister\u2019s wife wi\u2019 a bowet cam out,\n For a tenty and mensefu\u2019 wife was she;\n Glowered round her for gangrels that might be about,\n And syne in the stable-door thrawed round the key.\n\n And she oxtered the minister up the stair\n To his room, where his supper and slippers were het,\n Whaur a wee creepie-stool and an elbow chair\n At the blithe ingle-neuk were right cozily set.\n\n As the reverend carle gaed ben the house laughin\u2019,\n And clappin\u2019 his wife, an\u2019 rubbin\u2019 his hands,\n She helpit him aff wi\u2019 his green tartan raughen,\n And frae \u2019neath his round chin loosed his lily-white bands.\n\n When supper was ower, the minister birsled\n His shins on the creepie upon the hearth-stane;\n Worn out wi\u2019 fatigue, to his roostin-place hirsled,\n And laid himsel down wi\u2019 a wearied-man\u2019s grane.\n\n His canny wee wife saw him cozily happit,\n Syne drew back the chairs frae the warm ingle-side;\n Put creesh in the ee o\u2019 the candle, and clappit\n Right kindly and couthily down by his side.\n\n The cracks o\u2019 the twasome were kindly but few:\n The minister wi\u2019 a \u201chech-ho,\u201d turned him roun\u2019,\n O\u2019er his cauld shouther-head the warm blanket he drew,\n Syne pu\u2019d down his night-cap and snored snug and soun\u2019.\n\n The morning\u2019s bright bonfire, that bleezed in the east,\n Had meltit in heaven ilk wee siller stern,\n When the cock crawed reveill\u00e8 to man, bird, and beast,\n As he sat on an auld knotty rung in the barn.\n\n The dog in the watch-house yowled eerie and lang,\n And struggled right fiercely to break frae his chain;\n The auld chapel bell like a burial knell rang,\n And groanings were heard as frae bodies in pain.\n\n A loud rap cam rap to the minister\u2019s yett,\n The minister\u2019s wife wondered wha might be there;\n While the reverend carle, glammering, graipit to get\n His drawers and bauchels, to slip down the stair.\n\n But he warily first frae the stair-winnock keekit,\n To ken wha this early disturber might be;\n When he saw the dog loose, and the barn-door unsteekit,\n And his mare at the yett, cap\u2019ring wild to be free\n\n Frae a blackavised rider, wha spurred her and banned her,\n Wi\u2019 mony wild curses to tak to the road:\n And he stuck like a burr, though campsterie he fand her,\n While the minister cried, \u201cThere\u2019s been thieves here, gude \u2014\u2014!\u201d\n\n \u201cFie, Tibby rise,\u201d roared Mess John, loud as thunder,\n \u201cThe mischief\u2019s come o\u2019er us, we\u2019re herriet, undone;\n The barn\u2019s broke, the dog\u2019s loose, the mare\u2019s aff, and yonder\n She\u2019s rinnin\u2019\u2014fie! bring me my hat, coat, and shoon!\u201d\n\n His claes huddled on, wi\u2019 his staff in his han\u2019,\n He out at the yett wi\u2019 a belly-flaught flew;\n While the stour that his mare raised in clouds o\u2019er the lan\u2019,\n Turned into a glaur-drop ilk clear blob o\u2019 dew.\n\n The stour, borne alang wi\u2019 the wind strong and gusty,\n Gar\u2019d the minister look like a miller sae gray;\n And the sweat on his face, mixed wi\u2019 dust, grew as crusty\n As if he were modelled in common brick-clay.\n\n And sometimes he haltit, and sometimes he ran,\n And sometime he sat himsel down in despair;\n And sometimes he grew angry, and sometimes began\n To lighten his sair-burdened heart wi\u2019 a prayer.\n\n But madly the rider o\u2019er hill and o\u2019er dale,\n Wi\u2019 the minister\u2019s mare like a fire-flaught he flew;\n Whiles seen on a hill-top, whiles lost in a vale,\n Till they baith looked like motes on the welkin sae blue.\n\n The minister by the road-side sat him down,\n As vexed and as wearied as man weel could be;\n Syne pu\u2019d aff his wig, rubbed the sweat frae his crown,\n And puffed, steghed, and graned like a man gaun to dee.\n\n When an auld farmer carle, on his yaud trotting by,\n Accosted Mess John as he sat in despair;\n Made a bow like a corn-sack, and as he drew nigh,\n Raised his twa waukit loofs, cryin\u2019 \u201cWhat brought ye there?\n\n \u201cI\u2019m sure it\u2019s nae mair than an hour since I saw ye\n At Bourtree Brae-head, and that\u2019s eight miles awa!\u201d\n And he rubbit his een as he cried out, \u201cFoul fa\u2019 me!\n For glammery\u2019s come o\u2019er me, or else you\u2019re grown twa.\n\n \u201cAnd where is your mare, for she stood at the door,\n Wi\u2019 her bridle-reins drawn through a ring in the wa\u2019,\n At Dawson\u2019s door-cheek, where I saw her before\n I had drunk _deoch-an-dorus_ wi\u2019 Donald M\u2018Craw.\u201d\n\n \u201cYe saw me!\u201d said the minister; \u201chow could that be,\n When I\u2019ve only proceeded thus far on my road?\n And that this is mysel, by a glance ye may see.\u201d\n \u201cWhy, then,\u201d cried the farmer, \u201cthe thing\u2019s vastly odd.\n\n \u201cBut twa hours ago, sir, your double was sitting\n At Dawson\u2019s fire-side,\u2014faith! as I thoucht, half fou,\u2014\n And ilk ane at hand thoucht it time to be flitting,\n When ye cursed and blasphemed till the candle burned blue.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, Saunders, it\u2019s surely been Sawtan ye\u2019ve seen,\n The foul thief himsel, I could wad a gray groat;\n He staw my gray mare;\u2014just turn back, my auld friend,\n Till I strip the foul thief of his sanctified coat.\n\n \u201cI\u2019ve warsled wi\u2019 Sawtan for many a year;\n I\u2019ve cloured him and loundered him aft times right sair;\n But the foul fiend has played me a pliskie, I fear;\n Lord save\u2019s, man, I ne\u2019er heard the like, I declare.\n\n \u201cFie, Saunders, let\u2019s mount, and to Dawson\u2019s let\u2019s hurry,\n And chase the loon back to his ain lowin\u2019 hame;\n The tod\u2019s in the fauld, God\u2019s ain lambs he may worry;\n Come, Saunders, let\u2019s hunt him, Auld Clootie\u2019s fair game.\u201d\n\n And they rode till they came to John Dawson\u2019s fore-door,\n Whaur the minister lighted, but wadna step in,\n When he heard how the deil in his ain likeness swore,\n As he dirled at the door, for the third tappit hen.\n\n And the folk were confounded,\u2014amazed,\u2014when they saw\n The auld carle himsel they had aft seen before;\n Some darted into corners, and some ran awa,\n And ithers ran out, and glowered in at the door.\n\n But the minister beckoned them a\u2019 to come back\n To the room aff-and-on where the devil sat fou;\n In the wooden partition there gaped a wide crack,\n That ilk ane, by turns, wi\u2019 amazement looked through.\n\n And there they heard Cloots, in a big elbow-chair,\n Snore like thunder far-aff, and now sleeping right sound,\n And some thought his feet didna look like a pair,\n For the tae o\u2019 the ae boot to the heel was turned round.\n\n And they saw, when the ither foot once or twice moved,\n That the boot on that foot just turned round the same way;\n Which, to the onlookers, sufficiently proved,\n They were baith cloven feet,\u2014ay, as clear as the day.\n\n They saw a bit kitlin, that friskit and pattit\n A muckle black tossel below the big chair;\n And it swung like a pend\u2019lum, as wee baudrons clawtit\n The end that hung down like a bunch o\u2019 horse-hair.\n\n When Dawson\u2019s bull-terrier, streeked on the hearth-stane,\n Saw Clootie\u2019s tail wagging, he barkit like mad:\n Sprung till\u2019t like a fury, and tugged might and main,\n And the deevil himsel couldna lowsen his haud.\n\n But the deil started up wi\u2019 big chair, dog, an\u2019 a\u2019,\n And staggered, and stampit, and ance or twice fell;\n Mess John cried, \u201cLord save us!\u201d\u2014Like lightning, awa\n Flew deevil, and big chair, and terrier, to\u2014\u2014!\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s a strange production for you,\u201d said Mr Cleekum, as he folded\nthe paper and replaced it in his pocket.\n\n\u201cA strange production, indeed,\u201d said I; \u201cwhat could be Mr Gray\u2019s object\nin writing such a poem?\u201d\n\n\u201cMerely to please himself, sir, I suppose,\u201d was the lawyer\u2019s answer.\n\n\u201cBut,\u201d continued I, \u201chas it any reference to any particular character or\noccurrence; or is it merely an extravagant fiction of the dominie\u2019s own\nbrain?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt refers to an old popular tradition,\u201d answered Mr Cleekum,\n\u201cconcerning a pious predecessor of our worthy minister, Mr Singleheart;\nand, though the currency of its belief is now somewhat crossed and\nobstructed by an adverse current of growing intelligence, it still\nfloats in the memories and imaginations of those venerable annalists,\nthe old women of the village, with whom the idle story was likely to\nperish for ever, if the dominie\u2019s metrical version had not contributed\nto prolong it.\u201d\n\nVarious remarks were made upon the merits of the production; but as they\nwere all blended with statements and allusions relative to local\ncharacters and incidents not connected with my present object, I resume\nmy interrupted narrative.\n\nThe children still continued round the door, shouting, halooing, and\nacting a thousand extravagances, nor could they be prevailed upon to\ndepart till they saw the \u201cmaister.\u201d Simon, who had so far collected his\nscattered senses, and renewed his exhausted strength, as to be able to\ngive them that gratification, had no sooner opened the door for the\npurpose of receiving the congratulations of his scholars, than those who\nwere nearest leaped up and embraced him with unfeigned affection. They\npulled and lugged him, crying, \u201cMaister, maister!\u201d while the beloved\ninstructor stood hugging his chubby associates, and embracing them with\nall the warmth of an affectionate parent. These kind-hearted little\nbeings, after receiving another token of the old man\u2019s goodness, in the\nshape of pieces of biscuit and gingerbread, ran off, huzzaing, to inform\ntheir parents of the marvellous escape of their venerable preceptor.\n\nSimon, being disengaged from the warm embraces of his pupils, came into\nthe room where the landlord, Cleekum the lawyer, and myself were\nsitting. I had now full leisure and opportunity to examine the\nappearance of this singular and eccentric character. It was completely\nat variance with every characteristic of modern gentility. His dress\nbetokened the hand of the cunning craftsman of the last century, or his\nown whimsical taste had dictated to some modern son of the goose and\nthimble the antique shape of his habiliments; but, as we were before\ninformed by the landlord, they were entirely the fabrication of his own\ntaste and ingenuity. His single-breasted, rusty-black coat tapered away\nfrom the shoulders towards his lower extremities in the pyramidal shape,\nand when unbuttoned, or unclasped, rather, swung its copious folds round\nhis jolly form with cumbrous and fantastical elegance. Two\nmother-of-pearl buttons, of uncommon circumference, and encircled with\nbrass rings, were stuck as ornaments upon the haunches, and the breast\nwas decorated with grotesque circles of the same fantastical\ndescription, with the addition of a handsome row of bright silver\nclasps. The vest, with its massy superfluity of cloth, parted in the\nmiddle, and its ample pockets descended half-way down his thigh, leaving\na space between their separation and the head of his breeches for his\nbright linen shirt to shine through, in the shape of an isosceles\ntriangle. His blue plush breeches had three chequered or diced brass\nbuttons to preserve their connexion, and terminated at the knee with the\ngenuine old Cameronian cut. His stockings were light blue, sprinkled\nwith little oblong dots of white; and his shoes, cut square across the\ntoes to save his corns, were held upon his feet by two antiquated silver\nbuckles of uncommon magnitude and curious workmanship. His personal\nappearance was that of a substantial old bachelor, on whom nature had\ngenerously bestowed a sound constitution, and it was evident from his\nlooks that he by no means despised that invaluable inheritance. His face\ninclined to the square, but the features were all curvilinear, rather\nprominent, and flushed with that rosy hue of health which so often beams\nfrom the countenances of the sons and daughters of rustic labour. His\nforehead was highly expressive of intellect, but the nether part of the\nface indicated that lubberly sort of feeling which glories in a life of\ngood humoured ease and fat contentment. His eyes were small, of a bright\nblue, but not a pair, for the one squinted outward through the\ninterstices of his gray, bristly eyebrows; which, along with a nether\nlip somewhat pendulous, a mouth turned up at the corners, and a long\nflat chin, gave the whole face a comical and risible expression.\n\nDuring the time that Cleekum was reading his notes of the dominie\u2019s\nsolitary dialogue, Mr Singleheart, the village minister, M\u2018Glashan the\npiper, and some others belonging to the village, came into the room,\nwhich seemed to be as much public property as the village smithy. On the\ndominie\u2019s entrance all rose to salute and congratulate him upon his\nfortunate escape; and I could see, from the cordial manner in which each\nin his turn grasped the old man\u2019s hand, that each had his heart at his\nfinger-ends. It was not that puppyish forefinger-and-thumb sort of\nsalutation which clips another frosty forefinger-and-thumb as if\ndreading contagion, but a hearty, honest grappling of fist with fist,\nwhich drew the blood from its fountain with a thrilling impulse, and\nsent its current warm and glowing into the clenched extremities, which\nwere shaken so violently, and for such a length of time, that an\nimaginative and hasty person might suppose, in the rapidity of his\ndecision, that each individual was disposed to graft himself upon the\ndominie, whose right arm, at length, seemed as feeble as that of a poor\ngut-scraper, who has jigged at a country wedding for a whole night.\n\nWhen Simon entered, I was introduced to him by Cleekum, whom I had by\nthis time discovered to be an old school-fellow of my own. He saluted me\nwith a frank and pleasant smile, and squeezed my hand so cordially, that\nI immediately felt that spontaneous and indefinable feeling of\nattachment towards him which, though the electric emotion of a moment,\nis often the forerunner of a long course of friendly intimacy. Upon my\nfather\u2019s name being mentioned, Simon recognised him as a playmate of his\nearlier days, and gave me a kindly invitation to spend a few days with\nhim, which circumstances obliged me to refuse. Simon then took the\nopportunity of introducing me more particularly to the rest of the\ncompany, on account of \u201cthe old man,\u201d as he said, meaning my father, for\nwhom he seemed to entertain a deep sentiment of regard. He last of all\nrecommended me with an air of serious solemnity to the notice of\nM\u2018Gowan.\n\n\u201cThis gentleman,\u201d said he, pointing to the last-mentioned individual,\nwho appeared to be a singular compound of officiousness, selfishness,\nand benevolence, and who seemed to be at all times a standing joke with\nmy venerable friend, \u201chas some pretensions to honesty. He\u2019ll do ye a\ngood turn sometimes when ye\u2019re no thinking o\u2019t; and, unlike the most of\nother men, he likes his friends the better the longer they sit beside\nhim. Familiarity does not breed contempt with him, but poverty does; and\nyet he\u2019s no the hindmost to help misery to an awmous when he\u2019s in a\nright mood for being goodhearted, and that happens aye ance or twice in\na twalmonth.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome, come, now,\u201d said M\u2018Gowan, gravely, \u201cwe\u2019ll hae nae mair o\u2019 that,\nMr Gray. Ye\u2019re an unco wag. It was only yestreen ye got me into a foul\nscrape wi\u2019 our friend Cleekum there, and he flang out o\u2019 the house,\nswearing like a very heathen that he wad tak the law o\u2019 me for\ndefamation o\u2019 character.\u201d\n\n\u201cFor the sake of peace and good fellowship,\u201d said Mr Singleheart, \u201cit\nwill be meet and advisable for us to refrain, as much as in us lies,\nfrom profane joking and oonseasonable raillery; because joking has small\nyedification in it, and raillery is a sort of salt-and-pepper compound,\nwhilk burneth up the inward man with a fervent heat, and profiteth not,\nneither is meet for bodily nourishment.\u201d\n\n\u201cI would be o\u2019 your thocht, Mr Sinklart,\u201d said Donald M\u2018Glashlan the\npiper; \u201cI would be making peace wi\u2019 peast and pody\u201d\u2014\n\nThe piper was thus proceeding with his Highland exhortations to harmony,\nwhen Cleekum, who was sitting looking out at the window, started\nsuddenly from his seat and hurried out of the house. M\u2018Gowan\u2019s curiosity\nbeing roused by Cleekum\u2019s abrupt departure, he followed him to the door,\nand beheld him and M\u2018Harrigle the cattle-dealer at some distance,\nearnestly engaged in conversation. All that M\u2018Gowan\u2019s ear could catch of\ntheir discourse was concerning the mad bull, M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s property, and\nthe occasional mention of the dominie\u2019s name.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s mischief a-brewing down the lane there,\u201d said M\u2018Gowan, when he\ncame in. \u201cCleekum and that foolish passionate body M\u2018Harrigle are\nstanding yonder, an\u2019 I could hear they were sayin\u2019 something o\u2019 you, Mr\nGray, but what it was I couldna weel mak out. He\u2019s a doited, credulous\nbody, that M\u2018Harrigle; an\u2019 I could wager a saxpence Cleekum\u2019s makin\u2019 a\ndeevil o\u2019 him some way or anither.\u201d\n\nM\u2018Gowan\u2019s surmises were suddenly interrupted by vociferous and clamorous\nexclamations at the door, and their cause did not remain long\nunexplained. The door of the apartment flew open, and, rattling against\nthe wall with violence, admitted the author of this fresh disturbance.\nIt was M\u2018Harrigle. He was a short, square-shouldered man, of fierce\naspect, whose naturally harsh features were much exaggerated by a\npowerful and alarming expression of rage and resentment. The face was,\nindeed, at first sight indescribable, and the tumultuous feelings and\npassions that deepened and darkened every line of it wrought such\nfearful and sudden changes upon its muscular expression that the whole\nseemed at first a wizard compound of different identities.\n\nUpon entering, his first salutation was a deafening and broken torrent\nof cursing, poured forth upon the dominie, as the fancied author of the\nflight and death of the mad animal, whose career had spread such\nconsternation through the village. It was in vain that the whole company\nremonstrated against the rudeness, absurdity, and brutality of his\nconduct. He stood on the middle of the floor with his fist doubled,\nmenaced each of us in our turn, as we interposed between him and the\nobject of his resentment, or smiled at his folly and extravagance, and\nonce or twice grappled the large oaken cudgel with which he impelled his\nhorned property, as if he intended to commit the like beastly violence\non those around him. Cleekum had retired to a corner to enjoy the sport\nhis wicked waggery had created. The dominie sat composedly, and squinted\nat the cattle-dealer with a sly and jocular leer, which showed his soul\ndelighted even in a very serious joke, from an inveterate habit of\nextracting fun from all the petty and frivolous incidents of common\nlife. At times he seemed lost in a careless, musing mood, and at other\ntimes burst out into immoderate fits of laughter, which seemed to me\nperfectly unaccountable. He then, in the true spirit and feeling of an\nenthusiastic elocutionist, recited from Shakspeare some favourite\npassage, warbled out a fragment of some ancient ditty, every now and\nthen interspersing it with shrill and fitful passages of a new sonnata,\nwhich he had been practising on the violin, whose shrill treble fell in\nbetween the intervals of M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s bass notes, like loose sand or\ngravel strewed over a rude foundation of ruble work. \u201cD\u2014\u2014 ye,\u201d said\nM\u2018Harrigle, rising in his wrath at every fresh interruption of the\ndominie, and maddened at his really provoking coolness and indifference,\n\u201cd\u2014\u2014 ye, ye think it a\u2019 a joke to hunt a man\u2019s cattle to destruction,\nand then mak a fool o\u2019 himsel wi\u2019 your blackguard and unknown tongues!\nConfound your hide, you glee\u2019d, fiddling vagabond, an it werna for your\ncoat, I would harle your hide ower your lugs like a sark! Pay me my\nsiller\u2014pay me my siller for the beast, or I\u2019ll turn the nose on your\nface like the pin o\u2019 a hand-screw. Down wi\u2019 the dust\u2014I\u2019ll no leave the\nroom till I hae satisfaction o\u2019 ye ae way or ither, that\u2019s for certain.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet there be peace,\u201d said Mr Singleheart, \u201cfor out of strife cometh a\nmultitude of evils; and he who in vain taketh the name of his Maker\nshall not be held guiltless. You are an evil person, M\u2018Harrigle; and if\nyou refrain not from that profane and heathenish habit of cursing, we\nwill, by the advice and council of our Kirk-Session, be obligated to\ndebar you from all kirk preevileges, and leave you to be devoured and\nswallowed up by the evil one.\u201d\n\n\u201cI beg your pardon,\u201d said the credulous and superstitious cattle-dealer;\n\u201cI didna mean offence to you or ony man in the room; but I\u2019ll hae my\nain. But it\u2019s you, sir\u2014it\u2019s you, sir,\u201d continued he, addressing the\ndominie repeatedly, and extending the tone of his voice at every\nrepetition, till he had strained it to the most astounding pitch of\nvociferation; \u201cit\u2019s you, sir, that set ane o\u2019 your mischievous vagabonds\nto hunt the poor dumb animal, till he ran red wud wi\u2019 rage, and flew\nower the craig head. And now he\u2019s at the bottom o\u2019 the linn, and fient\nbe licket\u2019s to be seen o\u2019 him, but an ill-faured hash o\u2019 hide, an\u2019\nbanes, and harrigles, sooming an\u2019 walloping at the bottom o\u2019 the pool.\u201d\n\n\u201cSomebody\u2019s blawn an ill sough in your lug, friend,\u201d said the dominie,\nas he caught M\u2018Harrigle gently by the sleeve, and invited him to sit\ndown.\n\n\u201cAff haun\u2019s,\u201d cried M\u2018Harrigle, rudely repelling the dominie\u2019s\ninvitation,\u2014\u201caff haun\u2019s, I say; no man shall handle me like a brute\nbeast. I ken what\u2019s right as weel\u2019s ony man, and I\u2019ll allow no man to\nstraik me wi\u2019 the hair, to wyse me his ain gate, and syne row my tail to\ngar me rin by my ain byre door. I want no favours of ony man, but I\u2019ll\nhae my ain, if there\u2019s law and justice in the land.\u201d\n\nM\u2018Harrigle proceeded at great length to insist upon his right of\nrestitution, bespattering his slaughter-house observations with\nabominable oaths, like dirty shreds of dunghill rags sewed on a beggar\u2019s\ndoublet; while the dominie sat musing, swinging backward and forward in\nhis chair, making mental and sometimes audible quotations from the\nliquid Latin, and, at other times, reciting Greek professorially, _ore\nrotundo_. At length, awakening from his learned reverie, and looking\nover his shoulder to M\u2018Harrigle, he said, in a tone most provokingly\ncool and indifferent,\u2014\n\n\u201cWere ye cursing, M\u2018Harrigle? Ye shouldna curse, ye sinfu\u2019 body; for an\nill life maks an ill hinder-end, and Sawtan\u2019s but a rough nurse to\nspread the sheets and draw the curtains o\u2019 ane\u2019s death-bed.\u201d\n\nThe enraged cattle-dealer, finding all further threats and remonstrances\nunavailing, sat down in sullen and silent indignation, and, with his\narms folded across his breast, his eyebrows knit, and his upper teeth\nfirmly compressed against his nether lip, he scowled upon the supposed\nauthor of his wrongs, with an expression of face unutterably horrible.\nHe had just sat down when Grierson the messenger brought in a tall,\nyellow, raw-boned thing of a boy, about fourteen years of age. He had\nbeen seized in Sir Robert\u2019s poultry-yard, and although he had nothing in\nhis possession to convict him as a criminal, his manner was so\nembarrassed, and his appearance altogether so suspicious, that the\nservants laid hold on him, and committed him to the charge of the\nofficer above mentioned, to be carried before a Justice of the Peace and\ninterrogated. He was accordingly conveyed to M\u2018Gowan\u2019s, where the\nofficer expected to find Christopher Ramsay of Wrendykeside, who, he was\ninformed, had just alighted at the inn from his gig. He had gone,\nhowever, and the officer was about to depart with his charge, when the\ndominie called him back, and looking pleasantly at the boy, exclaimed,\n\u201cAh, Geordie, are ye there, ye wild loon?\u201d The boy started at the voice\nof his old preceptor, whom he had not before observed. He indeed had\nheard and believed that his venerable instructor had been torn to pieces\nby the fury of the mad animal, whose destruction had roused M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s\nwrath to such a pitch of frenzy. He gazed upon the dominie with open\nmouth, and with a pair of large round eyes, much dilated beyond their\nusual circumference by an overpowering feeling of astonishment; grew\npale, and trembled so fearfully that his gruff guardian was compelled by\nhumanity to let him have a seat beside his old master, who rose for his\naccommodation. The afflicted youth made an effort to speak, but in vain.\nHe stretched out his two hands, grasped that of his master which was\nextended towards him, looked up in his face, and sobbed as if his heart\nwould burst. The tears ran in floods down his cheeks, and he at length\ncried out in a choked undertone of bitter agony,\u2014\n\n\u201cMaister, will ye forgie me? Will ye forgie me? Will they hang me\nfor\u2019t?\u201d\n\n\u201cBlessings on\u2019s man, Geordie,\u201d cried the dominie, \u201cwhat\u2019s wrang wi\u2019 ye?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d cried the afflicted boy, \u201cmy father, and mother, and brothers, and\nas sisters, and a\u2019 will get a sair heart for me yet. Oh!\u201d and he\ncontinued to cry distractedly.\n\n\u201cThe deil tak the laddie,\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle, \u201cit maks a man\u2019s heart as\nsaft as ill-fed veal to look at him. What\u2019s come ower ye, ye blubbering\nstirk?\u201d\n\nMr Singleheart spoke not a word to him, but continued clapping him on\nthe shoulder, while M\u2018Glashan, every now and then, cried out, \u201cHout,\nladdie, you\u2019ll be makin\u2019 a fool o\u2019 us a\u2019 noo,\u201d and so saying, he drew\nthe back of his brawny fist across his eyes several times, began to\nfinger his bagpipe in silence, as if he would soothe his sympathy by the\nimagination of playing some merry spring, but his fingers, after two or\nthree rapid dumb-show flourishes, stood as stationary upon the holes as\nif the piper and his instrument of sound had been both chiselled out of\nthe same stone. The boy still vented his grief as clamorously and\nbitterly as ever, clung to his master with the agony of a\nconscience-stricken penitent, and cried,\u2014\n\n\u201cWill ye forgie me? It was me that hunted the bull that I thocht had\nkilled ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou, ye vagabond!\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle, collaring the unhappy youth.\nCleekum seized the opportunity of running off, rightly considering that\nhe had carried the joke far beyond the bounds of discretion, and really\napprehensive that the evil spirit he had conjured up would turn upon\nhimself and rend him in its fury. \u201cYou!\u201d continued the irascible\ncattle-dealer; \u201cwhat do ye think that ye deserve, you ill-gi\u2019en\nneer-do-weel? But I\u2019ll mak your father pay.\u201d\n\nThis last consideration loosened his grasp, and he seized the dominie\u2019s\nhands with both his own, begged a thousand pardons with a rueful\ncountenance, and in accents very different from his former imprecatory\naddresses. During the time that he was making this sincere and penitent\napology for his rudeness and misconduct, he several times glanced round\nthe apartment for Cleekum, crying out, \u201cWhere is that blackguard scribe?\nIt was him that did it a\u2019.\u201d He was safe, however.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s nae harm done where there\u2019s nae ill meant,\u201d said the dominie,\nin reply to M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s confession of repentance; \u201conly ye shouldna\nflee on a body like an ill-bred tyke, when an ill-disposed neebour cries\n\u2018shoo\u2019 to ye. Dinna ye be ower ready in telling your mind to anybody,\nbut let your thoughts cool as weel as your parritch.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, Simon,\u201d rejoined the cattle-dealer, \u201cI am sure ye can hardly\nforgie me for the ill-faured words I hae said to ye the night; I wish I\ncould forget and forgie them mysel. I\u2019m a wild brier o\u2019 a body; I\u2019m aye\ninto some confounded hobbleshow or anither. But I\u2019m glad, man, I didna\nlay hands on ye, for if I had I wad ne\u2019er hae forgi\u2019en mysel for\u2019t as\nlang as I live. Can I do naething to mak amends to ye for what I\u2019ve\ndone?\u201d\n\n\u201cNaething at a\u2019,\u201d replied the dominie, \u201cbut to settle as easily as ye\ncan wi\u2019 the laddie\u2019s father.\u201d\n\n\u201cPeradventure,\u201d Mr Singleheart suggested, \u201cthe youth may be released\nfrom his captivity, and sent to the habitation of his father.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019ll be twa ways o\u2019 that faith!\u201d exclaimed Grierson. \u201cNa, na,\nthough the hangman has lost a job, I\u2019ll be paid for my trouble. I dinna\ngang about beating bushes for linties, for deil-belickit but the\npleasure o\u2019 seeing them fleein\u2019 back again. I\u2019ll cage him. Ye\u2019re a\u2019\nready enough to wind a hank aff a neebour\u2019s reel, or tak a nievefu\u2019 out\no\u2019 his pock neuk, but ne\u2019er a ane o\u2019 ye\u2019ll gie a duddy loon ae thread to\nmend his breeks, or a hungry beggar a handfu\u2019 o\u2019 meal to haud his wame\nfrae stickin\u2019 to his back bane.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere,\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle, tossing down a small sum of money as a bribe\nto stop the mouth of this snarling terrier of the law, \u201ctak that, and\nsave the parish the expense o\u2019 buying you a tether.\u201d\n\nGrierson picked up the money and departed, leaving behind him as tokens\nof his displeasure, some muttered and unintelligible growlings; and the\nboy was set at liberty, and sent home to his father.\n\n\u201cCome, come,\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle, \u201cthis affair \u2019ll no be weel ended till we\nhae sowthered our hearts again wi\u2019 a half mutchkin o\u2019 M\u2018Gowan\u2019s best.\nCome, Duncan, draw the tow, and tell the gudewife to fetch the mutchkin\nstoup, and het water to kirsten\u2019t. I\u2019m sure I\u2019m a fule o\u2019 a body, for my\nlang tongue, my short temper, and my short wit, hae keepit me in a fry\na\u2019 the days o\u2019 me.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re vera right, M\u2018Harrigle,\u201d said the landlord, rubbing his hand\nbriskly at the blithe proposal. \u201cI\u2019ll ring for Tibbie; she\u2019ll bring us\nsomething worth preein\u2019 out o\u2019 her ain bole. She\u2019s a bit eident body,\nand aye keeps a drap heart\u2019s comfort in an orra neuk.\u201d\n\nM\u2018Gowan pulled a hare\u2019s foot at the end of a rope, which was suspended\nfrom an unhewn piece of knotted wood, of a three-legs-of-man shape,\nfastened by a strong screw nail into the wall, and a solemn bell, most\nunlike the merry tinkle of an alehouse warning, was heard jowin\u2019 and\ncroorin\u2019 in a distant apartment, from which our hostess presently made\nher appearance.\n\nHer aspect and demeanour at first sight bespoke your affection. There\nwas in her face a look of blithe contentment with her condition; in her\ndress a neat attention to cleanliness and simplicity, and in her whole\nmanner and behaviour a hearty and honest desire, not only to be happy\nherself, but to make all around her equally comfortable. She curtseyed\nrespectfully and smilingly when she entered the room; but it was not\nthat cut-and-dried sort of politeness which publicans in general\nindiscriminately pay to all their customers;\u2014it was a kind of friendly\ngreeting, mingled with no small portion of gratitude towards those on\nwhom she was conscious she depended for subsistence. It was that warm\nand kindly expression of affection which brought one who was removed\nfrom his family fireside in mind of his mother, and which made\nimagination point out her habitation as a quiet resting place, where the\nunsettled sojourner might stop and glean from the barren field of\nearthly enjoyment some few ripe ears of happiness.\n\n\u201cMy gude will to ye a\u2019, gentlemen; I\u2019m thinkin\u2019 ye were ca\u2019in\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat we were,\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle. \u201cFetch us a mutchkin o\u2019 your best,\ngudewife, and some het water.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019se no want that,\u201d replied our hostess; \u201cbut ye\u2019ll aiblins aforehand\nbe pleased to tak a tasting o\u2019 supper; I hae\u2019t ready for ye yonder, as I\nguessed some o\u2019 ye might stand in need o\u2019 some sma refreshment. I\u2019ll\nsend it ben to ye in twa or three minutes, and syne get ye onything else\nye want. Ay will ye,\u201d said the motherly, sonsy, little woman, as she\nshut the door behind her with a gentleness of hand which showed that her\naffections had some regard even for things inanimate.\n\nA beautiful tall girl immediately made her appearance, and prepared the\nround oaken table before us for the reception of the landlady\u2019s\nhospitality, by spreading over it a table-cloth of snowy whiteness, and\nin arranging the shining implements, which, from their brilliant\ncleanliness, seemed to be kept as much for ornaments to the kitchen\nshelf, as for the more vulgar purpose of preparing food for the process\nof mastication. She was evidently the daughter of the hostess. Her\ncountenance indicated all the amiable qualities of her mother, but her\nmanners were more polished,\u2014at least they seemed so, perhaps from the\ncircumstance of her language being pure English, unmixed with any of the\nDoric dialect of her parent. By the mutual assistance of the landlady\nand her daughter, the table soon groaned beneath a load of savoury\nsubstantialities, most provokingly pleasant to all but myself. Our\nchairs being drawn forward towards the attractive influence of the\nsupper, and grace being said by the reverend Mr Singleheart, they all\nproceeded lustily and cheerfully to the work of repletion.\n\n\u201cOogh!\u201d says M\u2018Glashan the piper, as he opened his Celtic jaws, and\ndisclosed two formidable rows of white stakes, which stood as a sort of\nturnpike gate to the entrance of his stomach, and demanded toll of all\nthat passed that way,\u2014\u201coogh! this\u2019ll pe tooin\u2019 her good, for her fu\u2019 bag\nmaks a loot trone.\u201d\n\n\u201cVerily, it is both savoury and refreshing,\u201d said Mr Singleheart, as he\nsawed away with a suppleness of elbow by no means consistent with the\nstaid solemnity of his usual motions.\n\n\u201cMy faith!\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle to the dominie, \u201cyour mill gangs glibly.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy,\u201d says the dominie, \u201cthe still sow licks up the draff, and a heapit\nplate maks hungry men scant o\u2019 cracks.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd scant o\u2019 havins too, I think,\u201d said M\u2018Gowan; \u201cfor the stranger\ngentleman\u2019s sittin\u2019 there before us wi\u2019 a toom plate.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet him alane,\u201d said the dominie; \u201cit\u2019s time he were learning that a\nman that\u2019s hamely\u2019s aye welcome, and that frank looks mak kind hearts.\u201d\n\nCleekum had secreted himself in the kitchen, and, though indebted to Mrs\nM\u2018Gowan\u2019s fidelity for his preservation from M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s indignation,\nhe was by no means satisfied with the amount of the night\u2019s amusement.\nIt was at all times a source of delight to him to observe men acting\nextravagantly and foolishly under misconception and false impressions of\none another; and he at no time hesitated to invent and circulate\nfabrications, generally innocent, indeed, as to intention, but sometimes\nproductive of serious consequences. He was commonly the most taciturn\nindividual in company, and notwithstanding his frolicsome and\nmischievous disposition, enjoyed the reputation among his neighbours of\nbeing a skilful lawyer, and what is still more creditable, a man of\nunimpeached integrity. This last quality, in some measure, atoned for\nhis love of mischief, and enabled him to perform with impunity wild\npranks, which might have seriously injured almost any other man.\n\nWhen he saw Dame M\u2018Gowan preparing supper, his whimsical imagination\nsuggested to him the very ridiculous and extravagant trick of making\nM\u2018Glashan believe that his favourite bagpipes formed a part of the\nentertainment. This he accomplished by giving a little urchin a penny to\nsteal unperceived into the room and fetch them away, and an old pair\nthat lay on a shelf in the kitchen furnished him with the ready\nmaterials for carrying his whimsical conceit into execution. Ribbons of\nthe same breadth and colour with those which garnished M\u2018Glashan\u2019s pipes\nwere purchased, and tied upon the drone, which was then attached to the\n\u201cchieftain o\u2019 the pudding race,\u201d which had never before perhaps been\ndignified with such notable marks of distinction. Mrs M\u2018Gowan whispered\nto her husband a hint of the rarity preparing for them in the kitchen,\nand he gave a sly intimation of the same to the dominie.\n\nPart of the dishes being removed, the whole company sat in silent\nexpectation of this new specimen of culinary skill, for the whispered\nhint had by this time been communicated to all except M\u2018Glashan himself.\nThe dominie squinted at M\u2018Gowan, with that sly and jocular expression of\nface for which he was so remarkable. The landlord himself could with\ndifficulty restrain his risibility within the compass of a well-bred\nsmile. It was evident, from the various workings of his features, that\nit required no small exertion to master down his inward emotion, and\nkeep it from leaping forth and divulging the secret of the coming joke.\n\nAfter a delay of a few minutes our good hostess entered with a pair of\nbagpipes on a large plate. She placed them on the table and hurried out\nof the room, evidently for the purpose of enjoying a prudential and\nprivate laugh. There stood the piper\u2019s instrument on the middle of the\ntable, \u201cwarm, reeking, rich,\u201d steaming forth its appetising fragrance,\nregaling every nose, delighting every eye, and provoking instantaneous\npeals of laughter from all but the supposed proprietor of this\nfantastical but seemingly substantial piece of good cheer.\n\n\u201cCod mak a mercy on us a\u2019! An\u2019 I will teclare, a poiled pagpipe! Who\u2019ll\nbe toing that, noo? Oogh! oogh!\u201d said the enraged musician, snuffing\nhimself into an ungovernable fit of rage, raising his brawny and\nponderous form into a threatening attitude and doubling his knotty, iron\nfists, with the design of hammering the offender, whose wicked temerity\nhad dared to brave the indignation of this half-reclaimed mountaineer.\n\u201cAn you\u2019ll offer to jag him, and let out his win\u2019 too, oogh! you\u2019ll\npetter be a\u2019 looking ower a house-rigging o\u2019 twa storey. You\u2019ll poil\nyour tam haggis in my pag, and sotter my trone too, and the vera ribbons\nI had at the competeetion. Shust mine!\u201d cried the enraged Highlander,\nlooking more intently at the Scotch haggis with its whimsical\nappendages. \u201cAn you\u2019ll no tell me the man wha would be toing that, I\nwill mak the room my ain in five minutes. I taur you all to touch him.\nI\u2019ll mak a tead man o\u2019 her\u2014oogh! oogh!\u201d\n\nI was the only individual in the company who seemed to feel any\napprehensions about the consequence of this absurd piece of waggery. All\nthe rest enjoyed it rarely, not even excepting the Rev. Mr Singleheart,\nwho, though possessing none of the elements of jocularity himself, was\nyet at times singularly well pleased to second a piece of innocent fun\nwith his individual portion of jocose laughter.\n\n\u201cSit down, ye muckle Highland stirk,\u201d said M\u2018Harrigle, \u201cand no mak a\nsough there about a boiled bagpipe. I\u2019se warrant it\u2019s a bit of gude\neatin\u2019; and we\u2019ll see what can be made o\u2019t when we hae pu\u2019d awa thae\nwhigmaleeries that are stickin\u2019 round about it. Faith! I wadna gie a\nmouthfu\u2019 o\u2019 your bagpipe, M\u2018Glashan, for a\u2019 the music that ever came out\no\u2019 its drone.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s quite a musical feast,\u201d quoth the dominie; \u201conly I fear we\u2019ll be\ntroubled wi\u2019 wind in our stomachs after making a meal o\u2019t. Sit down,\nM\u2018Glashan,\u201d he continued, \u201cfor, as you were sayin\u2019 before, a fu\u2019 bag\nmaks a loud drone.\u201d\n\n\u201cSit town! sit town! and see six Sassenach teevils tefour the bagpipes\nthat hae pelanged to a M\u2018Glashan for twa hunder year! Oogh! won the\ncompeteetion too!\u201d\n\nThe gaunt descendant of the Gael stood grinding his teeth, opening and\nclenching his big bony fists, as if he fancied himself about to grapple\nwith some sturdy antagonist. His large blue eyes flaming from beneath\nthe fringe of his knitted eyebrow, the big muscles encircling the corner\nof either eye, and curving round the mouth in deep hard folds, and the\noutward shelving upper-lip, puckered with a thousand wrinkles, were\nrendered more picturesque and fearful from being hedged round by an\nuncommon mass of bristly gray hair, two large portions of which hung on\nhis broad, flat cheeks, like two large bunches of burned furse, while\nthe whole rugged exterior was rendered still more imposing by the\nassociation of his favourite guttural interjection, \u201coogh!\u201d His aspect\nlowered so grim and threatening, his \u201cooghs\u201d became so loud and\nnumerous, that all began to think it time to soothe the spirit of this\nHighland storm, lest its rising wrath should descend with deadly\nvengeance on those around him.\n\nThe landlord stepped out, and returned with M\u2018Glashan\u2019s instrument. The\nmountaineer looked astonished, snatched it from him with eagerness, eyed\nit round and round, hugged and kissed the darling object of his\naffection, and poured into its capacious bag a stream of wind which\nimmediately issued in a wild and stormy pibroch. Delighted with his own\nperformance, \u201che hotched and blew with might and main,\u201d mingling, every\nnow and then, with his unearthly music, the half-recitative bass of a\nbroad rumbling laugh, while M\u2018Harrigle\u2019s rugged terrier, with his two\nfore paws upon the piper\u2019s knees, spun out long and eerie howls of\ncanine sympathy. It was in vain that we praised the savoury Scotch\nhaggis, and recommended it to the palate of M\u2018Glashan. His heart, as\nwell as his wind, was in his bagpipe, and he never once deigned to\nreturn an answer to our reiterated invitations; but having exhausted his\nscanty musical budget, the contents of which amounted to no more than a\nfew Highland reels and strathspeys, he droned away in voluntaries so\nutterly horrible and dissonant, that Simon Gray, after swallowing a few\nmorsels with as rueful contortions of visage as if every mouthful had\nbeen dipped in sand, ran out of the room holding his ears, and giving\nvent to a harsh German _ach!_ which was powerfully expressive of his\ncrucified sense of hearing. The piper piped on, and seemed to enjoy a\nsort of triumph over the wounded feelings of the departed dominie. None\nof the rest of the company followed his example, but each individual sat\nstill with as much coolness and composure as if his ears had been\nhermetically sealed against the grunting, groaning, and yelling of this\ninfernal musical-engine.\n\nM\u2018Glashan\u2019s tempestuous hostility at length ceased, and the dominie\nreturned as the large punch-bowl was shedding its fragrant effluvia\nthrough the apartment, giving to every eye a livelier lustre, to every\nheart a warmer glow, and to every tongue a more joyous and voluble\nexpression. No more than two or three glasses had circulated when Mr\nSingleheart and the dominie left the generous beverage to the enjoyment\nof the more profane and less responsible members of this assemblage of\nconvivial spirits.\n\n\u201cHe is an ill-hearted tyke who can\u2019t both give and take a joke,\u201d said\nCleekum, as he burst abruptly into the apartment. \u201cYou would not\ncertainly quarrel with an old friend, M\u2018Harrigle?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I\u2019ll be hanged if I do,\u201d was the reply of the cattle-dealer; \u201cbut\nLord, man, if I had cloured Simon, I might hae run the kintra. Faith! if\nye gang delvin\u2019 about this gate for fun, ye\u2019ll set your fit on a wasp\u2019s\nbyke some day. If I had but gotten my hands ower ye twa hours syne,\nthere would hae been a job for the doctor. Let there be nae mair about\nit;\u2014there\u2019s a glass to ye.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe night drave on wi\u2019 sangs and clatter.\u201d\n\nOne merry story suggested another, till the potent spirit of the bowl\ncovered some all over with slumber \u201cas with a cloak,\u201d laid others\nprostrate beneath the table, and to the maudlin eyes of the unconquered\nsurvivors presented every object as if of the dual number. The bustle\nand hurry of preparation in the kitchen had died away, orders for an\nadditional supply of liquor were more tardily executed, and the\nkitchen-maid came in half undressed, holding a short gown together at\nthe breast, rubbing her eyes, and staggering under the influence of a\nstolen nap at the fireside, from which she had been hastily and\nreluctantly roused. Cleekum, M\u2018Harrigle, M\u2018Glashan, and myself were the\nonly individuals who had any pretentions to sobriety. The landlord had\nprudently retired to rest an hour before. Silence reigned in the whole\nhouse, except in one apartment, and silence would have put down her\nvelvet footstep there also, but for the occasional roars of M\u2018Harrigle,\nwho bellowed as if he had been holding conversational communion with his\nown nowt; and the engine-without-oil sort of noise that M\u2018Glashan made\nas he twanged, sputtered, and grunted his native tongue to M\u2018Harrigle,\nwho was turning round to the piper every now and then, crying \u201cD\u2014\u2014n your\nGaelic, you\u2019ve spewed enough o\u2019t the night; put a bung in your throat,\nyou beast!\u201d\n\nA few flies that buzzed and murmured round the room were the only joyous\nand sleepless creatures that seemed disposed to prolong the revelry. The\ncold toddy having lost its delicious relish, produced loathing, and its\nformer exhilarating effluvia was now sickening to the nose. The\ncandle-wick stood in the middle of the flickering flame like a long nail\nwith a large round head, and sending the light in fitful flashes against\nthe walls. The cock had sounded his clarion, the morning seamed the\nopenings of the window-shutters with lines of light, and the ploughman,\nroused to labour, went whistling past the door. I opened the\nwindow-shutter. A glare of light rushed in and condensed the flame of\nour little luminary into a single bud of pale light, whose sickliness\nseemed to evince a kindred sympathy with the disorderly remains of the\nnight\u2019s revelry, and with the stupified senses and exhausted bodies of\nthe revellers themselves.\n\nI looked out of the window. All was silent, save the far-off whistle of\nthe ploughman who had passed, and the continual roar of the cataract;\nand all was motionless, except the blue feathery smoke which puffed from\na single-chimney, and floated down the glen in a long wavering stream.\nHow chill and piercing the morning air feels to the nervous and\ndebilitated reveller, and how reproachfully does the light of another\nday steal in upon the unseemly disorder of his privacy! Almost every man\nfeels himself to be somewhat of a blackguard who is thus surprised.\n\nGoing home drunk in a summer morning! What a beast! Feebleness of\nknees, that would gladly lie down by the wayside,\u2014headache, that makes\nthe brain a mere puddle of dirty recollections, and dismal\nanticipations,\u2014dimness of eyes, that makes every visible object\ncaricaturish and monstrous,\u2014filthiness of apparel enough to shame a\nvery scavenger,\u2014and a heart sick almost to the commission of _felo de\nse_. Zig-zag, thump, thump, down again, howling, swearing, praying. It\nis a libel on the brute creation to call it beastliness. Brutes do no\nsuch thing. And the morning, how fresh, clear, green, and glittering!\nHang that fellow,\u2014going to work, I imagine. What on earth roused him\nat such an unseasonable hour? To be a spy upon me, I suppose. Who are\nyou, sir?\u2014A poor man, please your honour, sir.\u2014A poor man! go and be\nhanged then.\u2014These birds yelping from that thicket are more unmusical\nthan hurdy-gurdy, marrowbone and cleaver. I wish each of them had a\npipe-stopple in its windpipe. I never heard such abominable discord.\nThe whole world is astir. Who told them I was going home at this time\nin the morning? Who is that singing the \u201cFlower o\u2019 Dunblane\u201d at the\nother side of the hedge? A milkmaid\u2014\u201cand the milkmaid singeth blithe.\u201d\nAh, John Milton, thy notions of rural felicity were formed in a\ncloset. You may have a peep of her through this \u201cslap.\u201d Rural\ninnocence!\u2014a mere humbug,\u2014a dirty, tawdry, pudding-legged,\nblowsy-faced, sun-burnt drab. What a thing for a shepherdess in a\npastoral! Confound these road trustees; they have been drawing the\nroad through a bore, and have made it ten times its common length, and\na hundred times narrower than its common breadth. Horribly rough; no\nman can walk steadily on it. Have the blockheads not heard of M\u2018Adam?\nIn the words of the Lawrencekirk album epigrammatist,\u2014\n\n \u201cThe people here ought to be hanged,\n Unless they mend their ways.\u201d\n\nHast thou, gentle reader, ever gone home drunk in a summer morning, when\nthy shame, that is day-light, was rising in the east? Sulky\u2014a question\nnot to be answered. So much for thy credit, for there be in this sinful\nand wicked world men who boast of such things. I am glad thou art not\none of them. Neither do I boast of such doings; for, gentle reader, I\nwent to bed. My bedroom was one of M\u2018Gowan\u2019s garret-rooms. Cleekum and\nM\u2018Harrigle, who lived at some distance, thought proper to retire to rest\nbefore visiting their own firesides; and M\u2018Glashan, being a sort of\nvagrant musician, who had no legal domicile in any particular place, had\nalways a bed assigned him in M\u2018Gowan\u2019s when he visited the village.\n\nStretched in bed after a day\u2019s travelling and a night\u2019s\ncarousing\u2014exquisite pleasure! It is worth a man\u2019s while to travel thirty\nor forty miles to enjoy such a blessed luxury. After a few yawnings,\npokings out and drawings up of the legs, the whole body begins to feel a\ngenial glow of heat, and he is worse than an infidel who in such a\npleasurable mood does not feel disposed to bless his Maker. Everything\nbeing properly arranged, the curtains carefully drawn around, the\nnight-cap pulled down over the ears and folded upward on the brow, the\npillow shifted, shuffled, and nicely adjusted to the head, the clothes\npulled and lugged about, till there is not a single air-hole left to\npinch the body, the downy bed itself, by sundry tossings and turnings,\nconverted into an exact mould for the particular part of the body that\nhas sunk into it, then does the joyous spirit sing to itself inwardly,\nwith the mute melody of gratitude,\u2014\u201cI\u2019m wearin\u2019 awa, Jean!\u201d\u2014_Blackwood\u2019s\nMagazine_, 1826.\n\n\n\n\n THE MILLER AND THE FREEBOOTER.\n\n BY SIR THOMAS DICK LAUDER.\n\n\nIn Glenquoich, in Aberdeenshire, in the early part of last century,\nthere was a corn-mill erected for the use of the neighbourhood, and as\nthe construction and management of such machines were ill understood in\nthat part of Scotland at the time, a miller was brought from the low\ncountry to superintend it. In this neighbourhood there lived at that\ntime a certain Donald Mackenzie, a hero remarkable for his haughty and\nimperious manner, and known by the appellation of \u201cDonald Unasach,\u201d or\nDonald the Proud. Being a native of Glenquoich, he knew as little of the\nEnglish language as the miller did of Gaelic. He was an outlaw, addicted\nto freebooting, and of so fierce and unruly a temper, that the whole\ncountry stood in awe of him. One circumstance regarding him struck\neveryone with superstitious awe, and created much conjecture and\nspeculation among those around him: he was never known to be without\nabundance of meal, and yet he was never known to carry any corn to the\nmill.\n\nBut the sagacious miller of Glenquoich soon discovered that, in order to\nbilk him of his proper mill-dues, the caitiff was in the habit of\nbringing his grain to the mill in the night, and grinding it, and\ncarrying it off before morning. To charge him directly with this fraud,\nwas too dangerous an attempt. But the miller ventured to ask him now and\nthen, quietly, how he did for meal, as he never brought any corn to the\nmill; to which the freebooter never returned any other answer than one\nin Gaelic, signifying that \u201cstrong is the hand of God!\u201d\n\nProvoked at last, the miller determined to take his own way of curing\nthe evil; and, having some previous notion of the next nocturnal visit\nof his unwelcome customer, he took care, before leaving the mill in the\nevening, to remove the bush, or that piece of wood which is driven into\nthe eye of the nether millstone, for the purpose of keeping the spindle\nsteady in passing through the upper stone. He also stopped up the spout\nthrough which the meal discharged itself; and as the mill was one of\nthose old-fashioned machines, where the water-wheel moved horizontally,\nand directly under the stones, it follows that, by this arrangement of\nthings, the corn would fall into the stream. Having made these\npreparations, the miller locked his house door, and went to bed.\n\nAbout midnight, Donald arrived with his people, and some sacks of dry\ncorn, and finding everything, as he thought, in good order in the mill,\nhe filled the hopper, and let on the water. The machinery revolved with\nmore than ordinary rapidity; the grain sank fast in the hopper; but not\na particle of it came out at the place where he was wont to receive it\ninto his bag as meal. Donald the Proud and his \u201cgillies\u201d were all\naghast. Frantic with rage, he and they ran up and down; and, in their\nhurry to do everything, they succeeded in doing nothing. At length\nDonald perceived, what even the obscurity of the night could not hide, a\nlong white line of fair provender flowing down the middle of the stream,\nthat left not a doubt as to where his corn was discharging itself. But\nhe could neither guess how this strange phenomenon was produced, nor how\nthe evil was to be cured. After much perplexity, he thought of turning\noff the water. But here the wily miller had also been prepared for him,\nhaving so contrived matters, that the pole, or handle connecting the\nsluice with the inside of the mill, had fallen off as soon as the water\nwas let on the wheel. Baffled at all points, Donald was compelled at\nlast to run to the miller\u2019s house. Finding the door locked, he knocked\nand bawled loudly at the window; and, on the miller demanding to know\nwho was there, he did his best to explain, in broken English, the whole\ncircumstances of the case. The miller heard him to an end; and turning\nhimself in his bed, he coolly replied, \u201cstrong is the hand of God!\u201d\nDonald Unasach gnashed his teeth, tried the door again, returned to the\nwindow, and, humbled by the circumstances, repeated his explanation and\nentreaties for help. \u201c_Te meal town te purn to te teil! hoigh, hoigh!_\u201d\n\u201cI thought ye had been ower weel practeesed in the business to let ony\nsic mischanter come ower ye, Donald,\u201d replied the imperturbable\nlowlander; \u201cbut, you know, \u2018strong is the hand of God!\u2019\u201d The mountaineer\nnow lost all patience. Drawing his dirk, and driving it through the\nwindow, he began to strike it so violently against the stones on the\noutside of the wall, that he illuminated the house with a shower of\nfire, that showed the terrified inmates the ferocious countenance of him\nwho wielded the weapon. \u201c_Te meal to te mill, te mutter to te mailler_,\u201d\nsputtered out Donald, in the midst of his wrath, meaning to imply, that\nif the miller would only come and help him, he should have all his dues\nin future. Partly moved by this promise, but still more by his\nwell-grounded fears, the miller arose at last, put the mill to rights,\nand ground the rest of the corn. And tradition tells us that after this\nthe mill-dues were regularly paid, and the greatest harmony subsisted\nbetween Donald Unasach and the miller of Glenquoich.\n\n\n\n\n BENJIE\u2019S CHRISTENING.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR.\n\n We\u2019ll hap and row, hap and row,\n We\u2019ll hap and row the feetie o\u2019t;\n It is a wee bit weary thing,\n I dinnie bide the greetie o\u2019t.\u2014PROVOST CREECH.\n\n An honest man, close button\u2019d to the chin,\n Broad-cloth without, and a warm heart within.\u2014COWPER.\n\n This great globe and all that it inherits shall dissolve,\n And, like the baseless fabric of a vision,\n Leave not a rack behind!\u2014SHAKSPEARE.\n\n\nAt the christening of our only bairn, Benjie, two or three remarkable\ncircumstances occurred, which it behoves me to relate. It was on a cold\nNovember afternoon; and really when the bit room was all redd up, the\nfire bleezing away, and the candles lighted, every thing looked full\ntosh and comfortable. It was a real pleasure, after looking out into the\ndrift that was fleeing like mad from the east, to turn one\u2019s neb\ninwards, and think that we had a civilised home to comfort us in the\ndreary season. So, one after another, the bit party we had invited to\nthe ceremony came papping in; and the crack began to get loud and\nhearty; for, to speak the truth, we were blessed with canny friends and\na good neighbourhood. Notwithstanding, it was very curious that I had no\nmind of asking down James Batter, the weaver, honest man, though he was\none of our own elders; and in papped James, just when the company had\nhafflins met, with his stocking-sleeves on his arms, his nightcap on his\nhead, and his blue-stained apron hanging down before him, to light his\npipe at our fire.\n\nJames, when he saw his mistake, was fain to retreat; but we would not\nhear tell of it, till he came in, and took a dram out of the bottle, as\nwe told him the not doing so would spoil the wean\u2019s beauty, which is an\nold freak (the smallpox, however, afterwards did that); so, with much\npersuasion, he took a chair for a gliff, and began with some of his\ndrolls\u2014for he is a clever, humoursome man, as ye ever met with. But he\nhad not got far on with his jests, when lo! a rap came to the door, and\nMysie whipped away the bottle under her apron, saying, \u201cWheesht,\nwheesht, for the sake of gudeness\u2014there\u2019s the minister!\u201d\n\nThis room had only one door, and James mistook it, running his head, for\nlack of knowledge, into the open closet, just as the minister lifted the\nouter-door sneck. We were all now sitting on nettles, for we were\nfrightened that James would be seized with a cough, for he was a wee\nasthmatic; or that some, knowing there was a thief in the pantry, might\nhurt good manners by breaking out into a giggle. However, all for a\nconsiderable time was quiet, and the ceremony was performed; little\nNancy, our niece, handing the bairn upon my arm to receive its name. So\nwe thought, as the minister seldom made a long stay on similar\noccasions, that all would pass off well enough. But wait a wee.\n\nThere was but one of our company that had not cast up, to wit, Deacon\nPaunch, the flesher, a most worthy man, but tremendously big, and grown\nto the very heels; as was once seen on a wager, that his ankle was\ngreater than my brans. It was really a pain to all feeling Christians,\nto see the worthy man waighling about, being, when weighed in his own\nscales, two-and-twenty stone ten ounces, Dutch weight. Honest man, he\nhad had a sore fecht with the wind and sleet, and he came in with a\nshawl roppined round his neck, peching like a broken-winded horse; so\nfain was he to find a rest for his weary carcass in our stuffed chintz\npattern elbow-chair by the fire-cheek.\n\nFrom the soughing of wind at the window, and the rattling in the lum, it\nwas clear to all manner of comprehension, that the night was a dismal\none; so the minister, seeing so many of his own douce folk about him,\nthought he might do worse than volunteer to sit still and try our toddy;\nindeed, we would have pressed him before this to do so, but what was to\ncome of James Batter, who was shut up in the closet, like the spies in\nthe house of Rahab the harlot, in the city of Jericho?\n\nJames began to find it was a bad business; and having been driving the\nshuttle about from before daylight, he was fain to crook his hough, and\nfelt round about him quietly in the dark for a chair to sit down upon,\nsince better might not be. But, wae\u2019s me! the cat was soon out of the\npock.\n\nMe and the minister were just argle-bargling some few words on the\ndoctrine of the camel and the eye of the needle, when, in the midst of\nour discourse, as all was wheesht and attentive, an awful thud was heard\nin the closet, which gave the minister, who thought the house had fallen\ndown, such a start, that his very wig louped for a full three-eights off\nhis crown. I say we were necessitated to let the cat out of the pock for\ntwo reasons: firstly, because we did not know what had happened; and,\nsecondly, to quiet the minister\u2019s fears, decent man, for he was a wee\nnervous. So we made a hearty laugh of it, as well as we could, and\nopened the door to bid James Batter come out, as we confessed all.\nEasier said than done, howsoever. When we pulled open the door, and took\nforward one of the candles, there was James doubled up, sticking\ntwofold, like a rotten in a sneck-trap, in an old chair, the bottom of\nwhich had gone down before him, and which, for some craze about it, had\nbeen put out of the way by Nanse, that no accident might happen. Save\nus! if the deacon had sate down upon it, pity on our brick-floor!\n\nWell, after some ado, we got James, who was more frightened than hurt,\nhauled out of his hidy-hole; and after lifting off his cowl, and\nsleeking down his front hair, he took a seat beside us, apologeezing for\nnot being in his Sunday\u2019s garb, the which the minister, who was a free\nand easy man, declared there was no occasion for, and begged him to make\nhimself comfortable.\n\nWell, passing over that business, Mr Wiggie and me entered into our\nhumours, for the drappikie was beginning to tell on my noddle, and made\nme somewhat venturesome\u2014not to say that I was not a little proud to have\nthe minister in my bit housie; so, says I to him in a cosh way, \u201cYe may\nbelieve me or no, Mr Wiggie, but mair than me think ye out of sight the\nbest preacher in the parish; nane of them, Mr Wiggie, can hold the\ncandle to ye, man.\u201d\n\n\u201cWheesht, wheesht,\u201d said the body, in rather a cold way that I did not\nexpect, knowing him to be as proud as a peacock\u2014\u201cI daresay I am just\nlike my neighbours.\u201d\n\nThis was not quite so kind\u2014so says I to him, \u201cMaybe sae, for many a one\nthinks ye could not hold a candle to Mr Blowster the Cameronian, that\nwhiles preaches at Lugton.\u201d\n\nThis was a stramp on his corny toe. \u201cNa, na,\u201d answered Mr Wiggie, rather\nnettled; \u201clet us drop that subject. I preach like my neighbours. Some of\nthem may be worse, and others better; just as some of your own trade may\nmake clothes worse, and some better, than yourself.\u201d\n\nMy corruption was raised. \u201cI deny that,\u201d said I, in a brisk manner,\nwhich I was sorry for after\u2014\u201cI deny that, Mr Wiggie,\u201d says I to him;\n\u201cI\u2019ll make a pair of breeches with the face of clay.\u201d\n\nBut this was only a passing breeze, during the which, howsoever, I\nhappened to swallow my thimble, which accidentally slipped off my middle\nfinger, causing both me and the company general alarm, as there were\ngreat fears that it might mortify in the stomach; but it did not; and\nneither word nor wittens of it have been seen or heard tell of from that\nto this day. So, in two or three minutes, we had some few good songs,\nand a round of Scotch proverbs, when the clock chapped eleven. We were\nall getting, I must confess, a thought noisy; Johnny Soutter having\nbroken a dram-glass, and Willie Fegs couped a bottle on the bit\ntable-cloth: all noisy, I say, except Deacon Paunch, douce man, who had\nfallen into a pleasant slumber; so, when the minister rose to take his\nhat, they all rose except the deacon, whom we shook by the arms for some\ntime, but in vain, to waken him. His round, oily face, good creature,\nwas just as if it had been cut out of a big turnip, it was so fat,\nfozey, and soft; but at last, after some ado, we succeeded, and he\nlooked about him with a wild stare, opening his two red eyes, like\nPandore oysters, asking what had happened; and we got him hoized up on\nhis legs, tying the blue shawl round his bull-neck again.\n\nOur company had not got well out of the door, and I was priding myself\nin my heart about being landlord to such a goodly turn out, when Nanse\ntook me by the arm, and said, \u201cCome, and see such an unearthly sight.\u201d\nThis startled me, and I hesitated; but at long and last I went in with\nher, a thought alarmed at what had happened, and\u2014my gracious! there, on\nthe easy-chair, was our bonny tortoise-shell cat, Tommy, with the red\nmorocco collar about its neck, bruised as flat as a flounder, and as\ndead as a mawk!\n\nThe deacon had sat down upon it without thinking; and the poor animal,\nthat our neighbours\u2019 bairns used to play with, and be so fond of, was\ncrushed out of life without a cheep. The thing, doubtless, was not\nintended, but it gave Nanse and me a very sore heart.\n\n\n\n\n THE MINISTER\u2019S WIDOW.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nThe dwelling of the minister\u2019s widow stood within a few miles of the\nbeautiful village of Castle-Holm, about a hundred low-roofed houses that\nhad taken the name of the parish of which they were the little romantic\ncapital. Two small regular rows of cottages faced each other, on the\ngentle acclivity of a hill, separated by a broomy common of rich\npasturage, through which hurried a translucent loch-born rivulet, with\nhere and there its shelves and waterfalls overhung by the alder or\nweeping birch. Each straw-roofed abode, snug and merry as a beehive, had\nbehind it a few roods of garden ground; so that, in spring, the village\nwas covered with a fragrant cloud of blossoms on the pear, apple, and\nplum trees; and in autumn was brightened with golden fruitage. In the\nheart of the village stood the manse, and in it had she who was now a\nwidow passed twenty years of privacy and peace. On the death of her\nhusband, she had retired with her family\u2014three boys\u2014to the pleasant\ncottage which they now inhabited. It belonged to the old lady of the\ncastle, who was patroness of the parish, and who accepted from the\nminister\u2019s widow of a mere trifle as a nominal rent. On approaching the\nvillage, strangers always fixed upon Sunnyside for the manse itself, for\nan air of serenity and retirement brooded over it, as it looked out from\nbelow its sheltering elms, and the farmyard with its corn-stack, marking\nthe homestead of the agricultural tenant, was there wanting. A neat\ngravel-walk winded away, without a weed, from the white gate by the\nroadside, through lilacs and laburnums; and the unruffled and unbroken\norder of all the breathing things that grew around, told that a quiet\nand probably small family lived within those beautiful boundaries.\n\nThe change from the manse to Sunnyside had been with the widow a change\nfrom happiness to resignation. Her husband had died of a consumption;\nand for nearly a year she had known that his death was inevitable. Both\nof them had lived in the spirit of that Christianity which he had\npreached; and therefore the last year they passed together, in spite of\nthe many bitter tears which she who was to be the survivor shed when\nnone were by to see, was perhaps on the whole the best deserving of the\nname of happiness of the twenty that had passed over their earthly\nunion. To the dying man Death had lost all his terrors. He sat beside\nhis wife, with his bright hollow eyes and emaciated frame, among the\nbalmy shades of his garden, and spoke with fervour of the many tender\nmercies God had vouchsafed to them here, and of the promises made to all\nwho believed in the Gospel. They did not sit together to persuade, to\nconvince, or to uphold each other\u2019s faith, for they believed in the\nthings that were unseen, just as they believed in the beautiful\nblossomed arbour that then contained them in its shading silence.\nAccordingly, when the hour was at hand in which he was to render up his\nspirit into the hand of God, he was like a grateful and wearied man\nfalling into a sleep. His widow closed his eyes with her own hands, nor\nwas her soul then disquieted within her. In a few days she heard the\nbell tolling, and from her sheltered window looked out, and followed the\nfuneral with streaming eyes, but an unweeping heart. With a calm\ncountenance and humble voice she left and bade farewell to the sweet\nmanse, where she had so long been happy; and as her three beautiful\nboys, with faces dimmed by natural grief, but brightened by natural\ngladness, glided before her steps, she shut the gate of her new dwelling\nwith an undisturbed soul, and moved her lips in silent thanksgiving to\nthe God of the fatherless and the widow.\n\nHer three boys, each one year older than the other, grew in strength and\nbeauty, the pride and flower of the parish. In school they were quiet\nand composed; but in play-hours they bounded in their glee together like\nyoung deer, and led the sportful flock in all their excursions through\nwood or over moor. They resembled, in features and in voice, both of\ntheir gentle parents; but nature had moulded to quite another character\ntheir joyful and impetuous souls. When sitting or walking with their\nmother, they subdued their spirits down to suit her equable and gentle\ncontentment, and behaved towards her with a delicacy and thoughtfulness\nwhich made her heart to sing for joy. So, too, did they sit in the kirk\non Sabbath, and during all that day the fountain of their joy seemed to\nsubside and to lie still. They knew to stand solemnly with their mother,\nnow and then on the calm summer evenings, beside their father\u2019s grave.\nThey remembered well his pale kind face\u2014his feeble walk\u2014his bending\nframe\u2014his hand laid in blessing on their young heads\u2014and the last time\nthey ever heard him speak. The glad boys had not forgotten their father;\nand that they proved by their piety unto her whom most on earth had\ntheir father loved. But their veins were filled with youth, health, and\nthe electricity of joy; and they carried without and within the house\nsuch countenances as at any time coming upon their mother\u2019s eyes on a\nsudden, were like a torch held up in the dim melancholy of a mist,\ndiffusing cheerfulness and elevation.\n\nYears passed on. Although the youngest was but a boy, the eldest stood\non the verge of manhood, for he had entered his seventeenth year, and\nwas bold, straight, and tall, with a voice deepening in its tone, a\ngraver expression round the gladness of his eyes, and a sullen mass of\ncoal-black hair hanging over the smooth whiteness of his open forehead.\nBut why describe the three beautiful brothers? They knew that there was\na world lying at a distance that called upon them to leave the fields,\nand woods, and streams, and lochs of Castle-Holm; and, born and bred in\npeace as they had been, their restless hearts were yet all on fire, and\nthey burned to join a life of danger, strife, and tumult. No doubt it\ngave their mother a sad heart to think that all her three boys, who she\nknew loved her so tenderly, could leave her alone, and rush into the\nfar-off world. But who shall curb nature? Who ought to try to curb it\nwhen its bent is strong? She reasoned a while, and tried to dissuade;\nbut it was in vain. Then she applied to her friends; and the widow of\nthe minister of Castle-Holm, retired as his life had been, was not\nwithout friends of rank and power. In one year her three boys had their\nwish;\u2014in one year they left Sunnyside, one after the other; William to\nIndia, Edward to Spain, and Harry to a man-of-war.\n\nStill was the widow happy. The house that so often used to be ringing\nwith joy, was now indeed too, too silent; and that utter noiselessness\nsometimes made her heart sick, when sitting by herself in the solitary\nroom. But by nature she was a gentle, meek, resigned, and happy being;\nand had she even been otherwise, the sorrow she had suffered, and the\nspirit of religion which her whole life had instilled, must have\nreconciled her to what was now her lot. Great cause had she to be glad.\nFar away as India was, and seemingly more remote in her imagination,\nloving letters came from her son there in almost every ship that sailed\nfor Britain; and if at times something delayed them, she came to believe\nin the necessity of such delays, and, without quaking, waited till the\nblessed letter did in truth appear. Of Edward, in Spain, she often\nheard\u2014though for him she suffered more than for the others. Not that she\nloved him better, for, like three stars, each possessed alike the calm\nheaven of her heart; but he was with Wellington, and the regiment in\nwhich he served seemed to be conspicuous in all skirmishes, and in every\nbattle. Henry, her youngest boy, who left her before he had finished his\nfourteenth year, she often heard from; his ship sometimes put into port;\nand once, to the terror and consternation of her loving and yearning\nheart, the young midshipman stood before her, with a laughing voice, on\nthe floor of the parlour, and rushed into her arms. He had got leave of\nabsence for a fortnight; and proudly, although sadly too, did she look\non her dear boy when he was sitting in the kirk with his uniform on, and\nhis war-weapons by his side\u2014a fearless and beautiful stripling, on whom\nmany an eye was insensibly turned even during service. And, to be sure,\nwhen the congregation were dismissed, and the young sailor came smiling\nout into the churchyard, never was there such a shaking of hands seen\nbefore. The old men blessed the gallant boy; many of the mothers looked\nat him not without tears; and the young maidens, who had heard that he\nhad been in a bloody engagement, and once nearly shipwrecked, gazed upon\nhim with unconscious blushes, and bosoms that beat with innocent\nemotion. A blessed week it was indeed that he was then with his mother;\nand never before had Sunnyside seemed so well to deserve its name.\n\nTo love, to fear, and to obey God, was the rule of this widow\u2019s life;\nand the time was near at hand when she was to be called upon to practise\nit in every silent, secret, darkest corner and recess of her afflicted\nspirit. Her eldest son, William, fell in storming a fort in India, as he\nled the forlorn-hope. He was killed dead in a moment, and fell into the\ntrench with all his lofty plumes. Edward was found dead at Talavera,\nwith the colours of his regiment tied round his body. And the ship in\nwhich Henry was on board, that never would have struck her flag to any\nhuman power sailing on the sea, was driven by a storm on a reef of\nrocks, went to pieces during the night, and of eight hundred men, not\nfifty were saved. Of that number Henry was not; but his body was found\nnext day on the sand, along with those of many of the crew, and buried,\nas it deserved, with all honours, and in a place where few but sailors\nslept.\n\nIn one month\u2014one little month\u2014did the tidings of the three deaths reach\nSunnyside. A government letter informed her of William\u2019s death in India,\nand added, that, on account of the distinguished character of the young\nsoldier, a small pension would be settled on his mother. Had she been\nstarving of want instead of blessed with competence, that word would\nhave had then no meaning to her ear. Yet true it is, that a human\u2014an\nearthly\u2014pride cannot be utterly extinguished, even by severest anguish,\nin a mother\u2019s heart, yea, even although her best hopes are garnered up\nin heaven; and the weeping widow could not help feeling it now, when,\nwith the black wax below her eyes, she read how her dead boy had not\nfallen in the service of an ungrateful state. A few days afterwards a\nletter came from himself, written in the highest spirits and tenderest\naffection. His mother looked at every word\u2014every letter\u2014every dash of\nthe pen;\u2014and still one thought\u2014one thought only, was in her soul;\u2014\u201cthe\nliving hand that traced these lines\u2014where, what is it now?\u201d But this was\nthe first blow only; ere the new moon was visible, the widow knew that\nshe was altogether childless.\n\nIt was in a winter hurricane that her youngest boy had perished; and the\nnames of those whose health had hitherto been remembered at every festal\nChristmas, throughout all the parish, from the castle to the humblest\nhut, were now either suppressed within the heart, or pronounced with a\nlow voice and a sigh. During three months, Sunnyside looked almost as if\nuninhabited. Yet the smoke from one chimney told that the childless\nwidow was sitting alone at her fireside; and when her only servant was\nspoken to at church, or on the village-green, and asked how her mistress\nwas bearing these dispensations, the answer was, that her health seemed\nlittle, if at all impaired, and that she talked of coming to divine\nservice in a few weeks, if her strength would permit. She had been seen\nthrough the leafless hedge standing at the parlour window, and had\nmotioned with her hand to a neighbour, who in passing, had uncovered his\nhead. Her weekly bounty to several poor and bedridden persons had never\nsuffered but one week\u2019s intermission. It was always sent to them on\nSaturday night; and it was on a Saturday night that all the parish had\nbeen thrown into tears, with the news that Henry\u2019s ship had been\nwrecked, and the brave boy drowned. On that evening she had forgotten\nthe poor.\n\nBut now the Spring had put forth her tender buds and blossoms\u2014had strewn\nthe black ground under the shrubs with flowers, and was bringing up the\nsoft, tender, and beautiful green over the awakening face of the earth.\nThere was a revival of the spirit of life and gladness over the garden,\nand the one encircling field of Sunnyside; and so likewise, under the\ngrace of God, was there a revival of the soul that had been sorrowing\nwithin its concealment. On the first sweet dewy Sabbath of May, the\nwidow was seen closing behind her the little white gate, which for some\nmonths her hand had not touched. She gave a gracious, but mournful\nsmile, to all her friends, as she passed on through the midst of them\nalong with the minister who had joined her on entering the churchyard;\nand although it was observed that she turned pale as she sat down in her\npew, with the Bibles and Psalm-books that had belonged to her sons lying\nbefore her, as they themselves had enjoined when they went away, yet her\nface brightened even as her heart began to burn within her at the simple\nmusic of the psalm. The prayers of the congregation had some months\nbefore been requested for her, as a person in great distress; and,\nduring service, the young minister, according to her desire, now said a\nfew simple words, that intimated to the congregation that the childless\nwidow was, through his lips, returning thanks to Almighty God, for that\nHe had not forsaken her in her trouble, but sent resignation and peace.\n\nFrom that day she was seen, as before, in her house, in her garden,\nalong the many pleasant walks all about the village; and in the summer\nevenings, though not so often as formerly, in the dwellings of her\nfriends, both high and low. From her presence a more gentle manner\nseemed to be breathed over the rude, and a more heartfelt delicacy over\nthe refined. Few had suffered as she had suffered; all her losses were\nsuch as could be understood, felt, and wept over by all hearts; and all\nboisterousness or levity of joy would have seemed an outrage on her,\nwho, sad and melancholy herself, yet wished all around her happy, and\noften lighted up her countenance with a grateful smile at the sight of\nthat pleasure which she could not but observe to be softened, sobered,\nand subdued for her sake.\n\nSuch was the account of her, her sorrow, and her resignation, which I\nreceived on the first visit I paid to a family near Castle-Holm, after\nthe final consummation of her grief. Well-known to me had all the dear\nboys been; their father and mine had been labourers in the same\nvineyard; and as I had always been a welcome visitor, when a boy, at the\nmanse of Castle-Holm, so had I been, when a man, at Sunnyside. Last time\nI had been there, it was during the holidays, and I had accompanied the\nthree boys on their fishing excursions to the lochs in the moor; and in\nthe evenings pursued with them their humble and useful studies. So I\ncould not leave Castle-Holm without visiting Sunnyside, although my\nheart misgave me, and I wished I could have delayed it till another\nsummer.\n\nI sent word that I was coming to see her, and I found her sitting in\nthat well-known little parlour where I had partaken the pleasure of so\nmany merry evenings with those whose laughter was now extinguished. We\nsat for awhile together speaking of ordinary topics, and then utterly\nsilent. But the restraint she had imposed upon herself she either\nthought unnecessary any longer, or felt it to be impossible; and rising\nup, went to a little desk, from which she brought forth three\nminiatures, and laid them down upon the table before us, saying, \u201cBehold\nthe faces of my three dead boys!\u201d\n\nSo bright, breathing, and alive did they appear, that for a moment I\nfelt impelled to speak to them, and to whisper their names. She beheld\nmy emotion, and said unto me, \u201cOh! could you believe that they are all\ndead? Does not that smile on Willie\u2019s face seem as if it were immortal?\ndo not Edward\u2019s sparkling eyes look so bright as if the mists of death\ncould never have overshadowed them? and think\u2014oh! think, that ever\nHenry\u2019s golden hair should have been dragged in the brine, and filled\nfull\u2014full, I doubt not, of the soiling sand!\u201d\n\nI put the senseless images one by one to my lips, and kissed their\nforeheads\u2014for dearly had I loved these three brothers; and then I shut\nthem up and removed them to another part of the room. I wished to speak,\nbut I could not; and, looking on the face of her who was before me, I\nknew that her grief would find utterance, and that not until she had\nunburdened her heart could it be restored to repose.\n\n\u201cThey would tell you, sir, that I bear my trials well; but it is not so.\nMany, many unresigned and ungrateful tears has my God to forgive in me,\na poor, weak, and repining worm. Almost every day, almost every night,\ndo I weep before these silent and beautiful phantoms; and when I wipe\naway the breath and mist of tears from their faces, there are they,\nsmiling continually upon me! Oh! death is a shocking thought, when it is\nlinked in love with creatures so young as these! More insupportable is\ngushing tenderness, than even dry despair; and, methinks, I could bear\nto live without them, and never to see them more, if I could only cease\nto pity them! But that can never be. It is for them I weep, not for\nmyself. If they were to be restored to life, would I not lie down with\nthankfulness into the grave? William and Edward were struck down, and\ndied, as they thought, in glory and triumph. Death to them was merciful.\nBut who can know, although they may try to dream of it in horror, what\nthe youngest of them, my sweet Harry, suffered, through that long dark\nhowling night of snow, when the ship was going to pieces on the rocks!\u201d\n\nThat last dismal thought held her for a while silent; and some tears\nstood in drops on her eyelashes, but seemed again to be absorbed. Her\nheart appeared unable to cling to the horrors of the shipwreck, although\nit coveted them; and her thoughts reverted to other objects. \u201cI walk\noften into the rooms where they used to sleep, and look on their beds\ntill I think I see their faces lying with shut eyes on their pillows.\nEarly in the morning do I often think I hear them singing; I awaken from\ntroubled unrest, as if the knock of their sportive hands were at my door\nsummoning me to rise. All their stated hours of study and of play, when\nthey went to school and returned from it, when they came into meals,\nwhen they said their prayers, when they went leaping at night to bed as\nlightsomely, after all the day\u2019s fatigue, as if they had just risen\u2014oh!\nSir, at all these times, and many, and many a time besides these, do I\nthink of them whom you loved.\u201d\n\nWhile thus she kept indulging the passion of her grief, she observed the\ntears I could no longer conceal; and the sight of my sorrow seemed to\ngive, for a time, a loftier character to hers, as if my weakness made\nher aware of her own, and she had become conscious of the character of\nher vain lamentations. \u201cYet, why should I so bitterly weep? Pain had not\ntroubled them\u2014passion had not disturbed them\u2014vice had not polluted them.\nMay I not say, \u2018My children are in heaven with their father?\u2019\u2014and ought\nI not, therefore, to dry up all these foolish tears now and for\nevermore?\u201d\n\nComposure was suddenly shed over her countenance, like gentle sunlight\nover a cheerless day, and she looked around the room as if searching for\nsome pleasant objects that eluded her sight. \u201cSee,\u201d said she, \u201cyonder\nare all their books, arranged just as Henry arranged them on his\nunexpected visit. Alas! too many of them are about the troubles and\nbattles of the sea! But it matters not now. You are looking at that\ndrawing. It was done by himself\u2014that is the ship he was so proud of,\nsailing in sunshine and a pleasant breeze. Another ship, indeed, was she\nsoon after, when she lay upon the reef! But as for the books, I take\nthem out of their places, and dust them, and return them to their\nplaces, every week. I used to read to my boys, sitting round my knees,\nout of many of these books, before they could read themselves; but now I\nnever peruse them, for their cheerful stories are not for me. But there\nis one Book I do read, and without it I should long ago have been dead.\nThe more the heart suffers, the more does it understand that Book. Never\ndo I read a single chapter, without feeling assured of something more\nawful in our nature than I felt before. My own heart misgives me; my own\nsoul betrays me; all my comforts desert me in a panic; but never yet\nonce did I read one whole page of the New Testament that I did not know\nthat the eye of God is on all His creatures, and on me like the rest,\nthough my husband and all my sons are dead, and I may have many years\nyet to live alone on the earth.\u201d\n\nAfter this we walked out into the little avenue, now dark with the deep\nrich shadows of summer beauty. We looked at that beauty, and spoke of\nthe surpassing brightness of the weather during all June, and advancing\nJuly. It is not in nature always to be sad; and the remembrance of all\nher melancholy and even miserable confessions was now like an uncertain\necho, as I beheld a placid smile on her face, a smile of such perfect\nresignation, that it might not falsely be called a smile of joy. We\nstood at the little white gate; and, with a gentle voice, that perfectly\naccorded with that expression, she bade God bless me; and then with\ncomposed steps, and now and then turning up, as she walked along, the\nmassy flower-branches of the laburnum, as, bent with their load of\nbeauty, they trailed upon the ground, she disappeared into that\nretirement which, notwithstanding all I had seen and heard, I could not\nbut think deserved almost to be called happy, in a world which even the\nmost thoughtless know is a world of sorrow.\n\n\n\n\n THE BATTLE OF THE BREEKS:\n _A PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF WILLIAM M\u2018GEE, WEAVER IN HAMILTON_.\n\n BY ROBERT MACNISH, LL.D.\n\n\nI often wonder when I think of the tribulations that men bring upon\nthemsels, through a want of gumption and common independence of speerit.\nThere now was I, for nae less than eighteen years, as henpeckit a man as\never wrocht at the loom. Maggie and me, after the first week of our\nmarriage, never forgathered weel thegither. There was something unco\ndour and imperious about her temper, although, I maun say, barring this\ndrawback, she was nae that ill in her way either,\u2014that is to say, she\nhad a sort of kindness about her, and behaved in a truly mitherly way to\nthe bairns, giein them a\u2019 things needfu\u2019 in the way of feeding and\nclaithing, so far as our means admitted. But, oh, man, for a\u2019 that, she\nwas a dour wife. There was nae pleasing her ae way or anither; and\nwhenever I heard the bell ringing for the kirk, it put me in mind of her\ntongue\u2014aye wag, wagging, and abusing me beyond bounds. In ae word, I was\na puir, broken-hearted man, and often wished myself in Abraham\u2019s bosom,\nawa frae the cares and miseries of this sinfu\u2019 world.\n\nI was just saying that folk often rin their heads into scrapes for want\nof a pickle natural spunk. Let nae man tell me that gude nature and\nsimpleecity will get on best in this world; na\u2014faith na. I hae had ower\nmuckle experience that way; and the langer I live has proved to me that\nmy auld maister, James Currie (him in the Quarry Loan), wasna sae far\nwrang when he alleged, in his droll, gude-humoured way, that a man\nshould hae enough o\u2019 the deil about him to keep the deil frae him. That\nwas, after a\u2019, ane of the wisest observes I hae heard of for a lang\ntime. Little did I opine that I would ever be obligated to mak use o\u2019t\nin my ain particular case:\u2014but, bide a wee, and ye shall see how it was\nbrocht about between me and Maggie.\n\nIt was on a wintry night when she set out to pick a quarrel wi\u2019 Mrs\nTodd, the huckster\u2019s wife, anent the price of a pickle flour which I had\nbought some days before, for making batter of, but which didna turn out\nsae weel as I expeckit, considering what was paid for\u2019t. Had I been\nconsulted, I would hae tell\u2019t her to bide at hame, and no fash her thumb\nabout the matter, which after a\u2019 was only an affair of three-ha\u2019pence\nfarthing, and neither here nor there. But, na; Maggie was nane o\u2019 the\nkind to let sic an object stan\u2019 by; so out she sets, wi\u2019 her red cloak\nabout her, and her black velvet bonnet\u2014that she had just that day got\nhame frae Miss Lorimer, the milliner\u2014upon her head. But I maun first\ntell what passed between her and me on this wonderful occasion.\n\n\u201cAnd now, my dear,\u201d quo\u2019 I, looking as couthy and humble as I could, and\npu\u2019ing my Kilmarnock nicht-cap a wee grain aff my brow in a kind of half\nrespectfu\u2019 fashion, \u201cwhat\u2019s this ye\u2019re ganging to be about? Odds, woman,\nI wadna gie a pirn for a\u2019 that has happened. What signifies a pickle\nflour, scrimp worth half a groat?\u201d\n\nFaith, I would better hae held my tongue, for nae sooner was the word\nuttered, than takin\u2019 haud of a can, half fu\u2019 o\u2019 ready-made dressing,\nwhich I was preparing to lay on a wab of blue check I was working for Mr\nAndrew Treddles, the Glasgow manufacturer\u2014I say, taking haud of this,\nshe let flee at my head like a cannon-ball. But Providence was kind, and\ninstead of knocking out my brains, as I had every reason to expeck, it\ngaed bang against our ain looking-glass, and shattered it into five\nhunder pieces. But I didna a\u2019thegither escape scaith\u2014the dressing having\nflown out as the can gaed by me, and plaistered a\u2019 my face ower in a\nmanner maist extraordinar to behold. By jingo! my spirit was roused at\nthis deadly attempt, and gin she hadna been my wife, I wad hae thrawn\nabout her neck, like a tappit-hen\u2019s. But, na\u2014I was henpeckit, and she\nhad sic a mastery ower me as nae persuasions of my ain judgment could\nowercome. Sae I could do naething but stan\u2019 glowering at her like a\nmoudiewart, while she poured out as muckle abuse as if I had been her\nflunkey, instead of her natural lord and master. Ance or twice I fand my\nnieves yeuking to gie her a clour by way of balancing accounts, but such\nwas the power of influence she had obtained, that I durstna cheep for my\nvery heart\u2019s blude. So awa she gaed on her errand, leaving me sittin\u2019 by\nthe fire to mak the best of my desperate condition.\n\n\u201cO, Nancy,\u201d said I to my dochter, as she sat mending her brither\u2019s sark,\nopposite to me, \u201cis na your mither an awfu\u2019 woman?\u201d\n\n\u201cI see naething awfu\u2019 about her,\u201d quo\u2019 the cratur; \u201cI think she servit\nye richt; and had I a man, I would just treat him in the same way, if he\ndaured to set his nose against onything I wanted.\u201d\n\nI declare to ye, when I heard this frae my ain flesh and blude, I was\nperfectly dumfoundered. The bairn I had brought up on my knee\u2014that used,\nwhen a wee thing, to come and sit beside me at the loom, and who was in\nthe custom of wheeling my pirns wi\u2019 her ain hand\u2014odds, man, it was\ndesperate. I couldna say anither word, but I faund a big tear come\nhap-happing ower my runkled cheeks, the first that had wet them sin\u2019 I\nwas a bit laddie rinnin\u2019 about before the schule door. What was her\nmither\u2019s abusiveness to this? A man may thole muckle frae his wife, but,\noh, the harsh words of an undutifu\u2019 bairn gang like arrows to his heart,\nand he weeps tears of real bitterness. I wasna angry at the lassie\u2014I was\nower grieved to be angered; and for the first time I fand that my former\nsufferings were only as a single thread to a hale hank of yarn, compared\nto them I suffered at this moment.\n\nA\u2019thegither, the thing was mair than I could stand, so rising up, I\nbetaks mysel to my but-an-ben neighbour, Andrew Brand. Andrew was an\nuncommon sagacious chiel, and, like mysel, a weaver to his trade. He was\nbeuk-learned, and had read a hantle on different subjects, so that he\nwas naturally looked up to by the folks round about, on account of his\ngreat lear. When onything gaed wrang about the Leechlee Street, where we\nlived, we were a\u2019 glad to consult him; and his advice was reckoned no\ngreatly behint that of Mr Meek, the minister. He was a great counter, or\n\u2019rithmetishian, as he ca\u2019d it; and it was thocht by mony gude judges\nthat he could handle a pen as weel as Mr Dick, the writing-master,\nhimsel. So, as I was saying, I stappit ben to Andrew\u2019s, to ask his\nadvice, but, odds! if ye ever saw a man in sic a desperate passion as he\nwas in when I tauld him how I had been used by my wife and dochter.\n\n\u201cWilliam M\u2018Gee,\u201d said he, raising his voice,\u2014it was a geyan strong\nane,\u2014\u201cye\u2019re an absolute gomeril. Oh, man, but ye\u2019re a henpeckit sumph! I\ntell ye, ye\u2019re a gawpus and a lauching-stock, and no worth the name of a\nman. Do ye hear that?\u201d\n\n\u201cO ay, I hear\u2019t very weel,\u201d quo\u2019 I, no that pleased at being sae spoken\nto, even by Andrew Brand, who was a man I could stamach a gude deal\nfrae, in the way of reproof\u2014\u201cI hear\u2019t a\u2019 weel eneuch, and am muckle\nobleeged to ye, nae doubt, for your consolation.\u201d\n\n\u201cHooly and fairly, William,\u201d said he in a kinder tone, for he saw I was\na degree hurt by his speech. \u201cCome, I was only joking ye, man, and ye\nmaunna tak onything amiss I hae said. But, really, William, I speak to\nye as a frien\u2019, and tell ye that ye are submitting to a tyranny which no\nman of common understanding ought to submit to. Is this no the land of\nliberty? Are we no just as free as the Duke in his grand palace down by;\nand has onybody a richt\u2014tell me that, William M\u2018Gee\u2014to tyranneeze ower\nanither as your wife does ower you! I\u2019ll no tell ye what to do, but I\u2019ll\njust tell ye what I would do if my wife and dochter treated me as yours\nhave treated you: losh, man, I would ding their harns about, and knock\ntheir heads thegither like twa curling-stanes. I would aye be master in\nmy ain house.\u201d\n\nThis was Andrew\u2019s advice, and I thocht it sounded geyan rational, only\nno very easy to be put in practice. Hoosomever, thinks I to mysel, I\u2019ll\nconsider about it, and gin I could only bring mysel to mak the\nexperiment, wha kens but I micht succeed to a miracle? On stapping back\nto my ain house, the first thing I did was to tak a thimblefu\u2019 of\nwhisky, by way of gieing me a pickle spunk, in case of ony fresh rumpus\nwi\u2019 the wife, and also to clear up my ideas; for I hae fand, that after\na lang spell at the loom, the thochts, as weel as the body, are like to\nget stupid and dozey. So I taks a drappie, and sits down quietly by the\nfireside, waiting for the return of Maggie frae scolding Mrs Todd about\nthe flour.\n\nIn she comes, a\u2019 in a flurry. Her face was as red as a peony rose, her\nbreathing cam fast, and she lookit a\u2019thegither like ane that has had a\nsair warsle wi\u2019 the tongue. But she was far frae being downcast. On the\ncontrair, she lookit as proud as a Turkey cock; and I saw wi\u2019 the tail\no\u2019 my ee that she had gained a gran\u2019 victory ower puir Mrs Todd, who was\na douce, quiet woman, and nae match for the like of her in randying. So\nshe began to stump and mak a great phrase about the way she had\noutcrawed the puir body; and was a\u2019thegither as upset about it as if\nDuke Hamilton had made her keeper of his palace. Losh! I was mad to\nhear\u2019t, and twa or three times had a gude mind to put in a word, to sic\na degree was my courage raised by the drap speerits; but aye as the\nwords were rising to my mouth, the thocht of the can and the dressing\nsent them back again, till they stuck like a bane in my throat. Very\nlikely I micht hae said ne\u2019er a word, and Andrew Brand\u2019s advice micht\nhae gane for naething, had it no been for the cratur Nancy, who was sae\nlifted up about her mither\u2019s dispute, that naething would sair her but\nto hae the hale affair mentioned cut and dry.\n\n\u201cAnd did ye cast up to Mrs Todd, mither,\u201d quo\u2019 the little cutty, \u201cthat\nshe was fat?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, that I did,\u201d said Maggie. \u201cI tell\u2019t her she was like a barn-door. I\ntell\u2019t her she was like the side of a house. \u2018Ye\u2019re a sow,\u2019 quo\u2019 I; \u2018ye\nget fou every hour of the day, wi\u2019 your lump of a gudeman!\u2019\u201d\n\nBut this wasna a\u2019\u2014for nae sooner had Maggie answered her dochter\u2019s first\nquestion, than the cratur was ready wi\u2019 anither: \u201cAnd, mither, did ye\ncast up to her that her faither was a meeser?\u201d\n\n\u201cAtweel did I, Nancy,\u201d answered the gudewife. \u201cI tell\u2019t her a\u2019 that. I\ncoost up to her that her faither was a meeser, and would ride to Lunnon\non a louse, and mak breeks of its skin, and candles of its tallow.\u201d\n\nI could thole this nae langer. I fand the hale man working within me,\nand was moved to a pitch of daring, mair like madness than onything\nelse. Faith, the whisky was of gude service now, and so was Andrew\nBrand\u2019s advice. I accordingly steekit my nieves wi\u2019 desperation, threw\nawa my cowl, tucked up my sark sleeves,\u2014for my coat happened to be aff\nat the time,\u2014and got up frae the three-footed stool I had been sitting\nupon in the twinkling of an ee. I trumbled a\u2019 ower, but whether it was\nwi\u2019 fear, or wi\u2019 anger, or wi\u2019 baith put thegither, it would be\ndifficult to say. I was in an awfu\u2019 passion, and as fairce as a papist.\n\n\u201cAnd so,\u201d said I, \u201cye coost up sic things to the honest woman, Mrs Todd!\nO, Maggie M\u2018Gee, Maggie M\u2018Gee, are ye no ashamed of yoursel?\u201d\n\n\u2019Od it would hae dune your heart gude to see how she glowered at me. She\nwas bewildered, and lookit as if to see whether I was mysel, and no some\nither body. But her evil speerit didna lie lang asleep; it soon broke\nout like a squib on the king\u2019s birthday, and I saw that I maun now stand\nfirm, or be a dead man for ever.\n\n\u201cHas your faither been at the whisky bottle?\u201d said she to her dochter.\n\u201cHe looks as if he was the waur of drink.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe had a glass just before ye cam in,\u201d answered the wicked jimpey; and\nscarcely had she spoken the word, when Maggie flew upon me like a\nteeger, and gied me a skelp on the cheek wi\u2019 her open loof, that made me\nturn round tapwise on the middle of the floor. Seeing that affairs were\ncome to this pass, I saw plainly that I maun go on, no forgetting in sae\ndoing my frien\u2019 Andrew\u2019s advice, as also my auld master Tammas Currie\u2019s\nobserve, anent a man ha\u2019eing aneuch of the deil in his temper to keep\nthe deil awa frae him. So I picked up a\u2019 the spunk I had in me, besides\nwhat I had frae the drap whisky; and fa\u2019ing to, I gied her sic a\nleathering as never woman got in her born days. In ae word, she met wi\u2019\nher match, and roared aloud for mercy; but this I would on nae account\ngrant, till she promised faithfully that, in a\u2019 time coming, she would\nacknowledge me as her lord and maister, and obey me in everything as a\ndutiful wife should her husband.\n\nAs soon as this was settled, in stappit Andrew Brand. At the sight of my\nwife greeting, and me sae fairce, he held up his hands wi\u2019 astonishment.\n\n\u201cWilliam M\u2018Gee,\u201d quo\u2019 he, \u201cit\u2019s no possible that ye\u2019re maister in this\nhouse!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s no only possible, but it\u2019s true, Andrew,\u201d was my answer; and,\ntaking me by the hand, he wished me joy for my speerit and success.\n\nSae far, sae weel; the first grand stroke was made, but there was\nsomething yet to do. I had discharged a\u2019 outstanding debts wi\u2019 my wife,\nand had brocht her to terms; but I had yet to reduce my bairns to their\nsenses, and show them that I was _their_ lord and maister, as weel as\ntheir mither\u2019s. Puir things! my heart was wae for them, for they were\nsairly miseducated, and held me in nae mair estimation, than if I had\nbeen ane of my ain wabster lads. So, just wi\u2019 a view to their gude, I\ntook down a pair of teuch ben-leather taws, weel burnt at the\nfinger-ends, and gied Nancy as mony cracks ower the bare neck, as set\nher squeeling beyond a\u2019 bounds. It was pitifu\u2019 to see the cratur, how\nshe skipped about the room, and ran awa to her mither, to escape my\nfaitherly rage. But a\u2019 assistance frae that quarter was at an end now;\nand she was fain to fa\u2019 down on her knees, and beg my forgiveness, and\npromise to conduct hersel as became my dochter, in a\u2019 time coming.\n\nJust at this moment, in comes wee Geordie, greeting for his parritch. He\nkent naething of what had taken place in the house; and, doubtless,\nexpeckit to mak an idiot of me, his faither, as he had been accustomed\nto do, almost frae his very cradle. I saw that now was the time to\nthresh the corruption out of him; and brandishing the taws ower my head,\nI made a stap forrit to lay hand upon him, and treat him like the lave.\nHe looked as if he had an inkling of what was forthcoming, and ran\nwhinging and craiking to his mither, who stood wiping her een wi\u2019 her\nstriped apron in a corner of the room. The terrified laddie clang to her\nknees, but she never offered to lend a helping hand, sae great was the\nsalutary terror wi\u2019 which I had inspired her. So I pu\u2019d him awa frae her\ncoats, to which he was clinging; and, laying him ower my knee, I gied\nhim hipsie-dipsie in the presence of his mither, his sister, and Andrew\nBrand, who were looking on.\n\nAnd thus hae I, who for eighteen years was ruled by my wife, got the\nupper hand; and ony man who is henpeckit as I hae been, should just tak\nthe same plan, and his success will be as sure as mine. Andrew Brand aye\nsaid to me that a man should wear his ain breeks; and I can maintain,\nfrae present experience, that a wiser saying is no to be found in the\nProverbs of Solomon, the son of David. No that Maggie hasna tried nows\nand thans to recover her lost power, but I hae on thae occasions\nconduckit mysel wi\u2019 sic firmness, that she has at last gien it up as a\nbad job, and is now as obedient a wife as ye\u2019ll meet wi\u2019 between this\nand Bothwell. The twa bairns, too, are just wonderfully changed, and are\nas raisonable as can be expeckit, a\u2019 things considered. Let men,\ntherefore, whether gentle or simple, follow my plan, and the word\n\u201chenpeckit,\u201d as Andrew Brand says, will soon slip out of the dictionair.\n\n\n\n\n MY SISTER KATE.\n\n BY ANDREW PICKEN.\n\n\nThere is a low road (but it is not much frequented, for it is terribly\nround about) that passes at the foot of the range of hills that skirt\nthe long and beautiful gut or firth of the Clyde, in the west of\nScotland; and as you go along this road, either up or down, the sea or\nfirth is almost at your very side, the hills rising above you; and you\nare just opposite to the great black and blue mountains on the other\nside of the gut, that sweep in heavy masses, or jut out in bold capes,\nat the mouth of the deep lochs that run up the firth into the\npicturesque highlands of Argyleshire.\n\nYou may think of the scene what you please, because steam-boating has,\nof late years, profaned it somewhat into commonness, and defiled its\npure air with filthy puffs of coal smoke; and because the Comet and all\nher unfortunate passengers were sunk to the bottom of this very part of\nthe firth; and because, a little time previous, a whole boatful of poor\nHighland reaper girls were all run down in the night-time, while they\nwere asleep, and drowned near the Clough lighthouse hard by; but if you\nwere to walk this road by the seaside any summer afternoon, going\ntowards the bathing village of Gourock, you would say, as you looked\nacross to the Highlands, and up the Clyde towards the rocks of Dumbarton\nCastle, that there are few scenes more truly magnificent and\ninteresting.\n\nThere is a little village exactly opposite to you, looking across the\nfirth, which is called Dunoon, and contains the burying-place of the\ngreat house of Argyle; and which, surrounded by a patch of green\ncultivated land, sloping pleasantly from the sea, and cowering snugly by\nitself, with its picturesque cemetery, under the great blue hills\nfrowning behind, looks, from across the firth, absolutely like a\ntasteful little haunt of the capricious spirit of romance.\n\nWell, between this road on the lowland side of the firth, and the\nwater\u2019s-edge, and before it winds off round by the romantic seat of Sir\nMichael Shaw Stewart, farther up, there stand, or stood, two or three\nsmall fishing cottages which, from the hills nearly over them, looked\njust like white shells, of a large size, dropped fancifully down upon\nthe green common between the hills and the road. In these cottages, it\nwas observed, the fishermen had numerous families, who, while young,\nassisted them in their healthful employment; and that the girls, of\nwhich there were a number, were so wild in their contented seclusion,\nthat if any passenger on the road stopped to observe them, as they sat\nin groups on the green mending their father\u2019s nets, they would take\nalarm, and rise and run off like fawns, and hide among the rocks by the\nsea, or trip back into the cottages. Now it happened, once on a time,\nthat a great event took place to one of the cottager\u2019s daughters, which,\nfor a long period, deranged and almost destroyed the happy equality in\nwhich they had hitherto lived; and becoming the theme of discourse and\ninquiry concerning things beyond the sphere of the fisher people and all\ntheir neighbours as far as Gourock, introduced among them no small\ndegree of ambition and discontent.\n\nThere was one of the fishermen, a remarkably decent, well disposed\nHighlandman, from the opposite shore of Argyleshire, named Martin\nM\u2018Leod, and he had two daughters, the youngest of which, as was no\nuncommon case, turned out to be remarkably and even delicately\nbeautiful.\n\nBut nobody ever saw or thought anything about the beauty of Catherine\nM\u2018Leod, except it might be some of the growing young men in the\nneighbouring cottages, several of whom began, at times, to look at her\nwith a sort of wonder, and seemed to feel a degree of awe in her\ncompany; while her family took an involuntary pride in her beyond all\nthe others; and her eldest sister somehow imitated her in every thing,\nand continually quoted her talk, and trumpeted about among the\nneighbours what was said and done by \u201cmy sister Kate.\u201d\n\nThings continued in this way as Kate grew to womankind; and she was the\nliveliest little body about the place, and used to sing so divertingly\nat the house-end, as she busied herself about her father\u2019s fishing gear,\nand ran up and down \u201camong the brekans on the brae,\u201d behind the\ncottages, or took her wanderings off all the way to the Clough\nlighthouse at the point. I say things continued in this way until a\ngentleman, who, it turned out, was all the way from London, came to\nlodge in Greenock, or Gourock, or Inverkip, or somewhere not very far\ndistant; and, being a gentleman, and, of course, at liberty to do every\nsort of out-of-the-way thing that he pleased, he got a manner of coming\ndown and wandering about among the cottages, and asking questions\nconcerning whatever he chose of the fishermen; and then it was not long\nuntil he got his eyes upon Kate.\n\n\u201cThe gentleman,\u201d as her sister used to tell afterwards, \u201cwas perfectly\nill, and smitten at once about our Kate. He was not able,\u201d she said, \u201cto\ntake the least rest, but was down constantly about us for weeks; and\nthen he got to talking to and walking with Kate, she linking her arm in\nhis beneath the hill, just as it had been Sir Michael Stewart and my\nlady; and then such presents as he used to bring for her, bought in the\ngrand shop of Bailie Macnicol, at Greenock; gowns, and shawls, and\nveils, and fine chip hats, never speaking of ribbons, and lace edging,\nand mob caps\u2014perfectly beautiful.\u201d\n\nThe whole of the fishermen\u2019s daughters became mad with envy of poor\nKate, and admiration of her new dress, which some said was mostly bought\nby her father after all, who wanted to have his daughter made a lady of;\nand now nothing was heard in the hamlet but murmurings and discontented\ncomplaints; every girl looking at herself in the little cracked glass\nthat her father used to shave by, to see if she were pretty, and wishing\nand longing, not only for a lover of her own, but even for a gentleman.\nSo, as matters grew serious, and the gentleman was fairly in love, old\nMartin M\u2018Leod, who looked sharply after Kate, behoved to have sundry\nconversations with the gentleman about her; and masters being appointed\nto teach her right things, which the fisher folks never heard of, but\nwhich were to turn her into a lady, Kate and the gentleman, after a\ntime, were actually married in Greenock new church, and set off for\nLondon.\n\nDuring all this time, there were various opinions among the fisher\npeople, how that Kate never was particularly in love with the gentleman;\nand some even said that she was in love with somebody else (for pretty\nmaidens must always be in love), or, at least, that some of the youths\nof the neighbourhood were in love with her; but then the old folks said,\nthat love was only for gentle people who could afford to pay for it; and\nthat when a gentleman was pleased to fall in love, no one had a right to\nsay him nay, or pretend to set up against him. Some of the young women,\nto be sure, ventured to contest this doctrine, and cited various cases\nfrom the authority of printed ballads bought at the Greenock fair, at a\nhalfpenny each; and also from the traditionary literature of\nArgyleshire, which was couched in the mellifluous numbers of the Gaelic\nlanguage; but, however this might be, the fame of Catherine M\u2018Leod\u2019s\nhappy marriage and great fortune was noised abroad exceedingly, among\nthe fisher people throughout these coasts, as well as about Gourock and\nall the parts adjacent.\n\nAs to the gentleman, it was found out that his name was Mr Pounteney,\nand that little Kate M\u2018Leod was now Mrs Pounteney, and a great London\nlady, but what quality of a gentleman Mr Pounteney really was, was a\nmatter of much controversy and discussion. Some said that he was a great\ngentleman, and others thought that, from various symptoms, he was not a\nvery great gentleman; some went so far as to say he was a lord or a\nprince, while others maintained that he was only a simple esquire.\n\nNothing, therefore, could be talked of wherever Flora M\u2018Leod went, but\nabout \u201cmy sister Kate;\u201d and she was quite in request everywhere, because\nshe could talk of the romantic history and happy fortune of her lucky\nsister. Mrs Pounteney\u2019s house in London, therefore, Mrs Pounteney\u2019s\ngrand husband, and Mrs Pounteney\u2019s coach, excited the admiration and the\ndiscontent of all the fishermen\u2019s daughters, for many miles round this\nromantic seacoast, and these quiet cottages under the hills, where the\nsimple people live upon their fish, and did not know that they were\nhappy. Many a long summer\u2019s day, as the girls sat working their nets on\na knoll towards the sea, the sun that shone warm upon their indolent\nlimbs on the grass, and the breeze that blew from the firth, or swept\nround from the flowery woods of Ardgowan, seemed less grateful and\ndelicious, from their discontented imaginings about the fortune of Mrs\nPounteney; and many a sweet and wholesome supper of fresh boiled fish\nwas made to lose its former relish, or was even embittered by obtrusive\ndiscourse about the fine wines and the gilded grandeur of \u201cmy sister\nKate.\u201d Even the fisher lads in the neighbourhood\u2014fine fearless\nyouths\u2014found a total alteration in their sweethearts; their discourse\nwas not relished, their persons were almost despised; and there was now\nno happiness found for a fisherman\u2019s daughter, but what was at least to\napproach to the state of grandeur and felicity so fortunately obtained\nby \u201cmy sister Kate.\u201d\n\nThe minds of Kate\u2019s family were so carried by her great fortune, that\nvague wishes and discontented repinings followed their constant\nmeditations upon her lucky lot. Flora had found herself above marrying a\nfisherman; and a young fellow called Bryce Cameron, who had long waited\nfor her, and whose brother, Allan, was once a sweetheart of Kate\u2019s\nherself, being long ago discarded; and she, not perceiving any chances\nof a gentleman making his appearance to take Bryce\u2019s place, became\nmelancholy and thoughtful; she began to fear that she was to have\nnobody, and her thoughts ran constantly after London and Mrs Pounteney.\nWith these anxious wishes, vague hopes began to mix of some lucky turn\nto her own fortune, if she were only in the way of getting to be a lady;\nand at length she formed the high wish, and even the adventurous\nresolve, of going all the way to London, just to get one peep at her\nsister\u2019s happiness.\n\nWhen this ambition seized Flora M\u2018Leod, she let the old people have no\nrest, nor did she spare any exertion to get the means of making her\nproposed pilgrimage to London. In the course of a fortnight from its\nfirst serious suggestion, she, with a gold guinea in her pocket, and two\none-pound notes of the Greenock Bank, besides other coins and valuables,\nand even a little old-fashioned Highland brooch, with which the quondam\nlover of her sister, Allan Cameron, had the temerity to intrust to her,\nto be specially returned into the hand of the great lady when she should\nsee her, besides a hundred other charges and remembrances from the\nneighbours, she set off one dewy morning in summer, carrying her shoes\nand stockings in her hand, to make her way to London, to get a sight of\neverything great, and particularly of her happy sister Kate.\n\nMany a weary mile did Flora M\u2018Leod walk, and ride, and sail, through\nunknown places, and in what she called foreign parts; for strange things\nand people met her eye, and long dull regions of country passed her like\na rapid vision, as she was wheeled towards the great capital, and proper\ncentre of England. After travelling to a distance that was to her\nperfectly amazing, she was set down in London, and inquired her way, in\nthe best English she could command, into one of those long brick\nstreets, of dark and dull gentility, to which she was directed; and\nafter much trouble and some expense, at length found the door of her\nsister\u2019s house. She stood awhile considering, on the steps of the\nmansion, and felt a sort of fear of lifting the big iron knocker that\nseemed to grin down upon her; for she was not in the habit of knocking\nat great folk\u2019s doors, and almost trembled lest somebody from within\nwould frown her into nothing, even by their high and lofty looks.\n\nAnd yet she thought the house was not so dreadfully grand after all;\u2014not\nat all such as she had imagined, for she had passed houses much bigger\nand grander than this great gentleman\u2019s; it was not even the largest in\nits own street, and looked dull and dingy, and shut up with blinds and\nrails, having a sort of melancholy appearance.\n\nBut she must not linger, but see what was inside. She lifted up the iron\nknocker, and as it fell the very clang of it, and its echo inside, smote\nupon her heart with a sensation of strange apprehension. A powdered man\nopened it, and stared at her with an inquisitive and impertinent look,\nthen saucily asked what she wanted. Flora courtesied low to the servant\nfrom perfect terror, saying she wanted to see Mrs Pounteney.\n\n\u201cAnd what can _you_ want with Mrs Pounteney, young woman, I should like\nto know?\u201d said the fellow; for Flora neither looked like a milliner\u2019s\nwoman nor any other sort of useful person likely to be wanted by a lady.\n\nFlora had laid various pretty plans in her own mind, about taking her\nsister by surprise, and seeing how she would look at her before she\nspoke, and so forth; at least she had resolved not to affront her by\nmaking herself known as her sister before the servants; but the man\nlooked at her with such suspicion, and spoke so insolently, that she\nabsolutely began to fear, from the interrogations of this fellow, that\nshe would be refused admittance to her own sister, and was forced to\nexplain and reveal herself before the outer door was fully opened to\nher. At length she was conducted, on tiptoe, along a passage, and then\nupstairs, until she was placed in a little back dressing-room. The\nservant then went into the drawing-room, where sat two ladies at\nopposite sides of the apartment, there to announce Flora\u2019s message.\n\nOn a sofa, near the window, sat a neat youthful figure, extremely\nelegantly formed, but _petite_, with a face that need not be described,\nfurther than that the features were small and pretty, and that, as a\nwhole, it was rich in the nameless expression of simple beauty. Her\ndress could not have been plainer, to be of silk of the best sort; but\nthe languid discontent, if not melancholy, with which the female, yet\nquite in youth, gazed towards the window, or bent over a little silk\nnetting with which she carelessly employed herself, seemed to any\nobserver strange and unnatural at her time of life. At a table near the\nfire was seated a woman, almost the perfect contrast to this interesting\nfigure, in the person of Mr Pounteney\u2019s eldest sister, a hard-faced,\nbusiness-like person, who, with pen and ink before her, seemed busy\namong a parcel of household accounts, and the characteristic\naccompaniment of a bunch of keys occasionally rattling at her elbow.\n\nThe servant approached, as if fearful of being noticed by \u201cthe old one,\u201d\nas he was accustomed to call Miss Pounteney, and in a half whisper\nintimated to the little figure that a female wanted to see her.\n\n\u201cEh! what!\u2014what is it you say, John?\u201d cried the lady among the papers,\nnoticing this man\u0153uvre of the servant.\n\n\u201cNothing, Madam; it is a person that wants my lady.\u201d\n\n\u201cYour lady, sirrah; it must be me!\u2014Eh! what!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, Madam; she wants to see Mrs Pounteney particularly.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, John!\u201d said the little lady on the sofa; \u201cjust refer her to Miss\nPounteney. There is nobody can want me.\u201d\n\n\u201cWants to see Mrs Pounteney particularly!\u201d resumed the sister-in-law:\n\u201chow dare you bring in such a message, sirrah? Mrs Pounteney\nparticularly, indeed! Who is she, sirrah! Who comes here with such a\nmessage while I am in the house?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou must be mistaken, John,\u201d said the little lady sighing, who was once\nthe lively Kate M\u2018Leod of the fishing cottage in Scotland; \u201cjust let\nMiss Pounteney speak to her, you need not come to me.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, madam,\u201d said the servant, addressing Miss Pounteney, the natural\npertness of his situation now returning to overcome his dread of \u201cthe\nold one.\u201d \u201cThis young person wants to see my mistress directly, and I\nhave put her into her dressing-room; pray, ma\u2019am, go,\u201d he added,\nrespectfully, to the listless Kate.\n\n\u201cDo you come here to give _your_ orders, sirrah?\u201d exclaimed Miss\nPounteney, rising like a fury, and kicking the footstool half way across\nthe room, \u201cand to put strange people of your own accord into any\ndressing-room in this house! and to talk of _your mistress_, and wanting\nto speak to her directly, and privately, while _I_ am here! I wonder\nwhat sister Becky would say, or Mr Pounteney, if he were at home!\u201d\n\n\u201cWho is it, John? Do just bring her here, and put an end to this!\u201d said\nKate, imploringly, to the man.\n\n\u201cMadam,\u201d said John at last to his trembling mistress, \u201cit is your\nsister!\u201d\n\n\u201cWho, John?\u201d cried Kate, starting to her feet; \u201cmy sister Flora\u2014my own\nsister, from Clyde side! Speak, John, are you sure?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, Madam, your sister from Scotland.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, where is she, where is she? Let me go!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no; you must be mistaken, John,\u201d said the lady with the keys,\nstepping forward to interrupt the anxious Kate. \u201cJohn, this is all a\nmistake,\u201d she added, smoothly; \u201cMrs Pounteney has no sister! John, you\nmay leave the room;\u201d and she gave a determined look to the other sister,\nwho stood astonished.\n\nThe moment the servant left the room, Miss Pounteney came forward, and\nstood in renewed rage over the fragile, melancholy Kate, and burst out\nwith \u201cWhat is this, Kate? Is it really possible, after what you know of\nmy mind, and all our minds, that you have dared to bring your poor\nrelations into my brother\u2019s house? That it is not enough that we are to\nhave the disgrace of your mean connections, but we are to have your\nsisters and brothers to no end coming into the very house, and sending\nup their beggarly names and designations by the very servants! Kate, I\nmust not permit this. I will not\u2014I shall not;\u201d and she stamped with\nrage.\n\n\u201cOh, Miss Pounteney,\u201d said Kate, with clasped hands, \u201cwill you not let\nme go and see my sister? Will you just let me go and weep on the neck of\nmy poor Flora? I will go to a private place\u2014I will go to another house,\nif you please; I will do anything when I return to you, if I ever\nreturn, for I care not if I never come into this unhappy house more!\u201d\nand, uttering this, almost with a shriek, she burst past the two women,\nand ran through the rooms to seek her sister.\n\nMeantime, Flora had sat so long waiting, without seeing her sister, that\nshe began to feel intense anxiety; and, fancying her little Kate wished\nto forget her, because she was poor, had worked herself up into a\nresolution of assumed coldness, when she heard a hurried step, and the\ndoor was instantly opened. Kate paused for a moment after her entrance,\nand stood gazing upon the companion of her youth, with a look of such\npassionate joy, that Flora\u2019s intended coldness was entirely subdued; and\nthe two sisters rushed into each other\u2019s arms in all the ecstacy of\nsisterly love.\n\n\u201cOh, Flora, Flora! my dear happy Flora!\u201d cried Kate, when she could get\nwords, after the first burst of weeping; \u201chave you really come all the\nway to London to see me?\u2014poor me!\u201d and her tears and sobs were again\nlike to choke her. \u201cKate\u2014my dear little Kate!\u201d said Flora, \u201cthis is not\nthe way I expected to find you. Do not greet so dreadfully; surely you\nare not happy, Kate?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut _you_ are happy,\u201d said Kate, weeping. \u201cAnd how is my good Highland\nfather, and mother, and my brother Daniel? Ah! I think, Flora, your\nclothes have the very smell of the seashore, and of the bark of the\nnets, and of the heather hills of Argyleshire. Alas the happy days you\nremind me of, Flora!\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd so, Kate, you are not so _very_ happy, after all,\u201d said Flora,\nlooking incredulously in her face; \u201cand you are so thin, and pale, and\nyour eyes are so red; and yet you have such a grand house, Kate! Tell me\nif you are really not happy.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have no house, Flora,\u201d said Kate, after a little, \u201cand, I may say, no\nhusband. They are both completely ruled by his two vixen sisters, who\nkept house for him before he married me, and still have the entire\nascendancy over him. My husband, too, is not naturally good tempered;\nyet he once loved me, and I might enjoy some little happiness in this\nnew life, if he had the feeling, or the spirit, to treat me as his wife,\nand free himself and the house from the dominion of his sisters,\nespecially the eldest. But I believe he is rather disappointed in his\nambitious career, and in the hopes he entertained of matches for his\nsisters, and he is somewhat sour and unhappy; and I have to bear it all,\nfor he is afraid of these women; and I, the youngest in the family, and\nthe only one who has a chance of being good tempered, am, on account of\nmy low origin, forced to bear the spleen of all in this unhappy house.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Kate, surely your husband would not behave so bad as to cast up to\nyou that your father was a fisherman, when he took you from the bonnie\nseaside himself, and when he thought himself once so happy to get you?\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas! he does indeed!\u2014too often\u2014too often\u2014when he is crossed abroad,\nand when his sisters set him on; and it so humbles me, Flora, when I am\nsitting at his table, that I cannot lift my head; and I am so sad, and\nso heart-broken among them all!\u201d\n\n\u201cBless me! and can people be really so miserable,\u201d said Flora, simply,\n\u201cwho have plenty of money, and silk dresses to wear every day they\nrise?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is little you know, my happy Flora, of artificial life here in\nLondon,\u201d said Kate, mournfully. \u201cAs for dress, I cannot even order one\nbut as my sister-in-law chooses; and as for happiness, I have left it\nbehind me on the beautiful banks of the Clyde. O that I were there\nagain!\u201d\n\n\u201cPoor little Kate!\u201d said Flora, wistfully looking again in her sister\u2019s\nface; \u201cand is that the end of all your grand marriage, that has set a\u2019\nthe lasses crazy, from the Fairlie Roads to Gourock Point? I think I\u2019ll\ngang back and marry Bryce Cameron after a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs Allan Cameron married yet?\u201d said Kate, sadly. \u201cWhen did you see\nblithe and bonnie Allan Cameron?\u2014Alas the day!\u201d\n\n\u201cHe gave me this brooch to return to you, Kate,\u201d said Flora, taking the\nbrooch out of her bosom. \u201cI wish he had not gien it to me for you, for\nyou\u2019re vexed enough already.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! well you may say I am vexed enough,\u201d said she, weeping and\ncontemplating the brooch. \u201cTell Allan Cameron that I am sensible I did\nnot use him well\u2014that my vain heart was lifted up; but I have suffered\nfor it; many a sad and sleepless night I have lain in my bed, and\nthought of the delightful days I spent near my father\u2019s happy cottage in\nScotland, and about you, and about Allan. Alas! just tell him not to\nthink more of me; for I am a sad and sorry married woman, out of my own\nsphere, and afraid to speak to my own people, panting my heart out and\ndying by inches, like the pretty silver fish that floundered on the hard\nstones, after my father had taken them out of their own clear water.\u201d\n\n\u201cGod help you, Kate!\u201d said Flora, rising; \u201cyou will break my heart with\ngrief about you. Let me out of this miserable house! Let me leave you\nand all your grandeur, since I cannot help you; and I will pray for you,\nmy poor Kate, every night at my bedside, when I get back to the bonnie\nshore of Argyleshire.\u201d\n\nSad was the parting of the two weeping sisters, and many a kiss of\nfraternal affection embittered, yet sweetened, the hour; and anxious was\nFlora M\u2018Leod to turn her back upon the great city of London, and to\njourney northwards to her own home in Scotland.\n\nIt was a little before sundown, on a Saturday evening, shortly after\nthis, that a buzz of steam let off at the Mid Quay of Greenock,\nindicated that a steamboat had come in; and it proved to be from the\nfair seaport of Liverpool, having on board Flora M\u2018Leod, just down from\nLondon. The boat as it passed had been watched by the cottagers where\nshe lived up the Firth; and several of them, their day\u2019s work being\nover, set out towards the Clough to see if there was any chance of\nmeeting Flora.\n\nMany were the congratulations, and more the inquiries, when they met\nFlora, lumbering homewards with her bundle and her umbrella, weary and\nlooking anxiously out for her own sweet cottage by Clyde side. \u201cAh,\nFlora! is this you!\u201d cried the whole at once; \u201cand are you really here\nagain! And how is your sister, and all the great people in London? And,\nindeed, it is very good of you not to look the least proud, after coming\nfrom such a grand place!\u201d\n\nWith such congratulations was Flora welcomed again among the\nlight-hearted fisher people in the West of Scotland. But it was observed\nthat her tone was now quite altered, and her own humble contentment had\ncompletely returned. In short, to bring our story to a close, she was\nshortly after married to Bryce Cameron, and various other marriages soon\nfollowed; for she gave such an account of what she had seen with her\neyes, that a complete revolution took place in the sentiments of the\nwhole young people of the neighbourhood.\n\nIt was observed in the hamlet that the unhappy Mrs Pounteney was never\nnamed after this by any but with a melancholy shake of the head; the\nambition of the girls to get gentlemen seemed quite extinguished, and\nFlora in time began to nurse children of her own in humble and pious\ncontentment.\u2014_The Dominie\u2019s Legacy._\n\n\n\n\n WAT THE PROPHET.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, \u201cTHE ETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\nAbout sixty years ago[4] there departed this life an old man, who, for\nsixty years previous to that, was known only by the name of Wat the\nProphet. I am even uncertain what his real surname was, though he was\nfamiliarly known to the most of my relatives of that day, and I was\nintimately acquainted with his nephew and heir, whose name was\nPaterson,\u2014yet I hardly think that was the prophet\u2019s surname, but that\nthe man I knew was a maternal nephew. So far, I am shortcoming at the\nvery outset of my tale, for in truth I never heard him distinguished by\nany other name than Wat the Prophet.[5]\n\nFootnote 4:\n\n This interesting account of a very extraordinary character was\n contributed to the _Edinburgh Literary Journal_ in 1829.\n\nFootnote 5:\n\n The old prophet\u2019s surname was Laidlaw, being of a race that has\n produced more singular characters than any of our country.\n\nHe must have been a very singular person in every respect. In his youth\nhe was so much more clever and acute than his fellows, that he was\nviewed as a sort of phenomenon, or rather \u201ca kind of being that had mair\nairt than his ain.\u201d It was no matter what Wat tried, for either at\nmental or manual exertion he excelled; and his gifts were so\nmiscellaneous, that it was no wonder his most intimate acquaintances\nrather stood in awe of him. At the sports of the field, at the\nexposition of any part of Scripture, at prayer, and at mathematics, he\nwas altogether unequalled. By this, I mean in the sphere of his\nacquaintance in the circle in which he moved, for he was the son of a\nrespectable farmer who had a small property. In the last-mentioned art\nhis comprehension is said to have been truly wonderful. He seemed to\nhave an intuitive knowledge of the science of figures from beginning to\nend, and needed but a glance at the rules to outgo his masters.\n\nBut this was not all. In all the labours of the field his progress was\nequally unaccountable. He could with perfect ease have mown as much hay\nas two of the best men, sown as much, reaped as much, shorn as many\nsheep, and smeared as many, and with a little extra exertion could have\nequalled the efforts of three ordinary men at any time. As for\nploughing, or any work with horses, he would never put a hand to it, for\nhe then said he had not the power of the labour himself. However\nunaccountable all this may be, it is no fabrication; I have myself heard\nseveral men tell, who were wont to shear and smear sheep with him, when\nhe was a much older man than they, that even though he would have been\nengaged in some fervent demonstration, in spite of all they could do,\n\u201che was aye popping off twa sheep, or maybe three, for their ane.\u201d\n\nI could multiply anecdotes of this kind without number, but these were\nmere atoms of the prophet\u2019s character\u2014a sort of excrescences, which were\nnevertheless in keeping with the rest, being matchless of their kind. He\nwas intended by his parents for the Church\u2014that is the Church of the\nCovenant, to which they belonged. I know not if Wat had consented\nthereto, but his education tended that way. However, as he said himself,\nhe was born for a higher destiny, which was to reveal the future will of\nGod to mankind for ever and ever. I have been told that he committed\nmany of his prophecies to writing; and I believe it, for he was a\nscholar, and a man of rather supernatural abilities; but I have never\nbeen able to find any of them. I have often heard fragments of them, but\nthey were recited by ignorant country people, who, never having\nunderstood them themselves, could not make them comprehensible to\nothers. But the history of his call to the prophecy I have so often\nheard, that I think I can state the particulars, although a little\nconfused in my recollection of them.\n\nThis event occurred about this time one hundred years ago, on an evening\nin spring, as Wat was going down a wild glen, which I know full well. \u201cI\nwas in a contemplative mood,\u201d he said (for he told it to any that asked\nhim), \u201cand was meditating on the mysteries of redemption, and doubting,\ngrievously doubting, the merits of an atonement by blood; when, to my\nastonishment in such a place, there was one spoke to me close behind,\nsaying, in the Greek language, \u2018Is it indeed so? Is thy faith no better\nrooted?\u2019\n\n\u201cI looked behind me, but, perceiving no one, my hair stood all on end,\nfor I thought it was a voice from heaven; and, after gazing into the\nfirmament, and all around me, I said fearfully, in the same language,\n\u2018Who art thou that speakest?\u2019 And the voice answered me again, \u2018I am one\nwho laid down my life, witnessing for the glorious salvation which thou\nart about to deny; turn, and behold me!\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I turned about, for the voice seemed still behind me, turn as I\nwould, and at length I perceived dimly the figure of an old man, of\nsingular aspect and dimensions, close by me. His form was exceedingly\nlarge and broad, and his face shone with benignity; his beard hung down\nto his girdle, and he had sandals on his feet, which covered his ankles.\nHis right arm and his breast were bare, but he had a crimson mantle over\nhis right shoulder, part of which covered his head, and came round his\nwaist. Having never seen such a figure or dress, or countenance before,\nI took him for an angel, sent from above to rebuke me; so I fell at his\nfeet to worship him, or rather to entreat forgiveness for a sin which I\nhad not power to withstand. But he answered me in these words: \u2018Rise up,\nand bow not to me, for I am thy fellow-servant, and a messenger from Him\nwhom thou hast in thy heart denied. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God,\nand Him only shalt thou serve. Come, I am commissioned to take thee into\nthe presence of thy Maker and Redeemer.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018Sir, how speakest thou in this wise? God is in heaven, and\nwe are upon the earth; and it is not given to mortal man to scale the\nheavenly regions, or come into the presence of the Almighty.\u2019 And he\nsaid, \u2018Have thy learning and thy knowledge carried thee no higher than\nthis? Knowest thou not that God is present in this wild glen, the same\nas in the palaces of light and glory\u2014that His presence surrounds us at\nthis moment\u2014and that He sees all our actions, hears our words, and knows\nthe inmost thoughts of our hearts?\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018Yes, I know it.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Then, are you ready and willing at this moment,\u2019 said he, \u2018to step\ninto His presence, and avow the sentiments which you have of late been\ncherishing?\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018I would rather have time to think the matter over again.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Alack! poor man!\u2019 said he, \u2018so you have never been considering that\nyou have all this while been in His immediate presence, and have even\nbeen uttering thy blasphemous sentiments aloud to His face, when there\nwas none to hear but He and thyself.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018Sir, a man cannot force his belief.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd he said, \u2018Thou sayest truly; but I will endeavour to convince\nthee.\u2019\u201d\n\nHere a long colloquy ensued about the external and internal evidences of\nthe Christian religion, which took Wat nearly half a day to relate; but\nhe still maintained his point. He asked his visitant twice who he was,\nbut he declined telling him, saying he wanted his reason convinced, and\nnot to take his word for anything.\n\nTheir conversation ended by this mysterious sage leading Wat away by a\npath which he did not know, which was all covered with a cloud of\nexceeding brightness. At length they came to a house like a common\npavilion, which they entered, but all was solemn silence, and they heard\nnobody moving in it, and Wat asked his guide where they were now.\n\n\u201cThis is the place where heavenly gifts are distributed to humanity,\u201d\nsaid the reverend apostle; \u201cbut they are now no more required, being of\nno repute. No one asks for them, nor will they accept of them when\noffered, for worldly wisdom is all in all with the men of this age.\nTheir preaching is a mere farce\u2014an ostentatious parade, to show off\ngreat and shining qualifications, one-third of the professors not\nbelieving one word of what they assert. The gift of prophecy is denied\nand laughed at; and all revelation made to man by dreams or visions\nutterly disclaimed, as if the Almighty\u2019s power of communicating with his\ncreatures were not only shortened, but cut off for ever. This fountain\nof inspiration, once so crowded, is now, you see, a dreary solitude.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was, in truth, a dismal-looking place, for in every chamber, as we\npassed along, there were benches and seats of judgment, but none to\noccupy them; the green grass was peeping through the seams of the\nflooring and chinks of the wall, and never was there a more appalling\npicture of desolation.\n\n\u201cAt length, in the very innermost chamber, we came to three men sitting\nin a row, the middle one elevated above the others; but they were all\nsleeping at their posts, and looked as if they had slept there for a\nthousand years, for their garments were mouldy, and their faces ghastly\nand withered.\n\n\u201cI did not know what to do or say, for I looked at my guide, and he\nseemed overcome with sorrow; but thinking it was ill-manners for an\nintruder not to speak, I said, \u2018Sirs, I think you are drowsily\ninclined?\u2019 but none of them moved. At length my guide said, in a loud\nvoice, \u2018Awake, ye servants of the Most High! Or is your sleep to be\neverlasting?\u2019\n\n\u201cOn that they all opened their eyes at once, and stared at me, but their\neyes were like the eyes of dead men, and no one of them moved a muscle,\nsave the middlemost, who pointed with pale haggard hand to three small\nbooks, or scrolls, that lay on the bench before them.\n\n\u201cThen my guide said, \u2018Put forth thine hand and choose one from these.\nThey are all divine gifts, and in these latter days rarely granted to\nany of the human race.\u2019 One was red as blood, the other pale, and the\nthird green; the latter was farthest from me, and my guide said, \u2018Ponder\nwell before you make your choice. It is a sacred mystery, and from the\nchoice you make, your destiny is fixed through time and eternity.\u2019 I\nthen stretched out my hand, and took the one farthest from me, and he\nsaid, \u2018It is the will of the Lord; so let it be! That which you have\nchosen is the gift of the spirit of prophecy. From henceforth you must\nlive a life of sufferance and tribulation, but your life shall be given\nyou for a proof, in order that you may reveal to mankind all that is to\nbefall them in the latter days.\u2019 And I opened the book, and it was all\nwritten in mystic characters, which I could not decipher nor comprehend;\nand he said, \u2018Put up the book in thy bosom, and preserve it as thou\nwouldst do the heart within thy breast; for as long as thou keepest that\nbook, shall thy natural life remain, and the spirit of God remain with\nthee, and whatsoever thou sayest in the spirit, shall come to pass. But\nbeware that thou deceive not thyself; for, if thou endeavour to pass off\nstudied speeches, and words of the flesh for those of the spirit, woe be\nunto thee! It had been better for thee that thou never hadst been born.\nPut up the book; thou canst not understand it now, but it shall be given\nthee to understand it, for it is an oracle of the most high God, and its\nwords and signs fail not. Go thy ways, and return to the house of thy\nfathers and thy kinsfolk.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018Sir, I know not where to go, for I cannot tell by what\npath you brought me hither.\u2019 And he took me by the hand, and led me out\nby a back-door of the pavilion; and we entered a great valley, which was\nall in utter darkness, and I could perceive through the gloom that many\npeople were passing the same way with ourselves; and I said, \u2018Sir, this\nis dreadful! What place is this?\u2019 And he said, \u2018This is the Valley of\nthe Shadow of Death. Many of those you see will grope on here for ever,\nand never get over, for they know not whether they go, or what is before\nthem. But seest thou nothing beside?\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018I see a bright and shining light beyond, whose rays reach\neven to this place.\u2019\u2014\u2018That,\u2019 said he, \u2018is the light of the everlasting\nGospel; and to those to whom it is given to perceive that beacon of\ndivine love, the passage over this valley is easy. I have shown it to\nyou; but if you keep that intrusted to your care, you shall never enter\nthis valley again, but live and reveal the will of God to man till\nmortality shall no more remain. You shall renew your age like the\neagles, and be refreshed with the dews of renovation from the presence\nof the Lord. Sleep on now, and take your rest, for I must leave you\nagain in this world of sin and sorrow. Be you strong, and overcome it,\nfor men will hold you up to reproach and ridicule, and speak all manner\nof evil of you; but see that you join them not in their voluptuousness\nand iniquity, and the Lord be with you!\u2019\u201d\n\nThere is no doubt that this is a confused account of the prophet\u2019s\nsublime vision, it being from second hands that I had it; and, for one\nthing, I know that one-half of his relation is not contained in it. For\nthe consequences I can avouch. From that time forth he announced his\nmission, and began prophesying to such families as he was sent to. But I\nforgot to mention a very extraordinary fact, that this vision of his\nactually lasted nine days and nine nights, and at the end of that time\nhe found himself on the very individual spot in the glen where the voice\nfirst spoke to him, and so much were his looks changed, that, when he\nwent in, none of the family knew him.\n\nHe mixed no more with the men of the world, but wandered about in wilds\nand solitudes, and when in the spirit, he prophesied with a sublimity\nand grandeur never equalled. He had plenty of money, and some property\nto boot, which his father left him; but these he never regarded, but\nheld on his course of severe abstemiousness, often subsisting on bread\nand water, and sometimes for days on water alone, from some motive known\nonly to himself. He had a small black pony on which he rode many years,\nand which he kept always plump and fat. This little animal waited upon\nhim in all his fastings and prayings with unwearied patience and\naffection. There is a well, situated on the south side of a burn, called\nthe Earny Cleuch, on the very boundary between the shires of Dumfries\nand Selkirk. It is situated in a most sequestered and lonely place, and\nis called to this day the Prophet\u2019s Well, from the many pilgrimages that\nhe made to it; for it had been revealed to him in one of his visions\nthat this water had some divine virtue, partaking of the nature of the\nWater of Life. At one time he lay beside this well for nine days and\nnights, the pony feeding beside him all that time, and though there is\nlittle doubt that he had some food with him, no body knew of any that he\nhad; and it was believed that he fasted all that time, or at least\nsubsisted, on the water of that divine well.\n\nSome men with whom he was familiar\u2014for indeed he was respected and liked\nby everybody, the whole tenor of his life having been so\ninoffensive;\u2014some of his friends, I say, tried to reason him into a\nbelief of his mortality, and that he would taste of death like other\nmen; but that he treated as altogether chimerical, and not worth\nanswering; when he did answer, it was by assuring them, that as long as\nhe kept his mystic scroll, and could drink of his well, his body was\nproof against all the thousand shafts of death. His unearthly monitor\nappeared to him very frequently, and revealed many secrets to him, and\nat length disclosed to him that he was STEPHEN, the first martyr for the\nGospel of Christ. Our prophet, in the course of time, grew so familiar\nwith him, that he called him by the friendly name of Auld Steenie, and\ntold his friends _when_ he had seen him, and _part_ of what he had told\nhim, but never the whole.\n\nWhen not in his visionary and prophetic moods, he sometimes indulged in\na little relaxation, such as draught-playing and fishing; but in these,\nlike other things, he quite excelled all compeers. He was particularly\nnoted for killing salmon, by throwing the spear at a great distance. He\ngave all his fish away to poor people, or such as he favoured that were\nnearest to him at the time; so that, either for his prophetic gifts, or\nnatural bounty, the prophet was always a welcome guest, whether to poor\nor rich.\n\nHe prophesied for the space of forty years, foretelling many things that\ncame to pass in his lifetime, and many which have come to pass since his\ndeath. I have heard of a parable of his, to which I can do no justice,\nof a certain woman who had four sons, three of whom were legitimate, and\nthe other not. The latter being rather uncultivated in his manners, and\nnot so well educated as his brethren, his mother took for him ample\npossessions at a great distance from the rest of the family. The young\nblade succeeded in his farming speculations amazingly, and was grateful\nto his parent, and friendly with his brethren in all their interchanges\nof visits. But when the mother perceived his success, she sent and\ndemanded a tenth from him of all he possessed. This rather astounded the\nyoung man, and he hesitated about compliance in parting with so much, at\nany rate. But the parent insisted on her right to demand that or any sum\nwhich she chose, and the teind she would have. The lad, not wishing to\nbreak with his parent and benefactor, bade her say no more about it, and\nhe would give her the full value of that she demanded as of his own\naccord; but she would have it in no other way than as her own proper\nright. On this the headstrong and powerful knave took the law on his\nmother; won, and ruined her; so that she and her three remaining sons\nwere reduced to beggary. Wat then continued\u2014\u201cAnd now it is to yourselves\nI speak this, ye children of my people, for this evil is nigh you, even\nat your doors. There are some here who will not see it, but there are\nseven here who will see the end of it, and then they shall know that\nthere has been a prophet among them.\u201d\n\nIt having been in a private family where this prophecy was delivered,\nthey looked always forward with fear for some contention breaking out\namong them. But after the American war and its consequences, the whole\nof Wat\u2019s parable was attributed thereto, and the good people relieved\nfrom the horrors of their impending and ruinous lawsuit.\n\nOne day he was prophesying about the judgment, when a young gentleman\nsaid to him, \u201cO, sir, I wish you could tell us when the judgment will\nbe.\u201d \u201cAlas! my man,\u201d returned he, \u201cthat is what I cannot do; for of that\nday and of that hour knoweth no man; no, not the angels which are in\nheaven, but the Almighty Father alone. But there will be many judgments\nbefore the great and general one. In seven years there will be a\njudgment on Scotland. In seven times seven there will be a great and\nheavy judgment on all the nations of Europe; and in other seven times\nseven there will be a greater one on all the nations of the world; but\nwhether or not that is to be the last judgment, God only knoweth.\u201d\n\nThese are dangerous and difficult sayings of our prophet. I wonder what\nthe Rev. Edward Irving would say about them, or if they approach in any\ndegree to his calculations. Not knowing the year when this prophecy was\ndelivered, it is impossible to reason on its fulfilment, but it is\nevident that both the first eras must be overpast. He always predicted\nruin on the cause of Prince Charles Stuart, even when the whole country\nwas ringing with applauses of his bravery and conquests. Our prophet\ndetested the politics of that house, and announced ruin and desolation\nnot only on the whole house, but on all who supported it. The only\nprophecy which I have yet seen in writing relates to that brave but\nunfortunate adventurer, and is contained in a letter to a Mrs Johnston,\nMoffat, dated October 1st, 1745, which must have been very shortly after\nthe battle of Prestonpans. After some religious consolation, he says,\n\u201cAs for that man, Charles Stuart, let no spirit be cast down because of\nhim, for he is only a meteor predicting a sudden storm, which is\ndestined to quench his baleful light for ever. He is a broken pot; a\nvessel wherein God hath no pleasure. His boasting shall be turned into\ndread, and his pride of heart into astonishment. Terror shall make him\nafraid on every side; he shall look on his right hand, and there shall\nbe none to know him; and on his left hand, and lo! destruction shall be\nready at his side\u2014even the first-born of death shall open his jaws to\ndevour him. His confidence shall pass away for ever, even until the king\nof terrors arrive and scatter brimstone upon his habitation. His roots\nshall be dried up beneath, and the foliage of his boughs stripped off\nabove, until his remembrance shall perish from the face of the earth. He\nshall be thrown into the deep waters, and the billows of God\u2019s wrath\nshall pass over him. He shall fly to the mountains, but they shall not\nhide him; and to the islands, but they shall cast him out. Then shall he\nbe driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the land.\n\n\u201cKnowest thou not this of old time, that the triumph of the wicked is of\nshort duration, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? Though\nhis excellency mount up into the heavens, and his pride reach the stars,\nyet shall he perish for ever, like a shadow that passeth away and is no\nmore. They who have seen him in the pride of his might shall say, Where\nis he? Where now is the man that made the nations to tremble? Is he\nindeed passed away as a dream, and chased away as a vision of the night?\nYea, the Lord, who sent him as a scourge on the wicked of the land,\nshall ordain the hand of the wicked to scourge him till his flesh and\nhis soul shall depart, and his name be blotted out of the world.\nTherefore, my friend in the Lord, let none despond because of this man,\nbut lay these things up in thy heart, and ponder on them, and when they\nare fulfilled, then shalt thou believe that the Lord sent me.\u201d\n\nFrom the tenor of this prophecy, it would appear that he has borrowed\nlargely from some of the most sublime passages of Scripture, which could\nnot fail of giving a tincture of sublimity to many of his sayings, so\nmuch admired by the country people. It strikes me there are some of\nthese expressions literally from the Book of Job; but, notwithstanding,\nit must be acknowledged that some parts of it are peculiarly applicable\nto the after-fate of Charles Edward.\n\nWhen old age began to steal on him, and his beloved friends to drop out\nof the world, one after another, he became extremely heavy-hearted at\nbeing obliged to continue for ever in the flesh. He never had any\ntrouble; but he felt a great change take place in his constitution,\nwhich he did not expect, and it was then he became greatly concerned at\nbeing obliged to bear a body of fading flesh about until the end of\ntime, often saying, that the flesh of man was never made to be immortal.\nIn this dejected state he continued about two years, often entreating\nthe Lord to resume that which He had given him, and leave him to the\nmercy of his Redeemer, like other men. Accordingly, his heavenly monitor\nappeared to him once more, and demanded the scroll of the spirit of\nprophecy, which was delivered up to him at the well in the wilderness;\nand then, with a holy admonition, he left him for ever on earth. Wat\nlived three years after this, cheerful and happy, and died in peace,\nold, and full of days, leaving a good worldly substance behind him.\n\n\n\n\n THE SNOW-STORM.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nIn summer there is beauty in the wildest moors of Scotland, and the\nwayfaring man who sits down for an hour\u2019s rest beside some little spring\nthat flows unheard through the brightened moss and water-cresses, feels\nhis weary heart revived by the silent, serene, and solitary prospect. On\nevery side sweet sunny spots of verdure smile towards him from among the\nmelancholy heather; unexpectedly in the solitude a stray sheep, it may\nbe with its lambs, starts half-alarmed at his motionless figure;\ninsects, large, bright, and beautiful, come careering by him through the\ndesert air; nor does the wild want its own songsters,\u2014the gray linnet,\nfond of the blooming furze, and now and then the lark mounting up to\nheaven above the summits of the green pastoral hills. During such a\nsunshiny hour, the lonely cottage on the waste seems to stand in a\nparadise; and as he rises to pursue his journey, the traveller looks\nback and blesses it with a mingled emotion of delight and envy. There,\nthinks he, abide the children of Innocence and Contentment, the two most\nbenign spirits that watch over human life.\n\nBut other thoughts arise in the mind of him who may chance to journey\nthrough the same scene in the desolation of winter. The cold bleak sky\ngirdles the moor as with a belt of ice\u2014life is frozen in air and on\nearth. The silence is not of repose but extinction; and should a\nsolitary human dwelling catch his eye, half buried in the snow, he is\nsad for the sake of them whose destiny it is to abide far from the\ncheerful haunts of men, shrouded up in melancholy, by poverty held in\nthrall, or pining away in unvisited and untended disease.\n\nBut, in good truth, the heart of human life is but imperfectly\ndiscovered from its countenance; and before we can know what the summer\nor what the winter yields for enjoyment or trial to our country\u2019s\npeasantry, we must have conversed with them in their fields and by their\nfiresides, and made ourselves acquainted with the powerful ministry of\nthe seasons, not over those objects alone that feed the eye and the\nimagination, but over all the incidents, occupations, and events, that\nmodify or constitute the existence of the poor.\n\nI have a short and simple story to tell of the winter life of the\nmoorland cottager\u2014a story but of one evening\u2014with few events and no\nsingle catastrophe\u2014which may haply please those hearts whose delight it\nis to think on the humble underplots that are carrying on in the great\ndrama of life.\n\nTwo cottagers, husband and wife, were sitting by their cheerful\npeat-fire one winter evening, in a small lonely hut on the edge of a\nwide moor, at some miles\u2019 distance from any other habitation. There had\nbeen, at one time, several huts of the same kind erected close together,\nand inhabited by families of the poorest class of day-labourers, who\nfound work among the distant farms, and at night returned to dwellings\nwhich were rent-free, with their little gardens won from the waste. But\none family after another had dwindled away, and the turf-built huts had\nall fallen into ruins, except one that had always stood in the centre of\nthis little solitary village, with its summer-walls covered with the\nrichest honeysuckles, and in the midst of the brightest of all the\ngardens. It alone now sent up its smoke into the clear winter sky\u2014and\nits little end window, now lighted up, was the only ground-star that\nshone towards the belated traveller, if any such ventured to cross, on a\nwinter night, a scene so dreary and desolate. The affairs of the small\nhousehold were all arranged for the night. The little rough pony, that\nhad drawn in a sledge, from the heart of the Black-moss, the fuel by\nwhose blaze the cottars were now sitting cheerily, and the little\nHighland cow, whose milk enabled them to live, were standing amicably\ntogether, under cover of a rude shed, of which one side was formed by\nthe peat-stack, and which was at once byre, and stable, and hen-roost.\nWithin, the clock ticked cheerfully as the fire-light reached its old\noak-wood case, across the yellow-sanded floor; and a small round table\nstood between, covered with a snow-white cloth, on which were milk and\noat-cakes, the morning, mid-day, and evening meal of these frugal and\ncontented cottars. The spades and the mattocks of the labourer were\ncollected into one corner, and showed that the succeeding day was the\nblessed Sabbath; while on the wooden chimneypiece was seen lying an open\nBible ready for family worship.\n\nThe father and the mother were sitting together without opening their\nlips, but with their hearts overflowing with happiness, for on this\nSaturday night they were, every minute, expecting to hear at the latch\nthe hand of their only daughter, a maiden of about fifteen years, who\nwas at service with a farmer over the hills. This dutiful child was, as\nthey knew, to bring home to them \u201cher sair-won penny fee,\u201d a pittance\nwhich, in the beauty of her girlhood, she earned singing at her work,\nand which, in the benignity of that sinless time, she would pour with\ntears into the bosoms she so dearly loved. Forty shillings a-year were\nall the wages of sweet Hannah Lee; but though she wore at her labour a\ntortoise-shell comb in her auburn hair, and though in the kirk none were\nmore becomingly arrayed than she, one half at least of her earnings were\nto be reserved for the holiest of all purposes; and her kind, innocent\nheart was gladdened when she looked on the little purse that was, on the\nlong-expected Saturday night, to be taken from her bosom, and put, with\na blessing, into the hand of her father, now growing old at his daily\ntoils.\n\nOf such a child the happy cottars were thinking in their silence. And\nwell, indeed, might they be called happy. It is at that sweet season\nthat filial piety is most beautiful. Their own Hannah had just outgrown\nthe mere unthinking gladness of childhood, but had not yet reached that\ntime when inevitable selfishness mixes with the pure current of love.\nShe had begun to think on what her affectionate heart had felt so long;\nand when she looked on the pale face and bending frame of her mother, on\nthe deepening wrinkles and whitening hairs of her father, often would\nshe lie weeping for their sakes on her midnight bed, and wish that she\nwere beside them as they slept, that she might kneel down and kiss them,\nand mention their names over and over again in her prayer. The parents\nwhom before she had only loved, her expanding heart now also venerated.\nWith gushing tenderness was now mingled a holy fear and an awful\nreverence. She had discerned the relation in which she, an only child,\nstood to her poor parents, now that they were getting old, and there was\nnot a passage in Scripture that spake of parents or of children, from\nJoseph sold into slavery to Mary weeping below the Cross, that was not\nwritten, never to be obliterated, on her uncorrupted heart.\n\nThe father rose from his seat, and went to the door to look out into the\nnight. The stars were in thousands, and the full moon was risen. It was\nalmost light as day, and the snow, that seemed encrusted with diamonds,\nwas so hardened by the frost, that his daughter\u2019s homeward feet would\nleave no mark on its surface. He had been toiling all day among the\ndistant Castle-woods, and, stiff and wearied as he now was, he was\nalmost tempted to go to meet his child; but his wife\u2019s kind voice\ndissuaded him, and, returning to the fireside, they began to talk of her\nwhose image had been so long passing before them in their silence.\n\n\u201cShe is growing up to be a bonny lassie,\u201d said the mother; \u201cher long and\nweary attendance on me during my fever last spring kept her down a\nwhile\u2014but now she is sprouting fast and fair as a lily, and may the\nblessing of God be as dew and as sunshine to our sweet flower all the\ndays she bloometh upon this earth.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, Agnes,\u201d replied the father, \u201cwe are not very old yet\u2014though we are\ngetting older\u2014and a few years will bring her to woman\u2019s estate; and what\nthing on this earth, think ye, human or brute, would ever think of\ninjuring her? Why, I was speaking about her yesterday to the minister,\nas he was riding by, and he told me that none answered at the\nexamination in the kirk so well as Hannah. Poor thing\u2014I well think she\nhas all the Bible by heart\u2014indeed, she has read but little else\u2014only\nsome stories, too true ones, of the blessed martyrs, and some o\u2019 the\nauld sangs o\u2019 Scotland, in which there is nothing but what is good, and\nwhich, to be sure, she sings, God bless her, sweeter than any laverock.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy,\u2014were we both to die this very night, she would be happy. Not that\nshe would forget us all the days of her life. But have you not seen,\nhusband, that God always makes the orphan happy? None so little lonesome\nas they! They come to make friends o\u2019 all the bonny and sweet things in\nthe world around them, and all the kind hearts in the world make friends\no\u2019 them. They come to know that God is more especially the Father o\u2019\nthem on earth whose parents he has taken up to heaven; and therefore it\nis that they, for whom so many have fears, fear not at all for\nthemselves, but go dancing and singing along like children whose parents\nare both alive. Would it not be so with our dear Hannah? So douce and\nthoughtful a child\u2014but never sad or miserable\u2014ready, it is true, to shed\ntears for little, but as ready to dry them up and break out into smiles!\nI know not why it is, husband, but this night my heart warms towards her\nbeyond usual. The moon and stars are at this moment looking down upon\nher, and she looking up to them, as she is glinting homewards over the\nsnow. I wish she were but here, and taking the comb out o\u2019 her bonny\nhair, and letting it all fall down in clusters before the fire, to melt\naway the cranreuch!\u201d\n\nWhile the parents were thus speaking of their daughter, a loud sough of\nwind came suddenly over the cottage, and the leafless ash-tree under\nwhose shelter it stood, creaked and groaned dismally as it passed by.\nThe father started up, and, going again to the door, saw that a sudden\nchange had come over the face of the night. The moon had nearly\ndisappeared, and was just visible in a dim, yellow, glimmering den in\nthe sky. All the remote stars were obscured, and only one or two were\nfaintly seen in a sky that half an hour before was perfectly cloudless,\nbut that was now driving with rack, and mist, and sleet, the whole\natmosphere being in commotion. He stood for a single moment to observe\nthe direction of this unforeseen storm, and then hastily asked for his\nstaff. \u201cI thought I had been more weather-wise\u2014a storm is coming down\nfrom the Cairnbrae-hawse, and we shall have nothing but a wild night.\u201d\nHe then whistled on his dog\u2014an old sheep-dog, too old for its former\nlabours\u2014and set off to meet his daughter, who might then, for aught he\nknew, be crossing the Black-moss. The mother accompanied her husband to\nthe door, and took a long frightened look at the angry sky. As she kept\ngazing, it became still more terrible. The last shred of blue was\nextinguished, the wind went whirling in roaring eddies, and great flakes\nof snow circled about in the middle air, whether drifted up from the\nground, or driven down from the clouds, the fear-stricken mother knew\nnot, but she at least knew that it seemed a night of danger, despair,\nand death. \u201cLord have mercy on us, James, what will become of our poor\nbairn!\u201d But her husband heard not her words, for he was already out of\nsight in the snow-storm, and she was left to the terror of her own soul\nin that lonesome cottage.\n\nLittle Hannah Lee had left her master\u2019s house, soon as the rim of the\ngreat moon was seen by her eyes, that had been long anxiously watching\nit from the window, rising, like a joyful dream, over the gloomy\nmountain-tops; and all by herself she tripped along beneath the beauty\nof the silent heaven. Still as she kept ascending and descending the\nknolls that lay in the bosom of the glen, she sang to herself a song, a\nhymn, or a psalm, without the accompaniment of the streams, now all\nsilent in the frost; and ever and anon she stopped to try to count the\nstars that lay in some more beautiful part of the sky, or gazed on the\nconstellations that she knew, and called them, in her joy, by the names\nthey bore among the shepherds. There were none to hear her voice, or see\nher smiles, but the ear and eye of Providence. As on she glided, and\ntook her looks from heaven, she saw her own little fireside\u2014her parents\nwaiting for her arrival\u2014the Bible opened for worship\u2014her own little room\nkept so neatly for her, with its mirror hanging by the window, in which\nto braid her hair by the morning light\u2014her bed prepared for her by her\nmother\u2019s hand\u2014the primroses in her garden peeping through the snow\u2014old\nTray, who ever welcomed her home with his dim white eyes\u2014the pony and\nthe cow;\u2014friends all, and inmates of that happy household. So stepped\nshe along, while the snow diamonds glittered around her feet, and the\nfrost wove a wreath of lucid pearls round her forehead.\n\nShe had now reached the edge of the Black-moss, which lay half-way\nbetween her master\u2019s and her father\u2019s dwelling, when she heard a loud\nnoise coming down Glen-Scrae, and in a few seconds she felt on her face\nsome flakes of snow. She looked up the glen, and saw the snow-storm\ncoming down fast as a flood. She felt no fears; but she ceased her song;\nand had there been a human eye to look upon her there, it might have\nseen a shadow on her face. She continued her course, and felt bolder and\nbolder every step that brought her nearer to her parents\u2019 house. But the\nsnow-storm had now reached the Black-moss, and the broad line of light\nthat had lain in the direction of her home was soon swallowed up, and\nthe child was in utter darkness. She saw nothing but the flakes of snow,\ninterminably intermingled, and furiously wafted in the air, close to her\nhead; she heard nothing but one wild, fierce, fitful howl. The cold\nbecame intense, and her little feet and hands were fast being benumbed\ninto insensibility.\n\n\u201cIt is a fearful change,\u201d muttered the child to herself; but still she\ndid not fear, for she had been born in a moorland cottage, and lived all\nher days among the hardships of the hills. \u201cWhat will become of the poor\nsheep!\u201d thought she,\u2014but still she scarcely thought of her own danger,\nfor innocence, and youth, and joy, are slow to think of aught evil\nbefalling themselves, and, thinking benignly of all living things,\nforget their own fear in their pity for others\u2019 sorrow. At last, she\ncould no longer discern a single mark on the snow, either of human\nsteps, or of sheep-track, or the footprint of a wildfowl. Suddenly, too,\nshe felt out of breath and exhausted, and, shedding tears for herself at\nlast, sank down in the snow.\n\nIt was now that her heart began to quake with fear. She remembered\nstories of shepherds lost in the snow, of a mother and a child frozen to\ndeath on that very moor\u2014and in a moment she knew that she was to die.\nBitterly did the poor child weep, for death was terrible to her, who,\nthough poor, enjoyed the bright little world of youth and innocence. The\nskies of heaven were dearer than she knew to her\u2014so were the flowers of\nearth. She had been happy at her work, happy in her sleep,\u2014happy in the\nkirk on Sabbath. A thousand thoughts had the solitary child,\u2014and in her\nown heart was a spring of happiness, pure and undisturbed as any fount\nthat sparkles unseen all the year through, in some quiet nook among the\npastoral hills. But now there was to be an end of all this\u2014she was to be\nfrozen to death\u2014and lie there till the thaw might come; and then her\nfather would find her body, and carry it away to be buried in the\nkirk-yard.\n\nThe tears were frozen on her cheeks as soon as shed; and scarcely had\nher little hands strength to clasp themselves together, as the thought\nof an overruling and merciful Lord came across her heart. Then, indeed,\nthe fears of this religious child were calmed, and she heard without\nterror the plover\u2019s wailing cry, and the deep boom of the bittern\nsounding in the moss. \u201cI will repeat the Lord\u2019s Prayer;\u201d and, drawing\nher plaid more closely around her, she whispered, beneath its\nineffectual cover,\u2014\u201cOur Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy\nname; thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.\u201d\nHad human aid been within fifty yards, it could have been of no\navail\u2014eye could not see her, ear could not hear her in that howling\ndarkness. But that low prayer was heard in the centre of eternity\u2014and\nthat little sinless child was lying in the snow, beneath the all-seeing\neye of God.\n\nThe maiden, having prayed to her Father in heaven, then thought of her\nfather on earth. Alas! they were not far separated! The father was lying\nbut a short distance from his child; he too had sunk down in the\ndrifting snow, after having, in less than an hour, exhausted all the\nstrength of fear, pity, hope, despair, and resignation, that could rise\nin a father\u2019s heart, blindly seeking to rescue his only child from\ndeath, thinking that one desperate exertion might enable them to perish\nin each other\u2019s arms. There they lay, within a stone\u2019s-throw of each\nother, while a huge snow-drift was every moment piling itself up into a\nmore insurmountable barrier between the dying parent and his dying\nchild.\n\nThere was all this while a blazing fire in the cottage, a white-spread\ntable, and beds prepared for the family to lie down in peace. Yet was\nshe who sat therein more to be pitied than the old man and the child\nstretched upon the snow. \u201cI will not go to seek them\u2014that would be\ntempting Providence, and wilfully putting out the lamp of life. No; I\nwill abide here, and pray for their souls!\u201d Then as she knelt down,\nlooked she at the useless fire burning away so cheerfully, when all she\nloved might be dying of cold; and unable to bear the thought, she\nshrieked out a prayer, as if she might pierce the sky up to the very\nthrone of God, and send with it her own miserable soul to plead before\nHim for the deliverance of her child and husband. She then fell down in\nblessed forgetfulness of all trouble, in the midst of the solitary\ncheerfulness of that bright-burning hearth, and the Bible, which she had\nbeen trying to read in the pauses of her agony, remained clasped in her\nhands.\n\nHannah Lee had been a servant for more than six months, and it was not\nto be thought that she was not beloved in her master\u2019s family. Soon\nafter she had left the house, her master\u2019s son, a youth of about\neighteen years, who had been among the hills looking after the sheep,\ncame home, and was disappointed to find that he had lost an opportunity\nof accompanying Hannah part of the way to her father\u2019s cottage. But the\nhour of eight had gone by, and not even the company of young William\nGrieve could induce the kind-hearted daughter to delay setting out on\nher journey a few minutes beyond the time promised to her parents. \u201cI do\nnot like the night,\u201d said William; \u201cthere will be a fresh fall of snow\nsoon, or the witch of Glen-Scrae is a liar, for a snow-cloud is hanging\no\u2019er the Birch-tree-linn, and it may be down to the Black-moss as soon\nas Hannah Lee.\u201d So he called his two sheep-dogs that had taken their\nplace under the long table before the window, and set out, half in joy,\nhalf in fear, to overtake Hannah, and see her safely across the\nBlack-moss.\n\nThe snow began to drift so fast, that before he had reached the head of\nthe glen, there was nothing to be seen but a little bit of the wooden\nrail of the bridge across the Sauch-burn. William Grieve was the most\nactive shepherd in a large pastoral parish; he had often passed the\nnight among the wintry hills for the sake of a few sheep, and all the\nsnow that ever fell from heaven would not have made him turn back when\nHannah Lee was before him, and, as his terrified heart told him, in\nimminent danger of being lost. As he advanced, he felt that it was no\nlonger a walk of love or friendship, for which he had been glad of an\nexcuse. Death stared him in the face, and his young soul, now beginning\nto feel all the passions of youth, was filled with frenzy. He had seen\nHannah every day\u2014at the fireside\u2014at work\u2014in the kirk\u2014on holidays\u2014at\nprayers\u2014bringing supper to his aged parents\u2014smiling and singing about\nthe house from morning till night. She had often brought his own meal to\nhim among the hills; and he now found that, though he had never talked\nto her about love, except smilingly and playfully, he loved her beyond\nfather or mother, or his own soul. \u201cI will save thee, Hannah,\u201d he cried,\nwith a loud sob, \u201cor lie down beside thee in the snow\u2014and we will die\ntogether in our youth.\u201d A wild whistling wind went by him, and the\nsnow=flakes whirled so fiercely round his head, that he staggered on for\na while in utter blindness. He knew the path that Hannah must have\ntaken, and went forwards shouting aloud, and stopping every twenty yards\nto listen for a voice. He sent his well-trained dogs over the snow in\nall directions\u2014repeating to them her name, \u201cHannah Lee,\u201d that the dumb\nanimals might, in their sagacity, know for whom they were searching;\nand, as they looked up in his face, and set off to scour the moor, he\nalmost believed that they knew his meaning (and it is probable they\ndid), and were eager to find in her bewilderment the kind maiden by\nwhose hand they had so often been fed. Often went they off into the\ndarkness, and as often returned, but their looks showed that every quest\nhad been in vain. Meanwhile the snow was of a fearful depth, and falling\nwithout intermission or diminution. Had the young shepherd been thus\nalone, walking across the moor on his ordinary business, it is probable\nthat he might have been alarmed for his own safety; nay, that, in spite\nof all his strength and agility, he might have sunk down beneath the\ninclemency of the night, and perished. But now the passion of his soul\ncarried him with supernatural strength along, and extricated him from\nwreath and pitfall. Still there was no trace of poor Hannah Lee; and one\nof his dogs at last came close to his feet, worn out entirely, and\nafraid to leave its master, while the other was mute, and, as the\nshepherd thought, probably unable to force its way out of some hollow,\nor through some floundering drift.\n\nThen he all at once knew that Hannah Lee was dead, and dashed himself\ndown in the snow in a fit of passion. It was the first time that the\nyouth had ever been sorely tried; all his hidden and unconscious love\nfor the fair lost girl had flowed up from the bottom of his heart, and\nat once the sole object which had blessed his life and made him the\nhappiest of the happy, was taken away and cruelly destroyed; so that,\nsullen, wrathful, baffled, and despairing, there he lay cursing his\nexistence, and in too great agony to think of prayer. \u201cGod,\u201d he then\nthought, \u201chas forsaken me, and why should He think on me, when He\nsuffers one so good and beautiful as Hannah to be frozen to death?\u201d God\nthought both of him and Hannah; and through His infinite mercy forgave\nthe sinner in his wild turbulence of passion. William Grieve had never\ngone to bed without joining in prayer, and he revered the Sabbath-day\nand kept it holy. Much is forgiven to the human heart by Him who so\nfearfully framed it; and God is not slow to pardon the love which one\nhuman being bears to another, in his frailty\u2014even though that love\nforget or arraign His own unsleeping providence. His voice has told us\nto love one another\u2014and William loved Hannah in simplicity, innocence,\nand truth. That she should perish was a thought so dreadful, that, in\nits agony, God seemed a ruthless being. \u201cBlow\u2014blow\u2014blow\u2014and drift us up\nfor ever\u2014we cannot be far asunder\u2014Oh, Hannah\u2014Hannah, think ye not that\nthe fearful God has forsaken us?\u201d\n\nAs the boy groaned these words passionately through his quivering lips,\nthere was a sudden lowness in the air, and he heard the barking of his\nabsent dog, while the one at his feet hurried off in the direction of\nthe sound, and soon loudly joined the cry. It was not a bark of\nsurprise, or anger, or fear\u2014but of recognition and love. William sprang\nup from his bed in the snow, and, with his heart knocking at his bosom\neven to sickness, he rushed headlong through the drifts with a giant\u2019s\nstrength, and fell down, half dead with joy and terror, beside the body\nof Hannah Lee.\n\nBut he soon recovered from that fit, and, lifting the cold corpse in his\narms, he kissed her lips, and her cheeks, and her forehead, and her\nclosed eyes, till, as he kept gazing on her face in utter despair, her\nhead fell back on his shoulder, and a long deep sigh came from her\ninmost bosom. \u201cShe is yet alive, thank God!\u201d\u2014and, as that expression\nleft his lips for the first time that night, he felt a pang of remorse:\n\u201cI said, O God, that Thou hadst forsaken us\u2014I am not worthy to be saved;\nbut let not this maiden perish, for the sake of her parents, who have no\nother child.\u201d The distracted youth prayed to God with the same\nearnestness as if he had been beseeching a fellow-creature, in whose\nhand was the power of life and of death. The presence of the Great Being\nwas felt by him in the dark and howling wild, and strength was imparted\nto him as to a deliverer. He bore along the fair child in his arms, even\nas if she had been a lamb. The snow-drift blew not; the wind fell dead;\na sort of glimmer, like that of an upbreaking and disparting storm,\ngathered about him; his dogs barked, and jumped, and burrowed joyfully\nin the snow; and the youth, strong in sudden hope, exclaimed, \u201cWith the\nblessing of God, who has not deserted us in our sore distress, will I\ncarry thee, Hannah, in my arms, and lay thee down alive in the house of\nthy father.\u201d At this moment there were no stars in heaven, but she\nopened her dim blue eyes upon him in whose bosom she was unconsciously\nlying, and said, as in a dream, \u201cSend the ribbon that ties up my hair as\na keepsake to William Grieve.\u201d \u201cShe thinks that she is on her deathbed,\nand forgets not the son of her master. It is the voice of God that tells\nme she will not now die, and that, under His grace, I shall be her\ndeliverer.\u201d\n\nThe short-lived rage of the storm was soon over, and William could\nattend to the beloved being on his bosom. The warmth of his heart seemed\nto infuse life into hers; and, as he gently placed her feet on the snow,\ntill he muffled her up in his plaid, as well as in her own, she made an\neffort to stand, and, with extreme perplexity and bewilderment, faintly\ninquired where she was, and what fearful misfortune had befallen them?\nShe was, however, too weak to walk; and, as her young master carried her\nalong, she murmured, \u201cO William! what if my father be in the moor?\u2014For\nif you, who need care so little about me, have come hither, as I\nsuppose, to save my life, you may be sure that my father sat not within\ndoors during the storm.\u201d As she spoke, it was calm below, but the wind\nwas still alive in the upper air, and cloud, rack, mist, and sleet were\nall driving about in the sky. Out shone for a moment the pallid and\nghostly moon, through a rent in the gloom, and by that uncertain light\ncame staggering forward the figure of a man. \u201cFather\u2014father!\u201d cried\nHannah\u2014and his gray hairs were already on her cheek. The barking of the\ndogs, and the shouting of the young shepherd, had struck his ear, as the\nsleep of death was stealing over him, and, with the last effort of\nbenumbed nature, he had roused himself from that fatal torpor, and\npressed through the snow-wreath that had separated him from his child.\nAs yet they knew not of the danger each had endured, but each judged of\nthe other\u2019s sufferings from their own; and father and daughter regarded\none another as creatures rescued, and hardly yet rescued, from death.\n\nBut a few minutes ago, and the three human beings who loved each other\nso well, and now feared not to cross the moor in safety, were, as they\nthought, on their deathbeds. Deliverance now shone upon them all like a\ngentle fire, dispelling that pleasant but deadly drowsiness; and the old\nman was soon able to assist William Grieve in leading Hannah along\nthrough the snow. Her colour and her warmth returned, and her lover\u2014for\nso might he well now be called\u2014felt her heart gently beating against his\nside. Filled as that heart was with gratitude to God, joy in her\ndeliverance, love to her father, and purest affection for her master\u2019s\nson, never before had the innocent maiden known what was happiness, and\nnever more was she to forget it. The night was now almost calm, and fast\nreturning to its former beauty, when the party saw the first twinkle of\nthe fire through the low window of the Cottage of the Moor. They soon\nwere at the garden gate, and, to relieve the heart of the wife and\nmother within, they talked loudly and cheerfully\u2014naming each other\nfamiliarly, and laughing between, like persons who had known neither\ndanger nor distress.\n\nNo voice answered from within\u2014no footstep came to the door, which stood\nopen as when the father had left it in his fear, and now he thought with\naffright that his wife, feeble as she was, had been unable to support\nthe loneliness, and had followed him out into the night, never to be\nbrought home alive. As they bore Hannah into the house, this fear gave\nway to worse, for there upon the hard clay floor lay the mother upon her\nface, as if murdered by some savage blow. She was in the same deadly\nswoon into which she had fallen on her husband\u2019s departure three hours\nbefore. The old man raised her up, and her pulse was still\u2014so was her\nheart\u2014her face pale and sunken\u2014and her body cold as ice. \u201cI have\nrecovered a daughter,\u201d said the old man, \u201cbut I have lost a wife;\u201d and\nhe carried her with a groan to the bed, on which he laid her lifeless\nbody. The sight was too much for Hannah, worn out as she was, and who\nhad hitherto been able to support herself in the delightful expectation\nof gladdening her mother\u2019s heart by her safe arrival. She, too, now\nswooned away, and, as she was placed on the bed beside her mother, it\nseemed, indeed, that Death, disappointed of his prey on the wild moor,\nhad seized it in the cottage and by the fireside. The husband knelt down\nby the bedside, and held his wife\u2019s icy hand in his, while William\nGrieve, appalled and awe-stricken, hung over his Hannah, and inwardly\nimplored God that the night\u2019s wild adventure might not have so ghastly\nan end. But Hannah\u2019s young heart soon began once more to beat\u2014and, soon\nas she came to her recollection, she rose up with a face whiter than\nashes and free from all smiles, as if none had ever played there, and\njoined her father and young master in their efforts to restore her\nmother to life.\n\nIt was the mercy of God that had struck her down to the earth,\ninsensible to the shrieking winds, and the fears that would otherwise\nhave killed her. Three hours of that wild storm had passed over her\nhead, and she heard nothing more than if she had been asleep in a\nbreathless night of the summer dew. Not even a dream had touched her\nbrain, and when she opened her eyes, which, as she thought, had been but\na moment shut, she had scarcely time to recall to her recollection the\nimage of her husband rushing out into the storm, and of a daughter\ntherein lost, till she beheld that very husband kneeling tenderly by her\nbedside, and that very daughter smoothing the pillow on which her aching\ntemples reclined. But she knew from the white steadfast countenances\nbefore her that there had been tribulation and deliverance, and she\nlooked on the beloved beings ministering by her bed, as more fearfully\ndear to her from the unimagined danger from which she felt assured they\nhad been rescued by the arm of the Almighty.\n\nThere is little need to speak of returning recollection, and returning\nstrength. They had all now power to weep, and power to pray. The Bible\nhad been lying in its place ready for worship, and the father read aloud\nthat chapter in which is narrated our Saviour\u2019s act of miraculous power\nby which He saved Peter from the sea. Soon as the solemn thoughts\nawakened by that act of mercy, so similar to that which had rescued\nthemselves from death, had subsided, and they had all risen up from\nprayer, they gathered themselves in gratitude round the little table\nwhich had stood so many hours spread; and exhausted nature was\nstrengthened and restored by a frugal and simple meal, partaken of in\nsilent thankfulness. The whole story of the night was then calmly\nrecited; and when the mother heard how the stripling had followed her\nsweet Hannah into the storm, and borne her in his arms through a hundred\ndrifted heaps\u2014and then looked upon her in her pride, so young, so\ninnocent, and so beautiful, she knew, that were the child indeed to\nbecome an orphan, there was one who, if there was either trust in nature\nor truth in religion, would guard and cherish her all the days of her\nlife.\n\nIt was not nine o\u2019clock when the storm came down from Glen-Scrae upon\nthe Black-moss, and now in a pause of silence the clock struck twelve.\nWithin these three hours William and Hannah had led a life of trouble\nand of joy, that had enlarged and kindled their hearts within them; and\nthey felt that henceforth they were to live wholly for each other\u2019s\nsakes. His love was the proud and exulting love of a deliverer, who,\nunder Providence, had saved from the frost and the snow, the innocence\nand the beauty of which his young passionate heart had been so\ndesperately enamoured; and he now thought of his own Hannah Lee ever\nmore moving about in his father\u2019s house, not as a servant, but as a\ndaughter\u2014and, when some few happy years had gone by, his own most\nbeautiful and loving wife. The innocent maiden still called him her\nyoung master, but was not ashamed of the holy affection which she now\nknew that she had long felt for the fearless youth on whose bosom she\nhad thought herself dying in that cold and miserable moor. Her heart\nleapt within her when she heard her parents bless him by his name; and\nwhen he took her hand into his before them, and vowed before that Power\nwho had that night saved them from the snow, that Hannah Lee should ere\nlong be his wedded wife, she wept and sobbed as if her heart would break\nin a fit of strange and insupportable happiness.\n\nThe young shepherd rose to bid them farewell\u2014\u201cMy father will think I am\nlost,\u201d said he, with a grave smile, \u201cand my Hannah\u2019s mother knows what\nit is to fear for a child.\u201d So nothing was said to detain him, and the\nfamily went with him to the door. The skies smiled as serenely as if a\nstorm had never swept before the stars; the moon was sinking from her\nmeridian, but in cloudless splendour; and the hollow of the hills was\nhushed as that of heaven. Danger there was none over the placid\nnight-scene; the happy youth soon crossed the Black-moss, now perfectly\nstill; and, perhaps, just as he was passing, with a shudder of\ngratitude, the very spot where his sweet Hannah Lee had so nearly\nperished, she was lying down to sleep in her innocence, or dreaming of\none now dearer to her than all on earth but her parents.\n\n\n\n\n LOVE AT ONE GLIMPSE;\n _OR, THE GLASGOW GENTLEMAN AND THE LADY_.\n\n\nSome years ago, there used to be pointed out, upon the streets of\nGlasgow, a man whose intellect had been unsettled upon a very strange\naccount. When a youth, he had happened to pass a lady on a crowded\nthroughfare\u2014a lady whose extreme beauty, though dimmed by the\nintervention of a veil, and seen but for a moment, made an indelible\nimpression upon his mind. This lovely vision shot rapidly past him, and\nwas in an instant lost amidst the commonplace crowd through which it\nmoved. He was so confounded by the tumult of his feelings, that he could\nnot pursue, or even attempt to see it again. Yet he never afterwards\nforgot it.\n\nWith a mind full of distracting thoughts, and a heart filled alternately\nwith gushes of pleasure and of pain, the man slowly left the spot where\nhe had remained for some minutes as it were thunderstruck. He soon\nafter, without being aware of what he wished, or what he was doing,\nfound himself again at the place. He came to the very spot where he had\nstood when the lady passed, mused for some time about it, went to a\nlittle distance, and then came up as he had come when he met the\nexquisite subject of his reverie\u2014unconsciously deluding himself with the\nidea that this might recall her to the spot. She came not; he felt\ndisappointed. He tried again; still she abstained from passing. He\ncontinued to traverse the place till the evening, when the street became\ndeserted. By-and-by, he was left altogether alone. He then saw that all\nhis fond efforts were vain, and he left the silent, lonely street at\nmidnight, with a soul as desolate as that gloomy terrace.\n\nFor weeks afterwards he was never off the streets. He wandered hither\nand thither throughout the town, like a forlorn ghost. In particular, he\noften visited the place where he had first seen the object of his\nabstracted thoughts, as if he considered that he had a better chance of\nseeing her there than anywhere else. He frequented every place of public\namusement to which he could purchase admission; and he made the tour of\nall the churches in the town. All was in vain. He never again placed his\neyes upon that angelic countenance. She was ever present to his mental\noptics, but she never appeared in a tangible form. Without her essential\npresence, all the world beside was to him as a blank\u2014a wilderness.\n\nMadness invariably takes possession of the mind which broods over much\nor over long upon some engrossing idea. So did it prove with this\nsingular lover. He grew \u201cinnocent,\u201d as the people of this country\ntenderly phrase it. His insanity, however, was little more than mere\nabstraction. The course of his mind was stopped at a particular point.\nAfter this he made no further progress in any intellectual attainment.\nHe acquired no new ideas. His whole soul stood still. He was like a\nclock stopped at a particular hour, with some things, too, about him,\nwhich, like the motionless indices of that machine, pointed out the date\nof the interruption. As, for instance, he ever after wore a peculiarly\nlong-backed and high-necked coat, as well as a neckcloth of a particular\nspot\u2014being the fashion of the year when he saw the lady. Indeed, he was\na sort of living memorial of the dress, gait, and manners of a former\nday. It was evident that he clung with a degree of fondness to every\nthing which bore relation to the great incident of his life. Nor could\nhe endure any thing that tended to cover up or screen from his\nrecollection that glorious yet melancholy circumstance. He had the same\nfeeling of veneration for that day, that circumstance, and for himself,\nas he then existed, which caused the chivalrous lover of former times to\npreserve upon his lips, as long as he could, the imaginary delight which\nthey had drawn from the touch of his mistress\u2019s hand.\n\nWhen I last saw this unfortunate person, he was getting old, and seemed\nstill more deranged than formerly. Every female whom he met on the\nstreet, especially if at all good looking, he gazed at with an\nenquiring, anxious expression; and when she had passed, he usually stood\nstill a few moments and mused, with his eyes cast upon the ground. It\nwas remarkable, that he gazed most anxiously upon women whose age and\nfigures most nearly resembled that of his unknown mistress at the time\nhe had seen her, and that he did not appear to make allowance for the\nyears which had passed since his eyes met that vision. This was part of\nhis madness. Strange power of love! Incomprehensible mechanism of the\nhuman heart!\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Journal_, 1829.\n\n\n\n\n NANNY WELSH, THE MINISTER\u2019S MAID.\n\n BY DANIEL GORRIE.\n\n\nThere are now\u2014so far at least as my experience goes\u2014fewer specimens of\nhomely, odd, and eccentric characters to be met with in Scotland than in\nformer years. In solitary nooks of the country, away from the boom of\ncities, and the rush of railways, many doubtless still exist, and\ncontribute largely to the amusement of their rural acquaintances; but it\ncannot be denied that the race of originals is fast disappearing, and\nthreatens ultimately to become altogether extinct. Into the cause or\ncauses of this I do not intend to enter; it is sufficient to chronicle\nthe melancholy fact. There may be a beauty in similarity, but there is a\nhigher beauty in diversity. Men and women are now so very much alike,\nthat the study of mankind is not such a difficult task after all. The\ngreater facilities for intercourse which the present generation enjoys\nhave tended to rub off the angularities of individual character, and to\ncreate a fusion, or confusion, of all classes in the community. Such\nbeing the case, it is pleasant at times to revert from the present to\nthe past, and to recall the peculiar aspect, the odd sayings, and\neccentric doings of persons with whom we were familiar in former years.\n\nAmong a number of others, Nanny Welsh stands prominent in my\nrecollection. She was maid-of-all-work in the old home-manse of Keppel,\nwhere I first saw the light of day, and for many years afterwards. A\nrare specimen Nanny was of the departed or departing race of familiar\ndomestics. She had herded the cows of neighbouring farmers, almost from\nher childhood, until she entered upon domestic service, and she had well\nnigh attained the prime of life before she became minister\u2019s maid, an\nhonour which she highly esteemed and long enjoyed. She was big-boned and\nmasculine in the build of her body. Her face was long and hard, almost\ngrim, and well freckled, and deeply browned by frequent exposure to the\nsun and air. A white \u201cmutch,\u201d with a high horse-shoe shaped crown,\nsurmounted her head at morning, noon, and night. With her gown tucked up\nbehind in the old familiar fashion of domestics, and a youngster\nstrapped on her back with a shawl, and peering with his little \u201cpow\u201d\nover her shoulders, she went to work, as if the fate of empires, not to\nspeak of the honour of the old manse, depended upon her exertions. She\nused to boast that she could \u201cpit mair through her hands in an hour than\nony ither woman i\u2019 the parish.\u201d She was, in truth, a capital worker; and\nwhile her hands went her tongue wagged. Nanny could never endure either\nto be idle or silent. When engaged in scrubbing pots and pans, the bairn\non her back was not forgotten, but received all the benefit of her\nsayings and soliloquies. In the discharge of her domestic duties she\nliked to carry everything her own way, and generally managed to take it,\nwhatever orders might be given to the contrary.\n\nThis good woman had the welfare of the family at heart, and a great\nfavourite she was amongst us youngsters, although she had a very summary\nmode of disposing of us sometimes when we attempted to teaze her or\nbecame unruly. I remember well an advice she gave us, on more than one\noccasion, when we were invited out to juvenile tea-parties in the\nneighbourhood. \u201cNoo, bairns,\u201d she would say, after our faces were\nscrubbed, and our hair was smoothed, \u201csee an\u2019 eat weel when ye\u2019re at it,\nan\u2019 no come hame garavishin\u2019 an\u2019 eatin\u2019.\u201d We not unfrequently paid the\npenalty next day of adhering too strictly to the letter of this advice;\nbut when children see heaps of buns, cookies, and shortbread piled up on\nthe table, who can blame them if they take no thought of the morrow?\nNanny used to relate with great glee a saying of one of us manse bairns.\nIt was the custom at the communion season in those days (and it may be\nthe custom in some places still) for the wealthier members of country\ncongregations to send the minister some substantial present for the\nbodily benefit of his officiating friends. One of us, standing at the\ngarden gate, had seen an expected arrival approaching, and running with\nbreathless haste to the kitchen, had exclaimed\u2014\u201cNanny, Nanny! here\u2019s a\nsalmon comin\u2019\u2014this is the _rale sacrament_!\u201d Nanny, honest woman, never\nforgot the sentiment, and often repeated it to the discomfiture of its\njuvenile author.\n\nIn the fulness of time, and when our domestic seemed doomed to a life of\nsingle blessedness, a wooer at last appeared in the person of Peter\nPearson, the pensioner. Peter had lost his wife; and six months after\nher decease, he came to the conclusion that it is not good\u2014that it is\nutterly uncomfortable, in fact\u2014for man to be alone. And so he looked\nfavourably upon Nanny Welsh, admired her proportions, estimated her\nenergy at its true value, and finally managed to make his way into the\nmanse kitchen of an evening. It must have cost him a considerable effort\nto effect this at first, as he regarded the minister with great awe.\nPeter had been in the artillery force. He had served in Spain and South\nAmerica, and returned home, not disabled, but \u201cdull of hearing,\u201d to\nenjoy his hard-won pension. He was a quiet and stolid, but kind-hearted\nman. He was very uncommunicative as regarded his military service and\nexploits. It was impossible to force or coax him to \u201cfight his battles\no\u2019er again\u201d by the fireside. Whether it was owing to want of narrative\npower, or to some dark remembrance that overshadowed his mind, Peter\ninvariably maintained discreet silence when soldiers and war became the\ntopics of conversation. On one occasion he was asked if he had ever been\nat Chili, and his answer was, \u201cI\u2019ve been at Gibraltar at ony rate!\u201d This\nsounds somewhat like the reply of the smart youth who, when it was\ninquired of him, if he had ever been in Paris, quickly responded, \u201cNo;\nbut my brother has been to Crail!\u201d\n\nThe wooing of Peter Pearson, pensioner, and Nanny Welsh, spinster, might\nhave formed a new era in the history of courtship. No sighs were heard.\nNo side-long, loving glances passed between them. There was no tremulous\npressure of the hands, or tingling touch of meeting lips. Peter was\n\u201csenselessly ceevil,\u201d although, I verily believe, if he had attempted to\nkiss Nanny she would have brained him on the spot with the beetle, and\nleft the warrior to die ingloriously on the hearthstone. No, they did\nnot wish to make \u201cauld fules\u201d of themselves. They wooed in their own\nway, and understood each other perfectly well. Peter sat by the hearth,\nsmoking his twist peacefully, and squirting out the juice as he had done\nat camp-fires in former years; and Nanny went about cleaning dishes,\nlifting tables, and arranging chairs, and only exchanging occasional\nwords with her future husband. She was never so talkative when Peter was\npresent as when he was absent. It was only on rare occasions that she\nventured to sit down on a chair beside him. She seemed always afraid of\nbeing caught doing anything so indecorous in the manse kitchen. I\nscarcely think that Peter required to propose. It was a tacit\nunderstanding, and their marriage-day was fixed, apparently, by mutual\nuncommunicated arrangement.\n\nOn the night before the bridal some of the neighbouring domestics and\nother women invaded the kitchen, and subjected Nanny to the painful\npleasure of feet-washing\u2014a ceremony somewhat different from the annual\nperformance at Vienna. She kicked furiously at first, calling her\ntormentors impudent hizzies and limmers; but she was compelled at last\nto succumb, and yielded with more reluctance than grace.\n\nThe marriage was celebrated quietly in the manse next day, and the\nyoungest of the family sat crowing on Nanny\u2019s knee, while she was being\ntold the sum and substance of her duties as a wife. No sooner was the\nceremony concluded, than she tucked up her wedding gown, and expressed\nher desire and determination to \u201csee a\u2019 things putten richt i\u2019 the\nkitchen afore she gaed awa\u2019.\u201d Peter had leased a cottage in a little\nway-side village, about two miles distant from the manse, and this was\nthe extent of their marriage jaunt. No doubt the evening would be spent\nhilariously by their friends and acquaintances, who would drink the\nhealth of the \u201chappy pair\u201d with overflowing bumpers.\n\nPeter and Nanny lived very happily together, although \u201cthe gray mare was\nthe better horse.\u201d She continued to be as industrious as ever, and the\npensioner managed to eke out his government pay by what is called, in\nsome parts of the country, \u201corra wark.\u201d Nanny came regularly every\nSabbath to the manse between sermons, and took pot-luck with the family.\nWe were always glad to see her, and hear her invariable, \u201cLosh, laddie,\nis that you?\u201d Many a time and oft we all visited her cottage in a body,\nand what glorious teas she used to give us! Still do I remember, and not\nwithout stomachic regrets, the mountains of bannocks, the hills of\ncakes, the hillocks of cookies, the ridges of butter, the red congealed\npools of jelly, and the three tea-spoonfuls of sugar in each cup! It was\na never-to-be-forgotten treat. Compare Nanny\u2019s tea-parties with the\nfashionable \u201ccookey-shines\u201d of the present generation! But, soft; that\nway madness lies! The good woman had a garden too; and how we youngsters\npitched into her carrots, currants, and gooseberries, or rather, to\nspeak correctly, pitched them into ourselves. We remembered her own\nadvice about not returning home \u201cgaravishin\u2019 and eatin\u2019.\u201d She prided\nherself greatly upon her powers of pig-feeding, and next to the pleasure\nof seeing us feasting like locusts was the delight she experienced in\ncontemplating, with folded arms, her precious pig devouring its meal of\npotatoes and greens. \u201cIsn\u2019t it a bonny beastie?\u2014did you ever see sic a\nbonny beastie?\u201d she would frequently exclaim. I never saw so much\naffection bestowed before or since upon the lowest of the lower animals.\nThe pig knew her perfectly well, and responded to her laudatory phrases\nby complacent grunts. Between Peter and the pig, I am verily persuaded,\nshe led a happier life than imperial princes in their palaces. No little\nartilleryman ever made his appearance to disturb the harmony of the\nhouse by tying crackers to the cat\u2019s tail.\n\nNanny\u2019s first visit to Edinburgh formed a rare episode in her life.\nThis happened a good many years after her marriage. The ride on the\ntop of the coach through the kingdom of Fife, she described as\n\u201cfearsome;\u201d and the horses dashing up hill and down, excited her\nliveliest compassion. When asked how she felt after her sail between\nKirkcaldy and Leith (the day was pleasant and the water smooth), her\nreply was\u2014\u201cWonnerfu\u2019\u2014wonnerfu\u2019 weel, after sic a voyage!\u201d The streets\nof the city, the high houses, the multitudinous shops, and the crowds\nof people, excited her rustic astonishment beyond all bounds. \u201cIs\u2019t a\nmarket the day?\u201d she would interject\u2014\u201cwhaur\u2019s a\u2019 the folk gaun?\u201d Her\nown appearance on the pavement attracted the notice of passers-by; and\nno wonder. Figure a big-boned, ungainly woman, with long, freckled\nface and open mouth, and dressed in defiance of the fashion of the\ntime, striding up the Bridges, and \u201cglowering\u201d into everybody\u2019s face,\nas if she expected to see her \u201caunty\u2019s second cousin\u201d\u2014figure such a\nperson, and you will form a respectable picture of Nanny Welsh,\n_alias_ Mrs Pearson, as she appeared many years ago on the streets of\nModern Athens. She could never go out alone from the house where she\nwas staying without losing herself. Once she went to the shop next\ndoor, and it took her an hour to find the way back again. On another\noccasion, when she had taken a longer trip than usual, she went\ncompletely off her reckoning, forgot the name of the street, mistook\nthe part of the town, and asked every person she met, gentle or\nsimple, swells or sweeps, \u201cGin they kent whaur Mrs So-and-so stopit!\u201d\nI never learned correctly how she got out of that scrape. All she\ncould say was that \u201ca ceevil man brocht her to the bottom o\u2019 the\nstair.\u201d She was perfectly dumfoundered when she saw and heard that the\npeople of Edinburgh had to buy the \u201cbits o\u2019 sticks\u201d with which they\nkindled their fires in the morning. She protested that she could bring\n\u201ca barrowfu\u2019 o\u2019 rosity roots frae the wuds that would keep her chimley\ngaun for a fortnicht.\u201d Going to the market to buy vegetables she\nlooked upon as perfectly preposterous. \u201cFlingin\u2019 awa,\u201d she would say,\n\u201cgude white saxpences an\u2019 shillin\u2019s for neeps, carrots, ingans, an\u2019\nkail\u2014it beats a\u2019!\u201d\n\nThe open-mouthed wonder of Nanny reached its height when one night,\nafter long and urgent solicitation, she was persuaded to go under good\nprotection to the Theatre Royal. Mackay was then in the zenith of his\nfame, and attracted crowded houses, more especially by his unique\nrepresentation of Bailie Nicol Jarvie. Nanny was taken to the pit. The\nblaze of light, the galleries rising one above another, the\ngaily-dressed ladies, the sea of faces surging from floor to roof, the\nwhistling, hooting, and laughing\u2014all these mingled together produced a\nbewildering effect upon the poor woman, and her bewilderment increased\nas the curtain rose and the play proceeded. She was speechless for about\nan hour\u2014she did nothing but gape and gaze. A human being suddenly\ntransported into some brilliant and magical hall, or into another world,\ncould scarcely have betrayed more abject astonishment. At last her\nwonder found vent, and she exclaimed in the hearing, and much to the\namusement, of those who surrounded her\u2014\u201cTak me awa\u2014tak me awa\u2014this is no\na place for me\u2014I\u2019m just Peter Pearson\u2019s ain wife!\u201d She would not be\npersuaded to remain even when the Bailie kept the house dissolved in\nloosened laughter. The idea seemed to be strong in her mind that the\npeople were all laughing at _her_. She was the best actress, although\nthe most unconscious one, in the whole house. What a capital pair the\nBailie and Nanny would have made! She would have beat Miss Nicol. Her\nfirst appearance on the stage would have been a perfect triumph\u2014it would\nhave secured the fame and fortune of Mrs Pearson. Nanny never liked to\nbe asked her opinion of the Edinburgh theatre. She only shook her head,\nand appeared to regard it as something akin to Pandemonium.\n\nNanny\u2019s stories about the sayings and doings of the Edinburgh people\nserved her for fireside talk many a winter evening after she returned\nhome to Peter Pearson. Peter, who had seen more of the world, used to\ntake a quiet chuckle to himself when she finished her description of\nsome \u201cferlie\u201d that had excited her astonishment or admiration. The\ngilded wonders above shop doors\u2014the Highlanders taking pinches of\nsnuff\u2014the wool-packs\u2014the great glittering spectacles\u2014the rams\u2019 heads and\nhorns\u2014these had excited her rustic curiosity almost as much as they\nattract the interest of a child. Poor honest Nanny! she has now slept\nfor years where the \u201crude forefathers of the hamlet sleep,\u201d and Peter,\nafter life\u2019s fitful fever, sleeps well by her side.\u2014_Pax Vobiscum!_\n\n\n\n\n LADY JEAN:\n _A TALE OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY_.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n The Yerl o\u2019 Wigton had three dauchters,\n O braw walie! they were bonnie!\n The youngest o\u2019 them and the bonniest too,\n Has fallen in love wi\u2019 Richie Storie.\n _Old Ballad._\n\nThe Earl of Wigton, whose name figures in Scottish annals of the reign\nof Charles II., had three daughters, named Lady Frances, Lady Grizel,\nand Lady Jean,\u2014the last being by several years the youngest, and by many\ndegrees the most beautiful. All the three usually resided with their\nmother at the chief seat of the family, Cumbernauld House, in\nStirlingshire; but the two eldest were occasionally permitted to attend\ntheir father in Edinburgh, in order that they might have some chance of\nobtaining lovers at the court held there by the Duke of Lauderdale,\nwhile Lady Jean was kept constantly at home, and debarred from the\nsociety of the capital, lest her superior beauty might interfere with\nand foil the attractions of her sisters, who, according to the notion of\nthat age, had a sort of \u201cright of primogeniture\u201d in matrimony, as well\nas in what was called \u201cheirship.\u201d\n\nIt may be easily imagined that, while the two marriageable ladies were\nenjoying all the delights of a third flat in one of the \u201ccloses\u201d of the\nCanongate, spending their days in seeing beaux, and their nights in\ndreaming of them, Lady Jean led no pleasant life amidst the remote and\nsolitary splendour of Cumbernauld, where her chief employment was the\ndisagreeable one of attending her mother, a very infirm and querulous\nold dame, much given (it was said) to strong waters. At the period when\nour tale opens, Lady Jean\u2019s charms, though never seen in the capital,\nhad begun to make some noise there; and the curiosity excited respecting\nthem amongst the juvenile party of the vice-regal court, had induced\nLord Wigton to confine her ladyship even more strictly than heretofore,\nlest perchance some gallant might make a pilgrimage to his country seat,\nin order to behold her, and from less to more, induce her to quit her\nretirement, in such a way as would effectually discomfit his schemes for\nthe pre-advancement of his elder daughters. He had been at pains to send\nan express to Cumbernauld, ordering Lady Jean to be confined to the\nprecincts of the house and the terrace-garden, and to be closely\nattended in all her movements by a trusty domestic. The consequence was\nthat the young lady complained most piteously to her deaf old\nlady-mother of the tedium and listlessness of her life, and wished with\nall her heart that she was as ugly, old, and happy as her sisters.\n\nLord Wigton was not insensible to the cruelty of his policy, however\nwell he might be convinced of its advantage and necessity. He loved his\nyoungest daughter more than the rest; and it was only in obedience to\nwhat he conceived to be the commands of duty, that he subjected her to\nthe restraint. His lordship, therefore, felt anxious to alleviate in\nsome measure the _d\u00e9sagr\u00e9mens_ of her solitary confinement; and knowing\nher to be fond of music, he had sent to her by the last messenger a\ntheorbo lute, with which he thought she would be able to amuse herself\nin a way very much to her mind,\u2014not considering that, as she could not\nplay upon the instrument, it would be little better to her than an\nunmeaning toy. By the return of his messenger, he received a letter from\nLady Jean, thanking him for the theorbo, but making him aware of his\noversight, and begging him to send some person who could teach her to\nplay.\n\nThe earl, whose acquirements in the philosophy of politics had never\nbeen questioned, felt ashamed of having committed such a solecism in so\ntrivial a matter; and like all men anxious to repair or conceal an error\nin judgment, immediately ran into another of ten times greater\nconsequence and magnitude: he gratified his daughter in her wish.\n\nThe gentry of Scotland were at that time in the custom of occasionally\nemploying a species of servants, whose accomplishments and duties would\nnow appear of a very anomalous character, though at that time naturally\narising from the peculiar situation of this country, in respect to its\nsouthern neighbour. They were, in general, humble men who had travelled\na good deal, and acquired many foreign accomplishments; who, returning\nto their native country after an absence of a few years, usually entered\ninto the service of the higher class of families, partly as ordinary\nlivery-men, and partly with the purpose of instructing the youth of both\nsexes, as they grew up and required such exercises, in dancing, music,\nwriting, &c., besides a vast variety of other arts, comprehended in the\ngeneral phrase of \u201cbreeding.\u201d Though these men received much higher\nwages, and were a thousand times more unmanageable than common serving\nmen, they served a good purpose in those days, when young people had\nscarcely any other opportunities of acquiring the ornamental branches of\neducation, except by going abroad.\n\nIt so happened, that not many days after Lord Wigton received his\ndaughter\u2019s letter, he was applied to for employment by one of these\nuseful personages, a tall and handsome youth, apparently\nfive-and-twenty, with dark, Italian-looking features, a slight\nmoustache, and as much foreign peculiarity in his dress as indicated\nthat he was just returned from his travels. After putting a few\nquestions, his lordship discovered that the youth was possessed of many\nagreeable accomplishments; was, in particular, perfectly well qualified\nto teach the theorbo, and had no objection to entering the service of a\nyoung lady of quality, only with the proviso that he was to be spared\nthe disgrace of a livery. Lord Wigton then made no scruple in engaging\nhim for a certain period; and next day saw the youth on the way to\nCumbernauld, with a letter from his lordship to Lady Jean, setting forth\nall his good qualities, and containing among other endearing\nexpressions, a hope that she would both benefit by his instructions, and\nbe in the meantime content on their account with her present residence.\n\nAny occurrence at Cumbernauld of higher import than the breaking of a\nneedle in embroidering, or the miscarriage of a brewing of currant-wine,\nwould have been quite an incident in the eyes of Lady Jean; and even to\nhave given alms at the castle-gate to an extraordinary beggar, or to see\nso much as a \u201cstranger\u201d in the candle, might have supplied her with\namusement infinite, and speculation boundless. What, then, must have\nbeen her delight, when the goodly and youthful figure of Richard Storie\nalighted one dull summer afternoon at the gate, and when the credentials\nhe presented disclosed to her the agreeable purpose of his mission! Her\njoy knew no bounds; nor did she know in what terms to welcome the\nstranger; she ran from one end of the house to the other, up stairs and\ndown stairs, in search of she knew not what; and finally, in her\ntransports, she shook her mother out of a drunken slumber, which the old\nlady was enjoying as usual in her large chair in the parlour.\n\nMaster Richard, as he was commonly designated, soon found himself\ncomfortably established in the good graces of the whole household of\nCumbernauld, and not less so in the particular favour of his young\nmistress. Even the sour old lady of the large chair was pleased with his\nhandsome appearance, and was occasionally seen to give a preternatural\nnod and smile at some of his musical exhibitions, as much as to say she\nknew when he performed well, and was willing to encourage humble merit.\nAs for Lady Jean, whose disposition was equally lively and generous, she\ncould not express, in sufficiently warm terms, her admiration of his\nperformances, or the delight she experienced from them. Nor was she ever\ncontent without having Master Richard in her presence, either to play\nhimself, or to teach her the enchanting art. She was a most apt\nscholar\u2014so apt, that in a few days she was able to accompany him with\nthe theorbo and voice, while he played upon an ancient harpsichord\nbelonging to the old lady, which he had rescued from a lumber room, and\nhad been at some pains to repair. The exclusive preference thus given to\nmusic for the time threw his other accomplishments into the shade, while\nit, moreover, occasioned his more constant presence in the apartments of\nthe ladies than he would have been otherwise entitled to. The\nconsequence was, that in a short time he almost ceased to be looked upon\nas a servant, and began gradually to assume the more interesting\ncharacter of a friend and equal.\n\nIt was Lady Jean\u2019s practice to take a walk, prescribed by her father,\nevery day in the garden, on which occasions the countess conceived\nherself as acting up to the letter of her husband\u2019s commands, when she\nordered Master Richard to attend his pupil. This arrangement was\nexceedingly agreeable to Lady Jean, as they sometimes took out the\ntheorbo, and added music to the pleasures of the walk. Another\nout-of-doors amusement, in which music formed a chief part, was\nsuggested to them by the appropriate frontispiece of a book of\ninstruction for the theorbo, which Master Richard had brought with him\nfrom Edinburgh. This engraving represented a beautiful young\nshepherdess, dressed in the fashionable costume of that period: a\nstupendous tower of hair hung round with diamonds, and a voluminous silk\ngown with a jewel-adorned stomacher, a theorbo in her arms, and a crook\nby her side,\u2014sitting on a flowery bank under a tree, with sheep planted\nat regular distances around her. At a little distance appeared a\nshepherd with dressed hair, long-skirted coat, and silk stockings, who\nseemed to survey his mistress with a languishing air of admiration, that\nappeared singularly ridiculous as contrasted with the coquettish and\ncontemptuous aspect of the lady. The plate referred to a particular song\nin the book, entitled \u201cA Dialogue betwixt Strephon and Lydia; or the\nproud Shepherdess\u2019s Courtship,\u201d the music of which was exceedingly\nbeautiful, while the verses were the tamest and most affected trash\nimaginable.\n\nIt occurred to Lady Jean\u2019s lively fancy, that if she and her teacher\nwere to personify the shepherdess and shepherd, and thus, as it were, to\ntransform the song to a sort of opera, making the terrace-garden the\nscene, not a little amusement might be added to the pleasure she\nexperienced from the mere music alone. This fancy was easily reduced to\nexecution; for, by seating herself under a tree, in her ordinary dress,\nwith the horticultural implement called a rake by her side, she looked\nthe very Lydia of the copperplate; while Richard, standing at his\ncustomary respectful distance, with his handsome person and somewhat\nforeign apparel, was a sufficiently good representation of Strephon.\nAfter arranging themselves thus, Master Richard opened the drama by\naddressing Lady Jean in the first verse of the song, which contained,\nbesides some description of sunrise, a comparison between the beauties\nof nature, at that delightful period, and the charms of Lydia, the\nsuperiority being of course awarded to the latter. Lady Jean, with the\nhelp of the theorbo, replied to this in a very disdainful style,\naffecting to hold the compliments of lovers very cheap, and asseverating\nthat she had no regard for any being on earth besides her father and\nmother, and no care but for these dear innocent sheep (here she looked\nkindly aside upon a neighbouring bed of cabbages), which they had\nentrusted to her charge. Other verses of similar nonsense succeeded,\nduring which the representative of the fair Lydia could not help feeling\nrather more emotion at hearing the ardent addresses of Strephon than was\nstrictly consistent with her part.\n\nAt last it was her duty to rise and walk softly away from her swain,\ndeclaring herself utterly insensible to both his praises and his\npassion, and her resolution never again to see or speak to him. This she\ndid in admirable style, though perhaps rather with the dignified gait\nand sweeping majesty of a tragedy-queen, than with anything like the\npettish or sullen strut of a disdainful rustic. Meanwhile, Strephon was\nsupposed to be left inconsolable. Her ladyship continued to support her\nassumed character for a few yards, till a turn of the walk concealed her\nfrom Master Richard; when, resuming her natural manner, she turned back,\nwith sparkling eyes, in order to ask his opinion of her performance, and\nit was with some confusion, and no little surprise, that on bursting\nagain into his sight, she discovered that Richard had not yet thrown off\nhis character. He was standing still as she had left him, fixed\nimmovably upon the spot in an attitude expressive of sorrow for her\ndeparture, and bending forward as if imploring her return. It was the\nexpression of his face that astonished her most; for it was not at all\nan expression appropriate to either his own character or to that which\nhe had assumed. It was an expression of earnest and impassioned\nadmiration; his whole soul seemed thrown into her face, which was\ndirected towards her, or rather the place where she had disappeared; and\nhis eyes were projected in the same direction, with such a look as that\nperhaps of an enraptured saint of old at the moment when a divinity\nparted from his presence. This lasted, however, but for a moment, for\nscarcely had that minute space of time elapsed before Richard, startled\nfrom his reverie by Lady Jean\u2019s sudden return, dismissed from his face\nall trace of any extraordinary expression, and stood before her,\nendeavouring to appear, just what he was, her ladyship\u2019s respectful\nservant and teacher. Nevertheless, this transformation did not take\nplace so quickly as to prevent her ladyship from observing the present\nexpression, nor was it accomplished with such address as to leave her\nroom for passing it over as unobserved. She was surprised\u2014she\nhesitated\u2014she seemed, in spite of herself, conscious of something\nawkward\u2014and finally she blushed slightly. Richard caught the contagion\nof her confusion in a double degree; and Lady Jean again became more\nconfused on observing that he was aware of her confusion. Richard was\nthe first to recover himself and speak. He made some remarks upon her\nsinging and acting\u2014not, however, upon her admirable performance of the\nlatter part of the drama; this encouraged her also to speak, and both\nsoon became somewhat composed. Shortly afterwards they returned to the\nhouse; but from that moment a chain of the most delicate, yet\nindissoluble sympathies began to connect the hearts of these youthful\nbeings, so alike in all natural qualities, and so dissimilar in every\nextraneous thing which the world is accustomed to value.\n\nAfter this interview there took place a slight estrangement between\nMaster Richard and Lady Jean that lasted a few days, during which they\nhad much less of conversation and music than for some time before. Both\nobserved this circumstance; but each ascribed it to accident, while it\nwas in reality occasioned by mutual reserve. Master Richard was afraid\nthat Lady Jean might be offended were he to propose anything like a\nrepetition of the garden drama; and Lady Jean, on her part, could not,\nconsistently with the rules of maidenly modesty, utter even a hint at\nsuch a thing, however she might secretly wish or long for it. The very\nconsciousness, reciprocally felt, of having something on their minds, of\nwhich neither durst speak, was sufficient to produce this reserve, even\nthough the emotions of the \u201ctender passion\u201d had not come in, as they\ndid, for a large share of the cause.\n\nAt length, however, this reserve was so far softened down, that they\nbegan to resume their former practice of walking together in the garden;\nbut, though the theorbo continued to make one of the party, no more\noperatic performances took place. Nevertheless, the mutual affection\nwhich had taken root in their hearts, experienced on this account no\nabatement, but, on the contrary, continued to increase.\n\nAs for Master Richard, it was no wonder that he should be deeply smitten\nwith the charms of his mistress; for, ever as he stole a long, furtive\nglance at her graceful form, he thought he had never seen in Spain or\nItaly any such specimens of female loveliness; and (if we may let the\nreader so far into the secret) he had indeed come to Cumbernauld with\nthe very purpose of falling in love.\n\nDifferent causes had operated upon Lady Jean. Richard being the first\nlove-worthy object she had seen since the period when the female heart\nbecomes most susceptible,\u2014the admiration with which she knew he beheld\nher,\u2014his musical accomplishments, which had tended so much to her\ngratification,\u2014all conspired to render him precious in her sight. In the\nwords of a beautiful modern ballad, \u201call impulses of soul and sense had\nthrilled\u201d her gentle and guileless heart\u2014\n\n \u2014\u2014hopes, and fears that kindled hopes,\n An undistinguishable throng,\n And gentle wishes, long subdued,\n Subdued and cherished long,\n\nhad exercised their tender and delightful influence over her; like a\nflower thrown upon one of the streams of her own native land, whose\ncourse was through the beauties, the splendours, and the terrors of\nnature, she was borne away in a dream, the magic scenery of which was\nalternately pleasing, fearful, and glorious, and from which she could no\nmore awake than could the flower restrain its course on the gliding\nwaters. The habit of contemplating her lover every day, and that in the\ndignified character of an instructor, gradually blinded her in a great\nmeasure to his humbler quality, and to the probable sentiments of her\nfather and the world upon the subject of her passion. If by any chance\nsuch a consideration was forced upon her notice, and she found occasion\nto tremble lest the sentiments in which she was so luxuriously indulging\nshould end in disgrace and disaster, she soon quieted her fears, by\nreverting to an idea which had lately occurred to her, namely, that\n_Richard was not what he seemed_. She had heard and read of love\nassuming strange disguises. A Lord Belhaven, in the immediately\npreceding period of the civil war, had taken refuge from the fury of\nCromwell in the service of an English nobleman, whose daughter\u2019s heart\nhe won under the disguise of a gardener, and whom, on the recurrence of\nbetter times, he carried home to Scotland as his lady. This story was\nthen quite popular, and at least one of the parties still survived to\nattest its truth. But even in nursery tales Lady Jean could find\nexamples which justified her own passion. The vilest animals, she knew,\non finding some beautiful dame, who was so disinterested as to fall in\nlove with them, usually turned out to be the most handsome princes that\never were seen, who invariably married and made happy the ladies whose\naffection had restored them to their natural form and just inheritance.\n\u201cWho knows,\u201d she thought, \u201cbut Richard may some day, in a transport of\npassion, throw open his coat, exhibit the star of nobility glittering on\nhis breast, and ask me to become a countess!\u201d\n\nSuch are the excuses which love suggests to reason, and which the reason\nof lovers easily accepts; while those who are neither youthful nor in\nlove wonder at the hallucination of their impassioned juniors.\nExperience soon teaches us that this world is not one of romance, and\nthat few incidents in life ever occur out of the ordinary way. But\nbefore we acquire this experience by actual observation, we all of us\nregard things in a very different light. The truth seems to be that, in\nthe eyes of youth, \u201cthe days of chivalry\u201d do not appear to be gone; our\nideas are then contemporary, or on a par with the early romantic ages of\nthe world; and it is only by mingling with mature men, and looking at\nthings as they are, that we at length advance towards, and ultimately\nsettle down in the _real era_ of our existence. Was there ever yet a\nyouth who did not feel some chivalrous impulses,\u2014some thirst for more\nglorious scenes than those around him,\u2014some aspirations after lofty\npassion and supreme excellence\u2014or who did not cherish some pure\nfirstlove that could not prudentially be gratified?\n\nThe greater part of the rest of the summer passed away before the lovers\ncame to an _eclaircissement_; and such, indeed, was their mutual reserve\nupon the subject, that had it not been for the occurrence of a singular\nand deciding circumstance, there appeared little probability of this\never otherwise taking place. The Earl of Home, a gay and somewhat\nfoolish young nobleman, one morning, after attending a convivial party,\nwhere the charms of Lady Jean Fleming formed the principal topic of\ndiscourse, left Edinburgh, and took the way to Cumbernauld, on the very\npilgrimage, and with the very purpose, which Lord Wigton had before\nanticipated. Resolved first to see, then to love, and lastly to run away\nwith the young lady, his lordship skulked about for a few days, and at\nlast had the pleasure of seeing the hidden beauty over the garden-wall,\nas she was walking with Master Richard. He thought he had never seen any\nlady who could be at all compared to Lady Jean, and, as a matter of\ncourse, resolved to make her his own, and surprise all his companions at\nEdinburgh with his success and her beauty. He watched again next day,\nand happening to meet Master Richard out of the bounds of Cumbernauld\npolicy, accosted him, with the intention of securing his services in\nmaking his way towards Lady Jean. After a few words of course, he\nproposed the subject to Richard, and offered a considerable bribe, to\ninduce him to work for his interest. Richard at first rejected the\noffer, but immediately after, on bethinking himself, saw fit to accept\nit. He was to mention his lordship\u2019s purpose to Lady Jean, and to\nprepare the way for a private interview with her. On the afternoon of\nthe succeeding day, he was to meet Lord Home at the same place, and tell\nhim how Lady Jean had received his proposals. With this they\nparted\u2014Richard to muse on this unexpected circumstance, which he saw\nmight blast all his hopes, unless he should resolve upon prompt and\nactive measures, and the Earl of Home to enjoy himself at the humble inn\nof the village of Cumbernauld, where he had for the last few days\nenacted the character of \u201cthe daft lad frae Edinburgh, that seemed to\nhae mair siller than sense.\u201d\n\nOn the morning of the tenth day after Master Richard\u2019s first interview\nwith Lord Home, that faithful serving-man found himself jogging swiftly\nalong the road to Edinburgh, mounted on a stout nag, with the fair Lady\nJean seated comfortably on a pillion behind him. It was a fine morning\nin autumn, and the road had a peculiarly gay appearance from the\nmultitude of country people, mounted and dismounted, who seemed also\nhastening towards the capital. Master Richard, upon inquiry, discovered\nthat it was the \u201cmarket-day,\u201d a circumstance which seemed favourable to\nhis design, by the additional assurance it gave him of not being\nrecognised among the extraordinary number of strangers who might be\nexpected to crowd the city on such an occasion.\n\nThe lovers approached the city by the west, and the first street they\nentered was the suburban one called Portsburgh, which leads towards the\ngreat market-place of Edinburgh. Here Richard, impatient as he was,\nfound himself obliged, like many other rustic cavaliers, to reduce the\npace of his horse to a walk, on account of the narrowness and crowded\nstate of the street. This he felt the more disagreeable, as it subjected\nhim and his interesting companion to the close and leisurely scrutiny of\nthe inhabitants. Both had endeavoured to disguise everything remarkable\nin their appearance, so far as dress and demeanour could be disguised;\nyet, as Lady Jean could not conceal her extraordinary beauty, and\nRichard had not found it possible to part with a slight and dearly\nbeloved moustache, it naturally followed that they were honoured with a\ngood deal of staring. Many an urchin upon the street threw up his arms\nas they passed along, exclaiming, \u201cOh! the black-bearded man!\u201d or, \u201cOh!\nthe bonnie leddie!\u201d\u2014the men all admired Lady Jean, the women Master\nRichard\u2014and many an old shoemaker ogled them earnestly over his\nhalf-door, with his spectacles pushed up above his dingy cowl. The\nlovers, who had thus to run a sort of gauntlet of admiration and remark,\nwere glad when they reached an inn, which Richard, who was slightly\nacquainted with the town, knew to be a proper place for the performance\nof a \u201chalf-merk marriage.\u201d\n\nThey alighted, and were civilly received by an obsequious landlady, who\nconducted them into an apartment at the back of the house. There Lady\nJean was for a short time left to make some arrangements about her\ndress, while Richard disclosed to the landlady in another room the\npurpose upon which he was come to her house, and consulted her about\nprocuring a clergyman. The dame of the house, to whom a clandestine\nmarriage was the merest matter of course, showed the utmost willingness\nto facilitate the design of her guests, and said that she believed a\nclerical official might be procured in a few minutes, provided that\nneither had any scruples of conscience, as \u201cmost part o\u2019 fouk frae the\nwest had,\u201d in accepting the services of an episcopal clergyman. The\nlover assured her that so far from having any objection to a \u201cgovernment\nminister\u201d (for so they were sometimes termed), he would prefer such to\nany other, as both he and his bride belonged to that persuasion. The\nlandlady heard this declaration with complacency, which showed that she\nloved her guests the better for it, and told Richard, that if he\npleased, she would immediately introduce him to the Dean of St Giles,\nwho, honest man, was just now taking his \u201cmeridian\u201d in the little back\ngarret-parlour, along with his friend and gossip, Bowed Andrew, the\nwaiter of the West Port. To this Richard joyfully assented, and speedily\nhe and Lady Jean were joined in their room by the said Dean,\u2014a squat\nlittle gentleman, with a drunken but important-looking face, and an air\nof consequentiality even in his stagger that was partly imposing and\npartly ridiculous. He addressed his clients with a patronizing simper,\nof which the effect was grievously disconcerted by an unlucky hiccup,\nand in a speech which might have had the intended tone of paternal and\nreverend authority, had it not been smattered and degraded into shreds\nby the crapulous insufficiency of his tongue. Richard cut short his\nill-sustained attempts at dignity by requesting him to partake of some\nliquor. His reverence almost leaped at the proffered jug, which\ncontained ale. He first took a tasting, then a sip\u2014shaking his head\nbetween\u2014next a small draught, with a still more convulsion-like shake of\nthe head; and, lastly, he took a hearty and persevering swill, from the\neffects of which his lungs did not recover for at least twenty\nrespirations. The impatient lover then begged him to proceed with the\nceremony; which he forthwith commenced in presence of the landlady and\nthe above-mentioned Bowed Andrew; and in a few minutes Richard and Lady\nJean were united in the holy bonds of matrimony.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\nWhen the ceremony was concluded, and both the clergyman and the\nwitnesses had been satisfied and dismissed, the lovers left the house,\nwith the design of walking forward into the city. In conformity to a\nprevious arrangement, Lady Jean walked first, like a lady of quality,\nand Richard followed closely behind, with the dress and deportment of\nher servant. Her ladyship was dressed in her finest suit, and adorned\nwith her finest jewels, all of which she had brought from Cumbernauld on\npurpose, in a mail or leathern trunk\u2014for such was the name then given to\nthe convenience now entitled a portmanteau. Her step was light, and her\nbearing gay, as she moved along; not on account of the success which had\nattended her expedition, or her satisfaction in being now united to the\nman of her choice, but because she anticipated the highest pleasure in\nthe sight of a place whereof she had heard such wonderful stories, and\nfrom a participation in whose delights she had been so long withheld.\n\nLike all persons educated in the country, she had been regaled in her\nchildhood with magnificent descriptions of the capital\u2014of its buildings,\nthat seemed to mingle with the clouds\u2014its shops, which apparently\ncontained more wealth than all the world beside\u2014of its paved streets\n(for paved streets were then wonders in Scotland)\u2014and, above all, of the\ngrand folks that thronged its Highgates, its Canongates, and its\nCowgates\u2014people whose lives seemed a perpetual holiday, whose attire was\never new, and who all lived in their several palaces.\n\nThough, of course, Edinburgh had then little to boast of, the country\npeople who occasionally visited it did not regard it with less\nadmiration than that with which the peasantry of our own day may be\nsupposed to view it, now that it is something so very different. It was\nthen, as well as now, the capital of the country, and, as such, bore the\nsame disproportion in point of magnificence to inferior towns, and to\nthe country in general. In one respect it was superior to what it is in\nthe present day, namely, in being the seat of government and of a court.\nLady Jean had often heard all its glorious peculiarities described by\nher sisters, who, moreover, took occasion to colour the picture too\nhighly, in order to raise her envy, and make themselves appear great in\ntheir alliance and association with so much greatness. She was,\ntherefore, prepared to see a scene of the utmost splendour\u2014a scene in\nwhich nothing horrible or paltry mingled, but which was altogether\ncalculated to awe or to delight the senses.\n\nHer ladyship was destined to be disappointed at the commencement, at\nleast, of her acquaintance with the city. The first remarkable object\nwhich struck her eye, after leaving the inn, was the high \u201cbow,\u201d or\narch, of the gate called the West Port. In this itself there was nothing\nworthy of particular attention, and she rather directed her eyes through\nthe opening beneath, which half disclosed a wide space beyond,\napparently crowded with people. But when she came close up to the gate,\nand cast, before passing, a last glance at the arch, she shuddered at\nthe sight then presented to her eyes. On the very pinnacle of the arch\nwas stuck the ghastly and weather-worn remains of a human head, the\nfeatures of which, half flesh, half bone, were shaded and rendered still\nmore indistinctly horrible by the long dark hair, which hung in meagre\ntresses around them.\n\n\u201cOh, Richard, Richard!\u201d she exclaimed, stopping and turning round, \u201cwhat\nis that dreadful-looking thing?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat, madam,\u201d said Richard, without any emotion, \u201cis the broken remnant\nof a west country preacher, spiked up there to warn his countrymen who\nmay approach this port, against doing anything to incur the fate which\nhas overtaken himself. Methinks he has preached to small purpose, for\nyonder stands the gallows, ready, I suppose, to bring him some brother\nin affliction.\u201d\n\n\u201cHorrible!\u201d exclaimed Lady Jean; \u201cand is this really the fine town of\nEdinburgh, where I was taught to expect so many grand sights? I thought\nit was just one universal palace, and it turns out to be a great\ncharnel-house!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is indeed more like that than anything else at times,\u201d said Richard;\n\u201cbut, my dear Lady Jean, you are not going to start at this bugbear,\nwhich the very children, you see, do not heed in passing.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, I think, Richard,\u201d answered her ladyship, \u201cif Edinburgh is to\nbe at all like this, it would be just as good to turn back at once, and\npostpone our visit to better times.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut it is not all like this,\u201d replied Richard; \u201cI assure you it is not.\nFor Heaven\u2019s sake, my lady, move on. The people are beginning to stare\nat us. You shall soon see grand sights enough, if we were once fairly\nout of this place. Make for the opposite corner of the Grassmarket, and\nascend the street to the left of that horrible gibbet. We may yet get\npast it before the criminals are produced.\u201d\n\nThus admonished, Lady Jean passed, not without a shudder, under the\ndreadful arch, and entered the spacious oblong square called the\nGrassmarket. This place was crowded at the west end with rustics engaged\nin all the bustle of a grain and cattle market, and at the eastern and\nmost distant extremity, with a mob of idlers, who had gathered around\nthe gibbet in order to witness the awful ceremony that was about to take\nplace. The crowd, which was scarcely so dense as that which attends the\nrarer scene of a modern execution, made way on both sides for Lady Jean\nas she moved along; and wherever she went, she left behind her a \u201cwake,\u201d\nas it were, of admiration and confusion. So exquisite and so new a\nbeauty, so splendid a suit of female attire, and so stout and handsome\nan attendant\u2014these were all calculated to inspire reverence in the minds\nof the beholders. Her carriage at the same time was so stately and so\ngraceful, that no one could be so rude as to interrupt or disturb it.\nThe people, therefore, parted when she approached, and left a free\npassage for her on all sides, as if she had been an angel or a spirit\ncome to walk amidst a mortal crowd, and whose person could not be\ntouched, and might scarcely be beheld\u2014whose motions were not to be\ninterfered with by those among whom she chose to walk\u2014but who was to be\nreceived with prostration of spirit, and permitted to depart as she had\ncome, unquestioned and unapproached. In traversing the Grassmarket, two\nor three young coxcombs, with voluminous wigs, short cloaks, rapiers,\nand rose-knots at their knees and shoes, who, on observing her at a\ndistance, had prepared to treat her with a condescending stare, fell\nback, awed and confounded, at her near approach, and spent the gaze,\nperhaps, upon the humbler mark of her follower, or upon vacancy.\n\nHaving at length passed the gibbet, Lady Jean began to ascend the steep\nand tortuous street denominated the West Bow. She had hitherto been\nunable to direct any attention to what she was most anxious to\nbehold,\u2014the scenic wonders of the capital. But having now got clear of\nthe crowd, and no longer fearing to see the gallows, she ventured to\nlift up her eyes and look around. The tallness and massiveness of the\nbuildings, some of which bore the cross of the Knights Templar on their\npinnacles, while others seemed to be surmounted or overtopped by still\ntaller edifices beyond, impressed her imagination; and the effect was\nrendered still more striking by the countless human figures which\ncrowded the windows, and even the roofs of the houses, all alike bending\ntheir attention, as she thought, towards herself. The scene before her\nlooked like an amphitheatre filled with spectators, while she and\nRichard seemed as the objects upon the arena. The thought caused her to\nhurry on, and she soon found herself in a great measure screened from\nobservation by the overhanging projections of the narrower part of the\nWest Bow, which she now entered.\n\nWith slow and difficult, but stately and graceful steps, she then\nproceeded, till she reached the upper angle of the street, where a novel\nand unexpected scene awaited her. A sound like that of rushing waters\nseemed first to proceed from the part of the street still concealed from\nher view, and presently appeared round the angle, the first rank of an\nimpetuous crowd, which, rushing downward with prodigious force, would\ncertainly have overwhelmed her delicate form, had she not dexterously\navoided them, by stepping aside upon a projecting stair, to which\nRichard also sprung just in time to save himself from a similar fate.\nFrom this place of safety, which was not without its own crowd of\nchildren, women, and sage-looking elderly mechanics, with Kilmarnock\ncowls, they in the next moment saw the massive mob rush past, like the\nfirst wave of a flood, bearing either along or down everything that came\nin their way. Immediately after, but at a more deliberate pace, followed\na procession of figures, which struck the heart of Lady Jean with as\nheavy a sense of sorrow as the crowd had just impressed with terror and\nsurprise. First came a small company of the veterans of the city-guard,\nsome of whom had perhaps figured in the campaigns of Middleton and\nMontrose, and whose bronzed, inflexible faces bore on this melancholy\noccasion precisely the same expression which they ordinarily exhibited\non the joyful one of attending the magistrates at the drinking of the\nKing\u2019s health on the 29th of May.\n\nBehind these, and encircled by some other soldiers of the same band,\nappeared two figures of a different sort. One of them was a\nyoung-looking, but pale and woe-worn man, the impressive wretchedness of\nwhose appearance was strikingly increased by the ghastly dress which he\nwore. He was attired from head to foot in a white shroud, such as was\nsometimes worn in Scotland by criminals at the gallows, but which was,\nin the present instance, partly assumed as a badge of innocence. The\nexcessive whiteness and emaciation of his countenance suited well with\nthis dismal apparel, and, with the wild enthusiasm that kindled in his\neyes, gave an almost supernatural effect to the whole scene, which\nrather resembled a pageant of the dead than a procession of earthly men.\nHe was the only criminal: the person who walked by his side, and\noccasionally supported his steps, being, as the crowd whispered around,\nwith many a varied expression of sympathy\u2014his father. The old man had\nthe air of a devout Presbyterian, with harsh, intelligent features, and\na dress which bespoke his being a countryman of the lower rank.\nAccording to the report of the bystanders, he had educated this, his\nonly son, for the unfortunate Church of Scotland, and now attended him\nto the fate which his talents and violent temperament had conspired to\ndraw down upon his head. If ever he felt any pride in the popular\nadmiration with which his son was honoured, no traces of such a\nsentiment now appeared. On the contrary, he seemed humbled to the very\nearth with sorrow; and though he had perhaps contemplated the issue, now\nabout to take place, with no small portion of satisfaction, so long as\nit was at a distance and uncertain, the feelings of a father had\nevidently proved too much for his fortitude, when the event approached\nin all its dreadful reality. The emotions perceptible in that rough and\nrigid countenance were the more striking, as being so much at variance\nwith its natural and characteristic expression; and the tear which\ngathered in his eye excited the greater commiseration, in so far as it\nseemed a stranger there. But the hero and heroine of our tale had little\ntime to make observations on this piteous scene, for the procession\npassed quickly on, and was soon beyond their sight. When it was gone,\nthe people of the Bow, who seemed accustomed to such sights, uttered\nvarious expressions of pity, indignation, and horror, according to their\nrespective feelings, and then slowly retired to their dens in the stairs\nand booths which lined the whole of this ancient and singular street.\n\nLady Jean, whose beautiful eyes were suffused with tears at beholding so\nmelancholy a spectacle, was then admonished by her attendant to proceed.\nWith a heart deadened to all sensations of wonder and delight, she moved\nforward, and was soon ushered into the place called the Lawnmarket, then\nperhaps the most fashionable district in Edinburgh, but the grandeur and\nspaciousness of which she beheld almost without admiration. The scene\nhere was, however, much gayer, and approached more nearly to her\nsplendid preconceptions of the capital than any she had yet seen. The\nshops were, in her estimation, very fine, and some of the people on the\nstreet were of that noble description of which she had believed all\ninhabitants of cities to be. There was no crowd on the street, which,\ntherefore, afforded room for the better display of her stately and\nbeautiful person; and as she walked steadily onwards, still \u201cushed\u201d (for\nsuch was then the phrase) by her handsome and noble-looking attendant, a\ngreater degree of admiration was excited amongst the gay idlers whom she\npassed, than even that which marked her progress through the humbler\ncrowd of the Grassmarket. Various noblemen, in passing towards their\nhomes in the Castle Hill, lifted their feathered hats and bowed\nprofoundly to the lovely vision; and one or two magnificent dames,\nsweeping along with their long silk trains borne up by liverymen, stared\nat or eyed askance the charms which threw their own so completely into\nshade. By the time Lady Jean arrived at the bottom of the Lawnmarket,\nthat is to say, where it was partially closed up by the Tolbooth, she\nhad in a great measure recovered her spirits, and found herself prepared\nto enjoy the sight of the public buildings, which were so thickly\nclustered together at this central part of the city.\n\nShe was directed by Richard to pass along the narrow road which then led\nbetween the houses and the Tolbooth on the south, and which, being\ncontinued by a still narrower passage skirting the west end of St Giles\u2019\nChurch, formed the western approach to the Parliament Close. Obeying his\nguidance in this tortuous passage, she soon found herself at the\nopening, or the square space\u2014so styled on account of its being closed on\nmore than one side by the meeting-place of the legislative assembly of\nScotland. Here a splendid scene awaited her. The whole square was filled\nwith the members of the Scottish Parliament, Barons and Commons, who had\njust left the House in which they sat together,\u2014with ladies, who on days\nof unusual ceremony were allowed to attend the House, and with horses\nrichly caparisoned, and covered with gold-embroidered foot-cloths, some\nof which were mounted by their owners, while others were held in\nreadiness by footmen. All was bustle and magnificence. Noblemen and\ngentlemen in splendid attire threaded the crowd in search of their\nhorses; ladies tripped after them with timid and careful steps,\nendeavouring, by all in their power, to avoid contact with such objects\nas were calculated to injure their fineries; grooms strode heavily\nabout, and more nimble lackeys jumped everywhere, here and there, some\nof them as drunk as the Parliament Close claret could make them, but all\nintent on doing the duties of attendance and respect to their masters.\nSome smart and well-dressed young gentlemen were arranging their cloaks\nand swords, and preparing to leave the square on foot, by the passage\nwhich had given entry to Master Richard and Lady Jean.\n\nAt sight of our heroine, most of these gallants stood still in\nadmiration, and one of them, with the trained assurance of a rake,\nobserving her to be beautiful, a stranger, and not too well protected,\naccosted her in a strain of language which caused her at once to blush\nand tremble. Richard\u2019s brow reddened with anger as he hesitated not a\nmoment in stepping up and telling the offender to leave the lady alone,\non pain of certain consequences which might not prove agreeable.\n\n\u201cAnd who are you, my brave fellow?\u201d said the youth, with bold assurance.\n\n\u201cSirrah!\u201d exclaimed Richard, so indignant as to forget himself, \u201cI am\nthat lady\u2019s husband\u2014her servant, I mean,\u201d and here he stopped short in\nsome confusion.\n\n\u201cAdmirable!\u201d exclaimed the other. \u201cHa! ha! ha! ha! Here, sirs, is a\nlady\u2019s lacquey, who does not know whether he is his mistress\u2019 servant or\nher husband. Let us give him up to the town-guard, to see whether the\nblack hole will make him remember the real state of the case.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he attempted to push Richard aside, and take hold of the\nlady. But he had not time to touch her garments with so much as a\nfinger, before her protector had a rapier flourishing in his eyes, and\nthreatened him with instant death, unless he desisted from his profane\npurpose. At sight of the bright steel he stepped back one or two paces,\ndrew his own sword, and was preparing to fight, when one of his more\ngrave associates called out\u2014\n\n\u201cFor shame, Rollo!\u2014with a lady\u2019s lacquey, too, and in the presence of\nthe duke and duchess! I see their royal highnesses, already alarmed, are\ninquiring the cause of the disturbance.\u201d\n\nIt was even as this gentleman said, and presently came up to the scene\nof contention some of the most distinguished personages in the crowd,\none of whom demanded from the parties an explanation of so disgraceful\nan occurrence.\n\n\u201cWhy, here is a fellow, my lord,\u201d answered Rollo, \u201cwho says he is the\nhusband of a lady whom he attends as a liveryman, and a lady, too, the\nbonniest, I daresay, that has been seen in Scotland since the days of\nQueen Magdalen!\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what matters it to you,\u201d said the inquirer, who seemed to be a\njudge of the Session, \u201cin what relation this man stands to his lady? Let\nthe parties both come forward, and tell their ain tale. May it please\nyour royal highness,\u201d he continued, addressing a very grave dignitary,\nwho sat on horseback behind him, as stiff and formal as a sign-post, \u201cto\nhear the _declarator_ of thir twa strange incomers. But see\u2014see\u2014what is\nthe matter wi\u2019 Lord Wigton?\u201d he added, pointing to an aged personage on\nhorseback, who had just pushed forward, and seemed about to faint and\nfall from his horse. The person alluded to, at sight of his daughter in\nthis unexpected place, was, in reality, confounded, and it was some time\nbefore he mastered voice enough to ejaculate\u2014\n\n\u201cOh, Jean, Jean! what is this ye\u2019ve been about? or what has brocht you\nto Edinburgh?\u201d\n\n\u201cLord have a care of us!\u201d exclaimed at this juncture another venerable\npeer, who had just come up, \u201cwhat has brocht my sonsie son, Richie\nLivingstone, to Edinburgh, when he should have been fechtin\u2019 the Dutch\nby this time in Transylvania?\u201d\n\nThe two lovers, thus recognised by their respective parents, stood with\ndowncast looks, and perfectly silent, while all was buzz and confusion\nin the brilliant circle around them; for the parties concerned were not\nmore surprised at the aspect of their affairs, than were all the rest at\nthe beauty of the far-famed but hitherto unseen Lady Jean Fleming. The\nEarl of Linlithgow, Richard\u2019s father, was the first to speak aloud,\nafter the general astonishment had for some time subsided; and this he\ndid in a laconic though important query, which he couched in the simple\nwords,\u2014\n\n\u201cAre ye married, bairns?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, dearest father,\u201d said his son, gathering courage, and coming close\nup to his saddle-bow; \u201cand I beseech you to extricate Lady Jean and me\nfrom this crowd, and I shall tell you all when we are alone.\u201d\n\n\u201cA pretty man ye are, truly,\u201d said the old man, who never took anything\nvery seriously to heart, \u201cto be staying at hame, and getting yoursel\nmarried, all this time you should have been abroad, winning honour and\nwealth, as your gallant granduncle did wi\u2019 Gustavus i\u2019 the thretties!\nHooever, since better mayna be, I maun try and console my Lord Wigton,\nwho, I doot, has the worst o\u2019 the bargain, ye ne\u2019er-do-weel!\u201d\n\nHe then went up to Lady Jean\u2019s father, shook him by the hand, and said,\nthat \u201cthough they had been made relations against their wills, he hoped\nthey would continue good friends. The young people,\u201d he observed, \u201care\nno that ill-matched; and it is not the first time that the Flemings and\nthe Livingstones have melled together, as witness the blithe marriage of\nthe Queen\u2019s Marie to Lord Fleming in the fifteen-saxty-five. At ony\nrate, my lord, let us put a good face on the matter, afore thae\nglowerin\u2019 gentles, and whipper-snapper duchesses. I\u2019ll get horses for\nthe two, and they\u2019ll join the riding\u2019 down the street; and de\u2019il hae me,\nif Lady Jean doesna outshine the hale o\u2019 them!\u201d\n\n\u201cMy Lord Linlithgow,\u201d responded the graver and more implacable Earl of\nWigton, \u201cit may set you to take this matter blithely, but let me tell\nyou, its a muckle mair serious affair for me. What think ye am I to do\nwi\u2019 Frances and Grizzy noo?\u201d\n\n\u201cHoot toot, my lord,\u201d said Linlithgow with a sly smile, \u201ctheir chance is\nas gude as ever it was, I assure you, and sae will everybody think that\nkens them. I _maun_ ca\u2019 horses though, or the young folk will be ridden\nower afore ever they do more gude, by thae rampaugin\u2019 young men.\u201d So\nsaying, and taking Lord Wigton\u2019s moody silence for assent, he proceeded\nto cry to his servants for the best pair of horses they could get, and\nthese being speedily procured, Lord Richard and his bride were requested\nto mount; after which they were formally introduced to the gracious\nnotice of the Duke and Duchess of York, and the Princess Anne, who\nhappened to attend Parliament on this the last day of its session, when\nit was customary for all the members to ride both to and from the House\nin an orderly cavalcade.\n\nThe order was given to proceed, and the lovers were soon relieved in a\ngreat measure from the embarrassing notice of the crowd, by assuming a\nparticular place in the procession, and finding themselves confounded\nwith more than three hundred equally splendid figures. As the pageant,\nhowever, moved down the High Street in a continuous and open line, it\nwas impossible not to distinguish the singular loveliness of Lady Jean,\nand the gallant carriage of her husband, from all the rest. Accordingly,\nthe trained bands and city guard, who lined the street, and who were in\ngeneral quite as insensible to the splendours of \u201cthe Riding\u201d as are the\nmusicians in a modern orchestra to the wonders of a melodrama in its\nfortieth night,\u2014even they perceived and admired the graces of the young\ncouple, whom they could not help gazing after with a stupid and\nlingering delight. From the windows, too, and the \u201cstair-heads,\u201d their\nbeauty was well observed, and amply conjectured and commented on; while\nmany a young cavalier endeavoured, by all sorts of pretences, to find\noccasion to break the order of the cavalcade, and get himself haply\nplaced nearer to the exquisite figure, of which he had got just one\nkilling glance in the square. Slowly and majestically the brilliant\ntrain paced down the great street of Edinburgh\u2014the acclamations of the\nmultitude ceaselessly expressing the delight which the people of\nScotland felt in this sensible type and emblem of their ancient\nindependence.\n\nAt length they reached the courtyard of Holyrood-house, where the duke\nand duchess invited the whole assemblage to a ball, which they designed\nto give that evening in the hall of the palace; after which all departed\nto their respective residences throughout the town, Lords Wigton and\nLinlithgow taking their young friends under their immediate protection,\nand seeking the residence of the former nobleman, a little way up the\nCanongate. In riding thither, the lovers had leisure to explain to their\nparents the singular circumstances of their union, and address enough to\nobtain unqualified forgiveness for their imprudence.\n\nOn alighting at Lord Wigton\u2019s house, Lady Jean found her sisters\nconfined to their rooms with headache, or some such serious\nindisposition, and in the utmost dejection on account of having been\nthereby withheld from the Riding of the Parliament. Their spirits, as\nmay be supposed, were not much elevated, when, on coming forth in\ndishabille to welcome their sister, they learned that she had had the\ngood fortune to be married before them. Their ill-luck was, however,\nirremediable, and so, making a merit of submitting to it, they\ncondescended to be rather agreeable during the dinner and the afternoon.\nIt was not long before all parties were perfectly reconciled to what had\ntaken place; and by the time it was necessary to dress for the ball, the\nelder young ladies declared themselves so much recovered as to be able\nto accompany their happy sister.\n\nThe Earl of Linlithgow and his son then sent a servant for proper\ndresses, and prepared themselves for the occasion without leaving the\nhouse. When all were ready, a number of chairs were called to transport\ntheir dainty persons down the street. The news of Lady Jean\u2019s arrival,\nand of her marriage, having now spread abroad, the court in front of the\nhouse, the alley, and even the open street, were crowded with people of\nall ranks, anxious to catch a passing glimpse of the heroine of so\nstrange a tale. As her chair was carried along, a buzz of admiration\nfrom all who were so happy as to be near it, marked its progress. Happy,\ntoo, was the gentleman who had the good luck to be near her chair as it\nwas set down at the palace-gate, and assist her in stepping from it upon\nthe lighted pavement. From the outer gate, along the piazza of the inner\ncourt, and all the way up the broad staircase to the illuminated hall,\ntwo rows of noblemen and gentlemen formed a brilliant avenue, as she\npassed along, while a hundred plumed caps were doffed in honour of so\nmuch beauty, and as many youthful eyes glanced bright with satisfaction\nat beholding it. The object of all this attention tripped modestly along\nin the hand of the Earl of Linlithgow, acknowledging, with many a\ngraceful flexure and undulation of person, the compliments of the\nspectators.\n\nAt length the company entered the spacious and splendid room in which\nthe ball was to be held. At the extremity, opposite to the entry, upon\nan elevated platform, sat the three royal personages, all of whom, on\nLady Jean\u2019s introduction, rose and came forward to welcome her and her\nhusband to the entertainments of Holyrood, and to hope that her ladyship\nwould often adorn their circle. In a short time the dancing commenced;\nand, amidst all the ladies who exhibited their charms and their\nmagnificent attire in that captivating exercise, who was, either in\nperson or dress, half so brilliant as Lady Jean?\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edin.\nJournal._\n\n\n\n\n THE MONKEY:\n _A SECOND PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF WILLIAM M\u2018GEE, WEAVER IN HAMILTON_.\n\n BY ROBERT MACNISH, LL.D.\n\n\nI dinna think that in a\u2019 nature there\u2019s a mair curiouser cratur than a\nmonkey. I mak this observe frae being witness to an extraordinar\u2019 event\nthat took place in Hamilton, three or four days after my\nnever-to-be-forgotten Battle of the Breeks.[6] Some even gaed the length\nto say that it was to the full mair curiouser than that affair, in sae\nfar as the principal performer in the ae case was a rational man,\nwhereas in the ither he was only a bit ape. But folk may talk as they\nlike about monkeys, and cry them down for being stupid and mischievous,\nI for ane will no gang that length. Whatever they may be on the score of\nmischief, there can be nae doubt, that, sae far as gumption is\nconcerned, they are just uncommon; and for wit and fun they would beat\nony man black and blue. In fact, I dinna think that monkeys are beasts\nava. I hae a half notion that they are just wee hairy men, that canna or\nrather winna speak, in case they may be made to work like ither folk,\ninstead of leading a life of idleness.\n\nFootnote 6:\n\n See _ante_, p. 223.\n\nBut to the point. I ance had a monkey, ane of the drollest looking\ndeevils ye ever saw. He was gayan big for a monkey, and was hairy a\u2019\nower, except his face and his bit hurdies, which had a degree of\nbareness about them, and were nearly as saft as a lady\u2019s loof. Weel,\nwhat think ye that I did wi\u2019 the beastie? \u2019Od, man, I dressed him up\nlike a Heelandman, and put a kilt upon him, and a lang-tailed red coat,\nand a blue bannet, which for security\u2019s sake I tied, womanlike, below\nhis chin, wi\u2019 twa bits of yellow ribbon. I not only did this, but I\nlearnt him to walk upon his twa hinder legs, and to carry a stick in his\nright hand when he gaed out, the better to support him in his\nperegrinations. He was for a\u2019 the world like a wee man in kilts\u2014sae much\nsae, that when Glengarry, the great Heeland chieftain, wha happened to\nbe at Hamilton on a visit to the Duke, saw him by chance, he swore by\nthe powers that he was like ane o\u2019 the Celtic Society, and that if I\nlikit he would endeavour to get him admitted a member of that body. I\nthocht at the time that Glengarry was jokin\u2019, but I hae since had gude\nreason for thinking that he was in real earnest, as Andrew Brand says\nthat he and the Celts hae been like to cut ane anither\u2019s throats, and\nthat he micht mean this as an affront upon them. Hoosomever I maun do\nGlengarry the justice to say, that had he got my Nosey (that was his\nname) made a member, he wadna hae pruved the least witty or courageous\no\u2019 the society, and would hae dune nae disgrace to the chief\u2019s\nrecommendation.\n\nBut I am fleeing awa like a shuttle frae the subject on hand. Weel, it\nturned out in this manner, as ye shall hear. Ae afternoon towards the\ngloamin\u2019, I was obligated to tak a stap down to the cross wi\u2019 a web\nunder my arm, which I had finished for Mr Weft, the muslin manufacturer.\nBy way of frolic\u2014a gayan foolish ane I allow\u2014I brocht Nosey alang wi\u2019\nme. He had on, as for ordinar, his Heeland dress, and walkit behind me,\nwi\u2019 the bit stick in his hand and his tail sticking out frae below his\nkilt, as if he had been my flunkey. It was, after a\u2019, a queer sicht,\nand, as may be supposed, I drew a hale crowd o\u2019 bairns after me, bawling\nout, \u201cHere\u2019s Willie M\u2018Gee\u2019s monkey,\u201d and giein\u2019 him nits and\ngingerbread, and makin\u2019 as muckle o\u2019 the cratur as could be; for Nosey\nwas a great favourite in the town, and everybody likit him for his droll\ntricks, and the way he used to girn, and dance, and tumble ower his\nhead, to amuse them.\n\nOn entering Mr Weft\u2019s shop, I faund it empty; there wasna leiving soul\nwithin. I supposed he had gane out for a licht; and being gayan familiar\nwi\u2019 him, I took a stap ben to the back shop, leaving Nosey in the fore\nane. I sat for twa or three minutes, but naebody made his appearance. At\nlast the front door, which I had ta\u2019en care to shut after me, opened,\nand I look\u2019t to see what it could be, thinking that, nae doubt, it was\nMr Weft, or his apprentice. It was neither the ane nor the ither, but a\nstrong middle-aged, redfaced Heelandman, wi\u2019 specks on, and wi\u2019 a kilt\nand a bannet, by a\u2019 the world like my monkey\u2019s. Now, what think ye Nosey\nwas about a\u2019 this time? He was sittin\u2019 behind the counter upon the lang\nthree-leggit stool that stood forenent Mr Weft\u2019s desk, and was turning\nower the leaves of his ledger wi\u2019 a look which, for auld-fashioned\nsagaciousness, was wonderfu\u2019 to behold. I was sae tickled at the sight\nthat I paid nae sort of attention to the Heelandman, but continued\nlooking frae the backshop at Nosey, lauching a\u2019 the time in my\nsleeve\u2014for I jaloused that some queer scene would tak place between the\ntwa. And I wasna far wrang, for the stranger, takin\u2019 out a pound frae\nhis spleuchan, handed it ower to the monkey, and speered at him, in his\ndroll norland deealect, if he could change a note. When I heard this, I\nthought I would hae lauched outright; and naething but sheer curiosity\nto see how the thing would end made me keep my gravity. It was plain\nthat Donald had ta\u2019en Nosey for ane of his ain countrymen\u2014and the thing\nafter a\u2019 wasna greatly to be wondered at, and that for three reasons.\n\nFirstly, the shop was rather darkish.\n\nSecondly, the Heelandman had on specks, as I hae just said; and it was\nlikely on this account that he was rather short-sighted; and\n\nThirdly, Nosey, wi\u2019 his kilt, and bannet, and red coat, was to a\u2019\nintents and purposes as like a human creature as a monkey could weel be.\n\nNae sooner, then, had he got the note than he opened it out, and lookit\nat it wi\u2019 his wee, glowrin\u2019, restless een, as if to see that it wasna a\nforgery. He then shook his head like a doctor when he\u2019s no very sure\nwhat\u2019s wrang wi\u2019 a person, but wants to mak it appear that he kens a\u2019\nabout it\u2014and continued in this style till the Heelandman\u2019s patience\nbegan to get exhausted.\n\n\u201cCan ye no shange the note, old shentleman?\u201d quo\u2019 Donald. Nosey gied his\nhead anither shake, and lookit uncommon wise.\n\n\u201cIs the note no goot, sir?\u201d spake the Heelandman, a second time; but the\ncratur, instead of answering him, only gied anither of his wise shakes,\nas much as to say, \u201cI\u2019m no very sure about it.\u201d At this Donald lost his\ntemper. \u201cIf the note doesna please ye, sir,\u201d quo\u2019 he, \u201cI\u2019ll thank ye to\ngie me it back again, and I\u2019ll gang to some ither place.\u201d And he\nstretchit out his hand to tak haud o\u2019t, when my frien\u2019 wi\u2019 the tail,\nlifting up his stick, lent him sic a whack ower the fingers as made him\npu\u2019 back in the twinkling of an ee.\n\n\u201cCot tamn ye, ye auld scoundrel,\u201d said the man; \u201cde ye mean to tak my\nmoney frae me?\u201d And he lifted up a rung big eneugh to fell a stot, and\nlet flee at the monkey; but Nosey was ower quick for him, and, jumping\naside, he lichted on a shelf before ane could say Jock Robinson. Here he\nrowed up the note like a ba\u2019 in his hand, and put it into his coat pouch\nlike ony rational cratur. Not only this, but he mockit the Heelandman by\na\u2019 manner of means, shooting out his tongue at him, spitting at him, and\ngirning at him wi\u2019 his queer outlandish physiognomy. Then he would tak\nhaud o\u2019 his tail in his twa hands, and wag it at Donald, and steeking\nhis nieves, he would seem to threaten him with a leatherin\u2019! A\u2019thegither\nhe was desperate impudent, and eneugh to try the patience of a saunt, no\nto speak o\u2019 a het-bluided Heelandman. It was gude for sair een to see\nhow Donald behavit on this occasion. He raged like ane demented,\nmisca\u2019ing the monkey beyond measure, and swearing as mony Gaelic aiths\nas micht hae saired an ordinar man for a twalmonth. During this time, I\nnever steered a foot, but keepit keekin\u2019 frae the back shop upon a\u2019 that\nwas ganging on. I was highly delighted; and jalousing that Nosey was\nower supple to be easily catched, I had nae apprehension for the event,\nand remained snug in my berth to see the upshot.\n\nIn a short time, in comes Mr Weft, wi\u2019 a piece of lowing paper in his\nhand, that he had got from the next door to licht the shop; and nae\nsooner did Donald see him than he axed him for his note.\n\n\u201cWhat note, honest man?\u201d said Mr Weft.\n\n\u201cCot tamn,\u201d quo\u2019 Donald; \u201cthe note the auld scoundrel, your grandfater,\nstole frae me.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy grandfaither!\u201d answered the ither wi\u2019 amazement. \u201cI am thinking,\nhonest man, ye hae had a glass ower muckle. My grandfaither has been\ndead for saxteen years, and I ne\u2019er heard tell till now that he was a\nfief.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel, then,\u201d quo\u2019 the Heelandman, \u201cI don\u2019t care naething about\nit. If he\u2019s no your grandfaither, he\u2019ll be your faither, or your\nbrither, or your cousin.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy faither or my brither, or my cousin!\u201d repeated Mr Weft. \u201cI maun tell\nye plainly, frien\u2019, that I hae neither faither, nor brither, nor cousin\nof ony description, on this side of the grave. I dinna understand ye,\nhonest man, but I reckon that ye hae sat ower lang at the whisky, and my\nadvice to ye is to stap awa hame and sleep it aff.\u201d\n\nAt this speech the Heelandman lost a\u2019 patience, and lookit sae awfully\nfairce, that ance or twice I was on the nick of coming forrit, and\nexplaining how matters really stood; but curiosity keepit me chained to\nthe back shop, and I just thoucht I would bide a wee, and see how the\naffair was like to end.\n\n\u201cPray, wha are you, sir?\u201d said Donald, putting his hands in his sides,\nand looking through his specks upon Mr Weft, like a deevil incarnit.\n\u201cWha are you, sir, that daur to speak to me in this manner?\u201d\n\n\u201cWha am I?\u201d said the ither, drapping the remnant of the paper, which was\nburnin\u2019 close to his fingers, \u201cI am Saunders Weft, manufacturer in\nHamilton\u2014that\u2019s what I am.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I am Tonald Campbell, piper\u2019s sister\u2019s son to his grace the great,\ngrand Tuke of Argyll,\u201d thundered out the Heelandman, wi\u2019 a voice that\nwas fearsome to hear.\n\n\u201cAnd what about that?\u201d quo\u2019 Mr Weft, rather snappishly, as I thocht. \u201cIf\nye were the great, grand Duke of Argyll himsel, as ye ca\u2019 him, I\u2019ll no\npermit you to kick up a dust in my shop.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe scounrel,\u201d said Donald, seizing Mr Weft by the throat, and shaking\nhim till he tottered like an aspen leaf, \u201cdiv ye mean to speak ill of\nhis grace the Tuke of Argyll?\u201d And he gied him anither shake\u2014then,\nlaying haud of his nose, he swore that he would pu\u2019t as lang as a cow\u2019s\ntail, if he didna that instant restore him his lost property. At this\nsicht I began to grue a\u2019 ower, and now saw the needcessity of stapping\nben, and saving my employer frae farther damage, bodily and itherwise.\nNae sooner had I made my appearance than Donald let go his grip of Mr\nWeft\u2019s nose, and the latter, in a great passion, cried out\u2014\n\n\u201cWilliam M\u2018Gee, I tak ye to witness what I hae sufferit frae this\nbluidthirsty Heelandman! It\u2019s no to be endured in a Christian country.\nI\u2019ll hae the law of him, that I will. I\u2019ll be whuppit but I\u2019ll hae\namends, although it costs me twenty pounds!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d quo\u2019 I, pretending ignorance of the hale concern.\n\u201cWhat, in the name of Nebuchadnezzar, has set ye thegither by the lugs?\u201d\n\nThen Mr Weft began his tale, how he had been collared and weel nigh\nthrappled in his ain shop;\u2014then the ither tauld how, in the first place,\nMr Weft\u2019s grandfaither, as he ca\u2019d Nosey, had stolen his note, and how,\nin the second place, Mr Weft himself had insulted the great, grand Duke\nof Argyll. In a word, there was a desperate kick-up between them, the\nane threeping that he would tak the law of the ither immediately. Na, in\nthis respect Donald gaed the greatest length, for he swore that, rather\nthan be defeated, he wad carry his cause to the House of Lords, although\nit cost him thretty pounds sterling. I now saw it was time to put in a\nword.\n\n\u201cHout-tout, gentlemen,\u201d quo\u2019 I, \u201cwhat\u2019s the use of a\u2019 this\nclishmaclaver? Ye\u2019ve baith gotten the wrang sow by the lug, or my name\u2019s\nno William M\u2018Gee. I\u2019ll wager ye a penny-piece, that my monkey Nosey is\nat the bottom of the business.\u201d\n\nNae sooner had I spoken the word, than the twa, looking round the shop,\nspied the beastie sitting upon the shelf, girning at them, and putting\nout his tongue, and wiggle-waggling his walking stick ower his left\nelbow, as if he had been playing upon the fiddle. Mr Weft at this\napparition set up a loud laugh; his passion left him in a moment, when\nhe saw the ridiculous mistake that the Heelandman had fa\u2019en into, and I\nthocht he would hae bursted his sides wi\u2019 evendown merriment. At first,\nDonald lookit desperate angry, and, judging frae the way he was twisting\nabout his mouth and rowing his een, I opined that he intended some\ndeadly skaith to the monkey. But his gude sense, of which Heelandmen are\nno a\u2019thegither destitute, got the better of his anger, and he roared and\nlauched like the very mischief. Nor was this a\u2019, for nae sooner had he\nbegan to lauch, than the monkey did the same thing, and held its sides\nin preceesely the same manner, imitating his actions, in the maist\namusin\u2019 way imaginable. This only set Donald a-lauching mair than ever,\nand when he lifted up his nieve, and shook it at Nosey in a\ngude-humoured way, what think ye that the cratur did? \u2019Od, man, he took\nthe note frae his pouch, whaur it lay rowed up like a ba\u2019, and papping\nit at Donald, hit him as fairly upon the nose as if it had been shot out\nof a weel-aimed musket. There was nae resisting this. The haill three,\nor rather the haill four, for Nosey joined us, set up a loud lauch; and\nthe Heelandman\u2019s was the loudest of a\u2019, showing that he was really a man\nof sense, and could tak a joke as weel as his neighbours.\n\nWhen the lauchin\u2019 had a wee subsided, Mr Campbell, in order to show that\nhe had nae ill will to Mr Weft, axed his pardon for the rough way he had\ntreated him, but the worthy manufacturer wadna hear o\u2019t. \u201cHouts, man,\u201d\nquo\u2019 he, \u201cdinna say a word about it. It\u2019s a mistak a\u2019thegither, and\nSolomon himsel, ye ken, whiles gaed wrang.\u201d Whereupon the Heelandman\nbought a Kilmarnock nicht-cap, price elevenpence ha\u2019penny, frae Mr Weft,\nand paid him wi\u2019 part of the very note that brocht on the ferlie I hae\njust been relating. But his gude wull didna end here, for he insisted on\ntakin\u2019 us a\u2019\u2014Nosey amang the lave\u2014to the nearest public, where he gied\nus a frien\u2019ly glass, and we keepit talking about monkeys, and what not,\nin a manner at ance edifying and amusing to hear.\n\n\n\n\n THE LADDER DANCER.\n\n Men should know why\n They write, and for what end; but note or text,\n I never know the word which will come next;\n So on I ramble, now and then narrating,\n Now pondering.\u2014_Byron._\n\n\nIt was a lovely evening in summer, when a crowd hallooing and shouting\nin the street of L\u2014\u2014, a village of the north of Scotland, at once\ndisturbed my reveries, and left me little leisure again to yield myself\nto their wayward dominion. In sooth, I had no pretence for indifference\nto a very singular spectacle of a something-like human being moving in\nmid-air; and although its saltatory gambols in this unusual situation\ncould scarcely be called dancing, it was certainly intended to be like\nit, however little the resemblance might be approved. A something\nbetween a male and female in point of dress\u2014a perfect hermaphrodite in\nregard to costume\u2014had mounted herself on gigantic stilts, on which she\nhopped about, defying the secrecy even of the middle floors of the\nsurrounding houses, and in some cases giving her a peep into the attic\nregions of less lofty domiciles. In this manner, stalking about from\nside to side, like a crane among the reeds, the very Diable Boiteux\nhimself was never more inquisitive after the domestic concerns of his\nneighbours, or better fitted to explore them by his invisibility, than\nshe was by her altitude. Her presence in mid-air, in more than one\ninstance, was the subject of alarm to the sober inmates of the street,\nwho, little suspicious of such intrusion, might perhaps be engaged in\nhousehold cares which did not court observation, or had sunk into the\nrelaxations of an undress, after the fatigues and heat of the day.\nEverywhere the windows might be heard thrown up with impatient\nhaste,\u2014the sash skirling and creaking in its ascent with the violence of\nthe effort, and immediately after, a head might be seen poked forward to\nexplore the \u201cwhence\u201d and \u201cwherefore,\u201d\u2014in short, to ask in one word, if\nit could be so condensed, the meaning and purpose of this a\u00ebrial\nvisitor.\n\nThe more desultory occupations of a little village hold but loosely\ntogether the different classes of it. Master and servant approach more\nnearly,\u2014the one is less elevated, and the other less depressed, than in\ngreat towns,\u2014a show is at least as great a treat to the one as to the\nother, and there is nothing in their respective notions of decorum to\nrepress their joyous feelings, while under the irresistible impulse of\nthe inimitable Mr Punch, or of the demure and clumsy bear, treading a\nmeasure with the graces of a _Mercandotti_. In short, the more simple\nelements of a villager\u2019s mind are, like their own more robust frames,\nmore easily inflamed;\u2014there is more excitable stuff about them, because\nthey are less frequently subjected to the tear and wear of novelty,\nwhich towns constantly afford. The schoolmaster and the schoolboy alike\npour out from the lowly straw-roofed \u201cacademy,\u201d with the same eager and\nbreathless haste, to catch a first glance, or secure a favourable post.\nSyntax and arithmetic\u2014blessed oblivion!\u2014are for the moment forgotten.\nThink of the ecstacies of the little culprit, who was perhaps under the\nrod, if at that awful moment a troop of dancing dogs, with their full\naccompaniment of pipe and tabor, came under the school window, and was\nat once gladdened with a respite and a show. One moment watching the\ngrim smile of the pedagogue; next lost in wonder at the accomplished\npuppets\u2014nothing to disturb his bliss but the trammels of Concordance, or\nthe intricacies of the Rule of Three.\n\nBut if mere novelty has such delights for the younger portion, to escape\nfrom the monotony of village life has not less charms for the graver\nclass of its inhabitants. An old gentleman, evidently unmindful of his\ndishabille, popped his head forth of his casement, heedless of the red\nKilmarnock in which it was bedight, and gazed with eager curiosity on\nthe ambitious female who had now passed his lattice. He seemed to have\ncaught a hint of the _dereglement_ of his own costume, by remarking that\nof his female neighbour at the adjoining window, who exposed\ncourageously the snowy ringlets which begirt the region of bumps and\nqualities, in place of the brown and glossy curls, which, till that\nill-fated moment, were supposed to have belonged to it.[7] He withdrew\nfrom sight with some precipitation, but whether in horror of his own\nrecklessness, or in deference to the heedlessness of his neighbour, must\nfor ever remain in doubt. Is it then strange if there was quite a\nrevel-rout in the streets of the little village, when old and young\nalike responded to the wonder of the scene? To whatever quarter she\npassed, not a window was down; labour was suspended to witness feats\nwhich no labour of theirs could accomplish. Women, bearing with them the\nmarks of the household toils in which they had been last engaged, stood\nat their doors, some with sarcastic, but all with curious gaze; while\nthe sunburnt Piedmontoise at times danced on her stilts a kind of mock\nwaltz, or hobbled from side to side, in ridicule, as it would seem, of\nthe livelier measure and footing of the quadrille. When, mounted on the\nhighest point of her stilts, she strided across the way, to collect or\nto solicit pence, the little urchins hanging about their mothers, clung\nmore closely to them as she approached, and looked up to her, doubting\nand fearful, as fish are said to be scared by a passing cloud. She was\nmost successful among the male spectators of the village. Her feats with\nthem excited no feelings of rivalry, and their notions of decorum were\nnot so easily disturbed as those of their helpmates, who, in refusing\ntheir contribution, never withhold their reprobation of such\nanti-Christian gambols.\n\nFootnote 7:\n\n I love to luxuriate in a note: it is like hunting in an unenclosed\n country. One word about the affectations of Graybeards. Among all the\n ten thousand reasons for their gray hairs, no one ever thought of\n years as being at least a probable cause. It is one of the very few\n hereditary peculiarities of physical constitution, which are loudly\n proclaimed and gladly seized, to apologise for the sin of hoary locks.\n Acute sorrow, or sudden surprise;\u2014indigestion\u2014that talismanic thing,\n the nerves\u2014love, speculation\u2014or anything, in short, are all approved\n theories to explain their first intrusion among the legitimate\n ringlets of male and female persons of \u201cno particular age.\u201d Even it is\n said that people have awoke gray who lay down under very different\n colours; of course, they had had a bad dream, or lain on the wrong\n side, but no conscientious perruquier could have sworn to their\n identity under such a metamorphosis. In short, gray hairs are purely\n accidental; they have nothing to do with years; and being deemed a\n misfortune, have from time immemorial been always spoken of with\n reverence, but nowhere that I can recollect are they spoken of with\n affection, save in the beautiful song, \u201cJohn Anderson, my Jo,\u201d where\n the kind-hearted wife invokes blessings on the frosty pow of her aged\n partner.\n\n\u201cGae awa wi\u2019 you, ye idle randie! Weel sets the like o\u2019 sic misleard\nqueans to gang about the country playing antics like a fule, to fules\nlike yoursel,\u201d was the answer given by a middle-aged woman, who stood\nnear me, to the boy who carried round a wooden platter for the\nhalfpence, and who instantly retired, to save herself from the latter\npart of her own reproach, dragging with her a ragged little rogue, who\nbegged hard to remain till the end of the exhibition. By this time the\nprocession had reached the end of the street, where some of the better\nclass of the inhabitants resided, and some preparations were made for a\nmore elaborate spectacle. The swarthy Savoyard, who accompanied the\nladder-dancer, after surveying the field, seemed to fix his station\nopposite to a respectable-looking house, whose liberality he evidently\nmeasured by its outward pretensions.\n\nThere is no state of helplessness equal to that of ignorance of the\nlanguage in which a favour is to be craved, and you may estimate the\nproficiency of the foreigner in the intricacies of our own dialect by\nthe obsequiousness of his smile, which he at once adapts to the purposes\nof solicitation, and of defence against insult and ridicule. While with\na look of preparation he bustled about, to gain attention, he grinned\nand nodded to the windows which were occupied, while he held a ladder\nupright, and placing his hat at the bottom of it to receive the niggard\nbounty of the spectators, he stood at the back of it, supporting it with\nboth his hands. The lady of the stilts now advanced, and resting on one\nof them, with considerable address lifted up the other and pushed it\nforward, with an action that seemed to denote something like a\nsalutation, or obeisance,\u2014a kind of a\u00ebrial salaam. At this moment the\nhall-door was opened, and a portly-looking woman of middle-age,\nevidently the mistress of the household, came forward and planted\nherself on the broad landing-place of the stair. There was about this\npersonage the round, full look which betokens ease and affluence; and\nthe firm, steady step which argues satisfaction with our condition. She\nfixed herself on the door-step with the solid perpendicularity of\nPompey\u2019s Pillar, and now and then turned round to some young girls who\nattended her, as if to chide them for mixing her up with so silly an\nexhibition.\n\nI had supposed that the Piedmontoise would have laid aside her stilts\nwhen she ascended the ladder, but far from it, for in this consisted the\nsingularity of the exhibition. She climbed the ladder, still mounted on\nthem, then descended like a cat on the other side of it; she hopped down\nas she had hopped up, with equal steadiness and agility, and thought to\ncrown her efforts by a notable feat, which was no less than standing on\nher head on the top of the ladder, and brandishing the two stilts, from\nwhich she had disengaged herself, round about her, like the arms of a\nwindmill. It required no great skill to see that the old lady was very\nmuch offended with this last performance, for when the little dish was\ncarried to her, and the ladder-dancer directed a beseeching look\naccompanied by an attitude which seemed to imply that there were other\nfeats yet in reserve, if encouragement was held out, the patroness of\nthe stair-head could restrain herself no longer, but poured out a\ntorrent partaking both of objurgation and admonition.\n\n\u201cNe\u2019er-do-weel hussie,\u201d and \u201cvagrant gipsy,\u201d were some of the sharp\nmissiles shot at the unsuspecting figurante, who, as little aware of the\nmeaning of all this \u201csharp-toothed violence,\u201d as the bird is of the\nmischief aimed at him by the fowler, sadly misapprehended its import,\nand thinking it conveyed encouragement and approbation, ducked her head\nin acknowledgment, while the thunder of the old lady\u2019s reprobation\nrolled about her in the most ceaseless rapidity of vituperation.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re a pretty ane indeed, to play sic antics afore ony body\u2019s house!\nHae ye naebody to learn ye better manners that to rin up and down a\nladder like a squirrel, twisting and turning yoursel till my banes are\nsair to look at you? Muckle fitter gin ye would read your Bible, if as\nmuch grace be left to ye; or maybe a religious tract, to begin wi\u2019, for\nI doubt ye wad need preparation afore ye could drink at the spring-head\nwi\u2019 ony special profit.\u201d\n\nThe last part was conveyed with a kind of smile of self-approbation; for\nof all tasks, to reclaim a sinner is the most pleasing and soothing to\nreligious vanity;\u2014so comfortable it is to be allowed to scold on any\nterms, but doubly delightful, because it always implies superiority. But\nthe ladder-dancer and her attendant were aware of no part of what was\npassing in the mind of the female lecturer, and fully as ignorant of the\neloquent address I have just repeated; she only saw, in the gracious\nlooks in which her feats were condemned, an approval of her labours, for\nit passed her philosophy to comprehend the ungodly qualities of standing\non the head, or whirling like a top. Again the ladder-dancer cringed and\nbowed to her of the stair-head; and her male supporter, who acted as a\nkind of pedestal to her elevation, bowed and grinned a little more\ngrimly, while the boy held out his plate to receive the results of all\nthis assiduity. But they could not command a single word of broad\nEnglish among them. Theirs only was the eloquence of nods and grimaces;\na monkey could have done as much, and in the present humour of the old\nlady, would have been as much approved. The ladder-dancer grew\nimpatient, and seemed determined on an effort to close her labours.\n\n\u201cAh, Madame!\u201d she exclaimed; \u201cMadame\u201d was repeated by the man, and\n\u201cMadame\u201d was re-echoed by the boy.\n\n\u201cNane o\u2019 your nonsense wi\u2019 me,\u201d was the response from the stair-head;\n\u201cyour madam\u2019ing, and I dinna ken what mair havers. Ye needna fash your\nhead to stand there a\u2019 day girning at me, and making sic outlandish\nsport. I\u2019m mair fule than you, that bides to look at you; a fine tale\nthey\u2019d hae to tell that could say they saw me here, idling my precious\ntime on the like o\u2019 you.\u201d\n\nShe now whispered to one of the girls, who retired, and soon after\nreturned, giving her a small parcel, which she examined, and seemed to\nsay all was right. She beckoned the ladder-dancer, who slid down with\ncat-like agility, and was instantly with her, standing a step lower, in\ndeference to the doughty dame.\n\n\u201cHere,\u201d said she, with a gruff air, which was rather affected than real,\n\u201ctak these precious gifts,\u201d handing her a bunch of religious tracts.\n\u201cSee if ye canna find out your spiritual wants, and learn to seek for\nthe \u2018Pearl of Price.\u2019 My certie, but ye\u2019re a weel-faured hussie,\u201d\nexamining her more narrowly, \u201cbut your gaits are no that commendable;\nbut for a\u2019 that, a mair broken ship has reached the land.\u201d\n\nI could observe that she slipped a half-crown into the hand of the\nPiedmontoise; and as she turned away to avoid thanks, an elderly\ngentleman (perhaps her husband), who stood by, said in a low voice,\u2014\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s like yoursel, Darsie; your bark was aye waur than your bite, ony\nday!\u201d\u2014_Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_, 1826.\n\n\n\n\n THE ELDER\u2019S DEATH-BED.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nIt was on a fierce and howling day that I was crossing the dreary moor\nof Auchindown, on my way to the manse of that parish\u2014a solitary\npedestrian. The snow, which had been incessantly falling for a week\npast, was drifted into beautiful but dangerous wreaths, far and wide,\nover the melancholy expanse; and the scene kept visibly shifting before\nme, as the strong wind that blew from every point of the compass struck\nthe dazzling masses, and heaved them up and down in endless\ntransformation. There was something inspiriting in the labour with\nwhich, in the buoyant strength of youth, I forced my way through the\nstorm; and I could not but enjoy those gleamings of sunlight that ever\nand anon burst through some unexpected opening in the sky, and gave a\ncharacter of cheerfulness, and even warmth, to the sides or summits of\nthe stricken hills. Sometimes the wind stopped of a sudden, and then the\nair was as silent as the snow\u2014not a murmur to be heard from spring or\nstream, now all frozen up over those high moorlands. As the momentary\ncessations of the sharp drift allowed my eyes to look onwards and\naround, I saw here and there, up the little opening valleys, cottages\njust visible beneath the black stems of their snow-covered clumps of\ntrees, or beside some small spot of green pasture kept open for the\nsheep. These intimations of life and happiness came delightfully to me\nin the midst of the desolation; and the barking of a dog, attending some\nshepherd in his quest on the hill, put fresh vigour into my limbs,\ntelling me that, lonely as I seemed to be, I was surrounded by cheerful,\nthough unseen company, and that I was not the only wanderer over the\nsnows.\n\nAs I walked along, my mind was insensibly filled with a crowd of\npleasant images of rural winter life, that helped me gladly onwards over\nmany miles of moor. I thought of the severe but cheerful labours of the\nbarn\u2014the mending of farm-gear by the fireside\u2014the wheel turned by the\nfoot of old age less for gain than as a thrifty pastime\u2014the skilful\nmother making \u201cauld claes look amaist as weel\u2019s the new\u201d\u2014the ballad\nunconsciously listened to by the family all busy at their own tasks\nround the singing maiden\u2014the old traditionary tale, told by some\nwayfarer hospitably housed till the storm should blow by\u2014the unexpected\nvisit of neighbours on need or friendship\u2014or the footstep of lover\nundeterred by snow-drifts that have buried up his flocks;\u2014but above all,\nI thought of those hours of religious worship that have not yet escaped\nfrom the domestic life of the peasantry of Scotland\u2014of the sound of\npsalms that the depth of the snow cannot deaden to the ear of Him to\nwhom they are chanted\u2014and of that sublime Sabbath-keeping which, on days\ntoo tempestuous for the kirk, changes the cottage of the shepherd into\nthe temple of God.\n\nWith such glad and peaceful images in my heart, I travelled along that\ndreary moor, with the cutting wind in my face, and my feet sinking in\nthe snow, or sliding on the hard blue ice beneath it\u2014as cheerfully as I\never walked in the dewy warmth of a summer morning, through fields of\nfragrance and of flowers. And now I could discern, within half an hour\u2019s\nwalk, before me, the spire of the church, close to which stood the manse\nof my aged friend and benefactor. My heart burned within me as a sudden\ngleam of stormy sunlight tipped it with fire; and I felt, at that\nmoment, an inexpressible sense of the sublimity of the character of that\ngrayheaded shepherd who had, for fifty years, abode in the wilderness,\nkeeping together his own happy little flock.\n\nAs I was ascending a knoll, I saw before me on horseback an old man,\nwith his long white hairs beaten against his face, who, nevertheless,\nadvanced with a calm countenance against the hurricane. It was no other\nthan my father, of whom I had been thinking\u2014for my father had I called\nhim for many years, and for many years my father had he truly been. My\nsurprise at meeting him on such a moor\u2014on such a day\u2014was but momentary,\nfor I knew that he was a shepherd who cared not for the winter\u2019s wrath.\nAs he stopped to take my hand kindly into his, and to give his blessing\nto his long-expected visitor, the wind fell calm\u2014the whole face of the\nsky was softened, and brightness, like a smile, went over the blushing\nand crimson snow. The very elements seemed then to respect the hoary\nhead of fourscore; and after our first greeting was over, when I looked\naround, in my affection, I felt how beautiful was winter.\n\n\u201cI am going,\u201d said he, \u201cto visit a man at the point of death; a man whom\nyou cannot have forgotten; whose head will be missed in the kirk next\nSabbath by all my congregation; a devout man, who feared God all his\ndays, and whom, on this awful trial, God will assuredly remember. I am\ngoing, my son, to the Hazel Glen.\u201d\n\nI knew well in childhood that lonely farmhouse, so far off among the\nbeautiful wild green hills, and it was not likely that I had forgotten\nthe name of its possessor. For six years\u2019 Sabbaths I had seen the Elder\nin his accustomed place beneath the pulpit, and, with a sort of solemn\nfear, had looked on his steadfast countenance during sermon, psalm, and\nprayer. On returning to the scenes of my infancy, I now met the pastor\ngoing to pray by his deathbed; and, with the privilege which nature\ngives us to behold, even in their last extremity, the loving and the\nbeloved, I turned to accompany him to the house of sorrow, resignation,\nand death.\n\nAnd now, for the first time, I observed walking close to the feet of his\nhorse, a little boy of about ten years of age, who kept frequently\nlooking up in the pastor\u2019s face, with his blue eyes bathed in tears. A\nchangeful expression of grief, hope, and despair, made almost pale\ncheeks that otherwise were blooming in health and beauty; and I\nrecognised, in the small features and smooth forehead of childhood, a\nresemblance to the aged man whom we understood was now lying on his\ndeath-bed. \u201cThey had to send his grandson for me through the snow, mere\nchild as he is,\u201d said the minister to me, looking tenderly on the boy;\n\u201cbut love makes the young heart bold\u2014and there is One who tempers the\nwind to the shorn lamb.\u201d\n\nI again looked on the fearless child with his rosy cheeks, blue eyes,\nand yellow hair, so unlike grief or sorrow, yet now sobbing aloud as if\nhis heart would break. \u201cI do not fear but that my grandfather will yet\nrecover, as soon as the minister has said one single prayer by his\nbedside. I had no hope, or little, as I was running by myself to the\nmanse over hill after hill, but I am full of hopes, now that we are\ntogether; and oh! if God suffers my grandfather to recover, I will lie\nawake all the long winter nights blessing Him for His mercy. I will rise\nup in the middle of the darkness, and pray to Him in the cold on my\nnaked knees!\u201d and here his voice was choked, while he kept his eyes\nfixed, as if for consolation and encouragement, on the solemn and\npitying countenance of the kind-hearted pious old man.\n\nWe soon left the main road, and struck off through scenery that, covered\nas it was with the bewildering snow, I sometimes dimly and sometimes\nvividly remembered; our little guide keeping ever a short distance\nbefore us, and with a sagacity like that of instinct, showing us our\ncourse, of which no trace was visible, save occasionally his own little\nfootprints as he had been hurrying to the manse.\n\nAfter crossing, for several miles, morass and frozen rivulet, and\ndrifted hollow, with here and there the top of a stone-wall peeping\nthrough the snow, or the more visible circle of a sheep-bucht, we\ndescended into the Hazel-glen, and saw before us the solitary house of\nthe dying Elder.\n\nA gleam of days gone by came suddenly over my soul. The last time that I\nhad been in this glen was on a day of June, fifteen years before,\u2014a\nholiday, the birthday of the king. A troop of laughing schoolboys,\nheaded by our benign pastor, we danced over the sunny braes, and\nstartled the linnets from their nests among the yellow broom. Austere as\nseemed to us the Elder\u2019s Sabbath face when sitting in the kirk, we\nschoolboys knew that it had its week-day smiles, and we flew on the\nwings of joy to our annual festival of curds and cream in the farm-house\nof that little sylvan world. We rejoiced in the flowers and the leaves\nof that long, that interminable summer day; its memory was with our\nboyish hearts from June to June; and the sound of that sweet name,\n\u201cHazel Glen,\u201d often came upon us at our tasks, and brought too brightly\ninto the school-room the pastoral imagery of that mirthful solitude.\n\nAs we now slowly approached the cottage through a deep snow-drift, which\nthe distress within had prevented the household from removing, we saw\npeeping out from the door, brothers and sisters of our little guide, who\nquickly disappeared, and then their mother showed herself in their\nstead, expressing by her raised eyes, and arms folded across her breast,\nhow thankful she was to see at last the pastor, beloved in joy and\ntrusted in trouble.\n\nSoon as the venerable old man dismounted from his horse, our active\nlittle guide led it away into the humble stable, and we entered the\ncottage. Not a sound was heard but the ticking of the clock. The matron,\nwho had silently welcomed us at the door, led us, with suppressed sighs\nand a face stained with weeping, into her father\u2019s sick room, which even\nin that time of sore distress was as orderly as if health had blessed\nthe house. I could not help remarking some old china ornaments on the\nchimneypiece, and in the window was an ever-blowing rose-tree, that\nalmost touched the lowly roof, and brightened that end of the apartment\nwith its blossoms. There was something tasteful in the simple furniture;\nand it seemed as if grief could not deprive the hand of that matron of\nits careful elegance. Sickness, almost hopeless sickness, lay there,\nsurrounded with the same cheerful and beautiful objects which health had\nloved; and she, who had arranged and adorned the apartment in her\nhappiness, still kept it from disorder and decay in her sorrow.\n\nWith a gentle hand she drew the curtain of the bed, and there, supported\nby pillows as white as the snow that lay without, reposed the dying\nElder. It was plain that the hand of God was upon him, and that his days\non the earth were numbered.\n\nHe greeted his minister with a faint smile, and a slight inclination of\nthe head\u2014for his daughter had so raised him on the pillows, that he was\nalmost sitting up in his bed. It was easy to see that he knew himself to\nbe dying, and that his soul was prepared for the great change; yet,\nalong with the solemn resignation of a Christian who had made his peace\nwith God and his Saviour, there was blended on his white and sunken\ncountenance an expression of habitual reverence for the minister of his\nfaith; and I saw that he could not have died in peace without that\ncomforter to pray by his death-bed.\n\nA few words sufficed to tell who was the stranger;\u2014and the dying man,\nblessing me by name, held out to me his cold shrivelled hand, in token\nof recognition. I took my seat at a small distance from the bedside, and\nleft a closer station for those who were more dear. The pastor sat down\nnear his head; and, by the bed, leaning on it with gentle hands, stood\nthat matron, his daughter-in-law\u2014a figure that would have graced and\nsainted a higher dwelling, and whose native beauty was now more touching\nin its grief. But religion upheld her whom nature was bowing down. Not\nnow for the first time were the lessons taught by her father to be put\ninto practice, for I saw that she was clothed in deep mourning and she\nbehaved like the daughter of a man whose life had been not only\nirreproachable but lofty, with fear and hope fighting desperately but\nsilently in the core of her pure and pious heart.\n\nWhile we thus remained in silence, the beautiful boy, who, at the risk\nof his life, had brought the minister of religion to the bedside of his\nbeloved grandfather, softly and cautiously opened the door, and with the\nhoar-frost yet unmelted on his bright glistering ringlets, walked up to\nthe pillow, evidently no stranger there. He no longer sobbed\u2014he no\nlonger wept\u2014for hope had risen strongly within his innocent heart, from\nthe consciousness of love so fearlessly exerted, and from the presence\nof the holy man in whose prayers he trusted, as in the intercession of\nsome superior and heavenly nature. There he stood, still as an image in\nhis grandfather\u2019s eyes, that, in their dimness, fell upon him with\ndelight. Yet, happy as was the trusting child, his heart was devoured by\nfear, and he looked as if one word might stir up the flood of tears that\nhad subsided in his heart. As he crossed the dreary and dismal moors, he\nhad thought of a corpse, a shroud, and a grave; he had been in terror,\nlest death should strike in his absence the old man, with whose gray\nhairs he had so often played; but now he _saw_ him alive, and felt that\ndeath was not able to tear him away from the clasps, and links, and\nfetters of his grandchild\u2019s embracing love.\n\n\u201cIf the storm do not abate,\u201d said the sick man, after a pause, \u201cit will\nbe hard for my friends to carry me over the drifts to the kirkyard.\u201d\nThis sudden approach to the grave struck, as with a bar of ice, the\nheart of the loving boy; and, with a long deep sigh, he fell down with\nhis face like ashes on the bed, while the old man\u2019s palsied right hand\nhad just strength to lay itself upon his head. \u201cBlessed be thou, my\nlittle Jamie, even for His own name\u2019s sake who died for us on the tree!\u201d\nThe mother, without terror, but with an averted face, lifted up her\nloving-hearted boy, now in a dead fainting-fit, and carried him into an\nadjoining room, where he soon revived. But that child and the old man\nwere not to be separated. In vain he was asked to go to his brothers and\nsisters;\u2014pale, breathless, and shivering, he took his place as before,\nwith eyes fixed on his grandfather\u2019s face, but neither weeping nor\nuttering a word. Terror had frozen up the blood of his heart; but his\nwere now the only dry eyes in the room; and the pastor himself\nwept\u2014albeit the grief of fourscore is seldom vented in tears.\n\n\u201cGod has been gracious to me, a sinner,\u201d said the dying man. \u201cDuring\nthirty years that I have been an elder in your kirk, never have I missed\nsitting there one Sabbath. When the mother of my children was taken from\nme\u2014it was on a Tuesday she died, and on Saturday she was buried\u2014we stood\ntogether when my Alice was let down into the narrow house made for all\nliving; on the Sabbath I joined in the public worship of God: she\ncommanded me to do so the night before she went away. I could not join\nin the psalm that Sabbath, for her voice was not in the throng. Her\ngrave was covered up, and grass and flowers grew there; so was my heart;\nbut thou, whom, through the blood of Christ, I hope to see this night in\nParadise, knowest that, from that hour to this day, never have I\nforgotten thee!\u201d\n\nThe old man ceased speaking, and his grandchild, now able to endure the\nscene (for strong passion is its own support), glided softly to a little\ntable, and bringing a cup in which a cordial had been mixed, held it in\nhis small soft hands to his grandfather\u2019s lips. He drank, and then said,\n\u201cCome closer to me, Jamie, and kiss me for thine own and thy father\u2019s\nsake;\u201d and as the child fondly pressed his rosy lips on those of his\ngrandfather, so white and withered, the tears fell over all the old\nman\u2019s face, and then trickled down on the golden head of the child, at\nlast sobbing in his bosom.\n\n\u201cJamie, thy own father has forgotten thee in thy infancy, and me in my\nold age; but, Jamie, forget not thou thy father nor thy mother, for that\nthou knowest and feelest is the commandment of God.\u201d\n\nThe broken-hearted boy could give no reply. He had gradually stolen\ncloser and closer unto the old loving man, and now was lying, worn out\nwith sorrow, drenched and dissolved in tears, in his grandfather\u2019s\nbosom. His mother had sunk down on her knees and hid her face with her\nhands. \u201cOh! if my husband knew but of this\u2014he would never, never desert\nhis dying father!\u201d and I now knew that the Elder was praying on his\ndeath-bed for a disobedient and wicked son.\n\nAt this affecting time the minister took the family Bible on his knees,\nand said, \u201cLet us sing to the praise and glory of God, part of the\nfifteenth psalm;\u201d and he read, with a tremulous and broken voice, those\nbeautiful verses:\u2014\n\n \u201cWithin thy tabernacle, Lord,\n Who shall abide with thee?\n And in Thy high and holy hill\n Who shall a dweller be?\n The man that walketh uprightly,\n And worketh righteousness,\n And as he thinketh in his heart,\n So doth he truth express.\u201d\n\nThe small congregation sang the noble hymn of the psalmist to \u201cplaintiff\nMartyrs, worthy of the name.\u201d The dying man himself, ever and anon,\njoined in the holy music; and when it feebly died away on his quivering\nlips, he continued still to follow the tune with the motion of his\nwithered hand, and eyes devoutly and humbly lifted up to heaven. Nor was\nthe sweet voice of his loving grandchild unheard; as if the strong fit\nof deadly passion had dissolved in the music, he sang with a sweet and\nsilvery voice, that, to a passer-by, had seemed that of perfect\nhappiness\u2014a hymn sung in joy upon its knees by gladsome childhood before\nit flew out among the green hills, to quiet labour or gleesome play. As\nthat sweetest voice came from the bosom of the old man, where the singer\nlay in affection, and blended with his own so tremulous, never had I\nfelt so affectingly brought before me the beginning and the end of life,\nthe cradle and the grave.\n\nEre the psalm was yet over, the door was opened, and a tall fine-looking\nman entered, but with a lowering and dark countenance, seemingly in\nsorrow, in misery, and remorse. Agitated, confounded, and awe-struck by\nthe melancholy and dirge-like music, he sat down on a chair, and looked\nwith a ghastly face towards his father\u2019s death-bed. When the psalm\nceased, the Elder said with a solemn voice, \u201cMy son, thou art come in\ntime to receive thy father\u2019s blessing. May the remembrance of what will\nhappen in this room before the morning again shine over the Hazel Glen\nwin thee from the error of thy ways! Thou art here, to witness the mercy\nof thy God and thy Saviour, whom thou hast forgotten.\u201d\n\nThe minister looked, if not with a stern, yet with an upbraiding\ncountenance, on the young man, who had not recovered his speech, and\nsaid, \u201cWilliam! for three years past your shadow has not darkened the\ndoor of the house of God. They who fear not the thunder may tremble at\nthe still small voice; now is the hour for repentance, that your\nfather\u2019s spirit may carry up to heaven tidings of a contrite soul saved\nfrom the company of sinners!\u201d\n\nThe young man, with much effort, advanced to the bedside, and at last\nfound voice to say, \u201cFather, I am not without the affections of nature,\nand I hurried home as soon as I heard that the minister had been seen\nriding towards our house. I hope that you will yet recover, and if I\nhave ever made you unhappy, I ask your forgiveness; for though I may not\nthink as you do on matters of religion, I have a human heart. Father! I\nmay have been unkind, but I am not cruel. I ask your forgiveness.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome nearer to me, William; kneel down by the bedside, and let my hand\nfind the head of my beloved son\u2014for blindness is coming fast upon me.\nThou wert my first-born, and thou art my only living son. All thy\nbrothers and sisters are lying in the kirkyard, beside her whose sweet\nface thine own, William, did once so much resemble. Long wert thou the\njoy, the pride of my soul\u2014ay, too much the pride, for there was not in\nall the parish such a man, such a son, as my own William. If thy heart\nhas since been changed, God may inspire it again with right thoughts.\nCould I die for thy sake\u2014could I purchase thy salvation with the\noutpouring of thy father\u2019s blood\u2014but this the Son of God has done for\nthee, who hast denied Him! I have sorely wept for thee\u2014ay, William, when\nthere was none near me\u2014even as David wept for Absalom, for thee, my son,\nmy son!\u201d\n\nA long deep groan was the only reply; but the whole body of the kneeling\nman was convulsed; and it was easy to see his sufferings, his\ncontrition, his remorse, and his despair. The pastor said, with a\nsterner voice and austerer countenance than were natural to him, \u201cKnow\nyou whose hand is now lying on your rebellious head? But what signifies\nthe word father to him who has denied God, the Father of us all?\u201d\u2014\u201cOh!\npress him not so hardly,\u201d said the weeping wife, coming forward from a\ndark corner of the room, where she had tried to conceal herself in\ngrief, fear, and shame. \u201cSpare, oh! spare my husband\u2014he has ever been\nkind to me;\u201d and with that she knelt down beside him, with her long,\nsoft, white arms mournfully and affectionately laid across his neck. \u201cGo\nthou, likewise, my sweet little Jamie,\u201d said the Elder, \u201cgo even out of\nmy bosom, and kneel down beside thy father and thy mother, so that I may\nbless you all at once, and with one yearning prayer.\u201d The child did as\nthat solemn voice commanded, and knelt down somewhat timidly by his\nfather\u2019s side; nor did that unhappy man decline encircling with his arm\nthe child too much neglected, but still dear to him as his own blood, in\nspite of the deadening and debasing influence of infidelity.\n\n\u201cPut the Word of God into the hands of my son, and let him read aloud to\nhis dying father the 25th, 26th, and 27th verses of the eleventh chapter\nof the Gospel according to St John.\u201d The pastor went up to the kneelers,\nand, with a voice of pity, condolence, and pardon, said, \u201cThere was a\ntime when none, William, could read the Scriptures better than couldst\nthou\u2014can it be that the son of my friend hath forgotten the lessons of\nhis youth?\u201d He had not forgotten them; there was no need for the\nrepentant sinner to lift up his eyes from the bedside. The sacred stream\nof the Gospel had worn a channel in his heart, and the waters were again\nflowing. With a choked voice he said, \u201cJesus said unto her, I am the\nResurrection and the Life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead,\nyet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me, shall never\ndie. Believest thou this? She saith unto him, Yea, Lord; I believe that\nthou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is not an unbeliever\u2019s voice,\u201d said the dying man triumphantly;\n\u201cnor, William, hast thou an unbeliever\u2019s heart. Say that thou believest\nin what thou hast now read, and thy father will die happy!\u201d\u2014\u201cI do\nbelieve; and as thou forgivest me, so may I be forgiven by my Father who\nis in heaven.\u201d\n\nThe Elder seemed like a man suddenly inspired with a new life. His faded\neyes kindled\u2014his pale cheeks glowed\u2014his palsied hands seemed to wax\nstrong\u2014and his voice was clear as that of manhood in its prime. \u201cInto\nThy hands, O God, I commit my spirit!\u201d\u2014and so saying, he gently sank\nback on his pillow; and I thought I heard a sigh. There was then a long\ndeep silence, and the father, and mother, and child rose from their\nknees. The eyes of us all were turned towards the white placid face of\nthe figure now stretched in everlasting rest; and without lamentations,\nsave the silent lamentations of the resigned soul, we stood around the\n\u201cDeath-bed of the Elder.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n A HIGHLAND FEUD.\n\n BY SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n\nThe principal possessors of the Hebrides were originally of the name of\nMacDonald, the whole being under the government of a succession of\nchiefs, who bore the name of Donald of the Isles, and were possessed of\nauthority almost independent of the kings of Scotland. But this great\nfamily becoming divided into two or three branches, other chiefs settled\nin some of the islands, and disputed the property of the original\nproprietors. Thus, the MacLeods, a powerful and numerous clan, who had\nextensive estates on the mainland, made themselves masters, at a very\nearly period, of a great part of the large island of Skye, seized upon\nmuch of the Long Island, as the isles of Lewis and Harris are called,\nand fought fiercely with the MacDonalds and other tribes of the islands.\nThe following is an example of the mode in which these feuds were\nconducted:\u2014\n\nAbout the end of the sixteenth century, a boat, manned by one or two of\nthe MacLeods, landed in Eigg, a small island peopled by the MacDonalds.\nThey were at first hospitably received; but having been guilty of some\nincivility to the young women of the island, it was so much resented by\nthe inhabitants, that they tied the MacLeods hand and foot, and putting\nthem on board of their own boat, towed it to the sea, and set it adrift,\nleaving the wretched men, bound as they were, to perish by famine, or by\nthe winds and waves, as chance should determine. But fate so ordered it,\nthat a boat belonging to the Laird of MacLeod fell in with that which\nhad the captives on board, and brought them in safety to the Laird\u2019s\ncastle of Dunvegan, in Skye, where they complained of the injury which\nthey had sustained from the MacDonalds of Eigg. MacLeod, in great rage,\nput to sea with his galleys, manned by a large body of his people, which\nthe men of Eigg could not entertain any rational hope of resisting.\nLearning that their incensed enemy was approaching with superior forces,\nand deep vows of revenge, the inhabitants, who knew they had no mercy to\nexpect at MacLeod\u2019s hands, resolved, as the best chance of safety in\ntheir power, to conceal themselves in a large cavern on the sea-shore.\n\nThis place was particularly well-calculated for that purpose. The\nentrance resembles that of a fox-earth, being an opening so small that a\nman cannot enter save by creeping on hands and knees. A rill of water\nfalls from the top of the rock, and serves, or rather served at the\nperiod we speak of, wholly to conceal the aperture. A stranger, even\nwhen apprised of the existence of such a cave, would find the greatest\ndifficulty in discovering the entrance. Within, the cavern rises to a\ngreat height, and the floor is covered with white dry sand. It is\nextensive enough to contain a great number of people. The whole\ninhabitants of Eigg, who, with their wives and families, amounted to\nnearly two hundred souls, took refuge within its precincts.\n\nMacLeod arrived with his armament, and landed on the island, but could\ndiscover no one on whom to wreak his vengeance\u2014all was desert. The\nMacLeods destroyed the huts of the islanders, and plundered what\nproperty they could discover; but the vengeance of the chieftain could\nnot be satisfied with such petty injuries. He knew that the inhabitants\nmust either have fled in their boats to one of the islands possessed by\nthe MacDonalds, or that they must be concealed somewhere in Eigg. After\nmaking a strict but unsuccessful search for two days, MacLeod had\nappointed the third to leave his anchorage, when, in the gray of the\nmorning, one of the seamen beheld, from the deck of his galley, the\nfigure of a man on the island. This was a spy whom the MacDonalds,\nimpatient of their confinement in the cavern, had imprudently sent out\nto see whether MacLeod had retired or no. The poor fellow, when he saw\nhimself discovered, endeavoured, by doubling after the manner of a hare\nor fox, to obliterate the track of his footsteps, and prevent its being\ndiscovered where he had re-entered the cavern. But all his art was in\nvain; the invaders again landed, and tracked him to the entrance of the\ncavern.\n\nMacLeod then summoned those who were within it, and called upon them to\ndeliver the individuals who had maltreated his men, to be disposed of at\nhis pleasure. The MacDonalds, still confident in the strength of their\nfastness, which no assailant could enter but on hands and knees, refused\nto surrender their clansmen.\n\nMacLeod then commenced a dreadful work of indiscriminate vengeance. He\ncaused his people, by means of a ditch cut above the top of the rock, to\nturn away the stream of water which fell over the entrance of the\nprecipice. This being done, the MacLeods collected all the combustibles\nwhich could be found on the island, particularly quantities of dry\nheather, piled them up against the aperture, and maintained an immense\nfire for many hours, until the smoke, penetrating into the inmost\nrecesses of the cavern, stifled to death every creature within. There is\nno doubt of the truth of this story, dreadful as it is. The cavern is\noften visited by strangers; and I have myself seen the place, where the\nbones of the murdered MacDonalds still remain, lying as thick on the\nfloor of the cave as in the charnel-house of a church.\n\n\n\n\n THE RESURRECTION MEN.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR, M.D.\n\n How then was the Devil drest?\n He was in his Sunday\u2019s best;\n His coat was red, and his breeches were blue,\n With a hole behind, where his tail came through.\n\n Over the hill, and over the dale,\n And he went over the plain:\n And backward and forward he switched his tail,\n As a gentleman switches his cane.\n _Coleridge._\n\n\nAbout this time[8] there arose a great sough and surmise that some loons\nwere playing false with the kirkyard, howking up the bodies from their\ndamp graves, and hurling them away to the college. Words canna describe\nthe fear, and the dool, and the misery it caused. All flocked to the\nkirk yett; and the friends of the newly buried stood by the mools, which\nwere yet dark, and the brown, newly-cast divots, that had not yet ta\u2019en\nroot, looking with mournful faces, to descry any tokens of sinking in.\n\nFootnote 8:\n\n See _ante_, \u201cBenjie\u2019s Christening,\u201d page 214.\n\nI\u2019ll never forget it. I was standing by when three young lads took\nshools, and, lifting up the truff, proceeded to howk down to the coffin,\nwherein they had laid the gray hairs of their mother. They looked wild\nand bewildered like, and the glance of their een was like that of folk\nout of a mad-house; and none dared in the world to have spoken to them.\nThey didna even speak to ane anither; but wrought on wi\u2019 a great hurry\ntill the spades struck on the coffin-lid\u2014which was broken. The\ndead-claithes were there huddled a\u2019thegither in a nook, but the dead was\ngane. I took haud o\u2019 Willie Walker\u2019s arm, and looked down. There was a\ncauld sweat all ower me;\u2014losh me! but I was terribly frighted and eerie.\nThree mair graves were opened, and a\u2019 just alike, save and except that\nof a wee unkirstened wean, which was aff bodily, coffin and a\u2019.\n\nThere was a burst of righteous indignation throughout the parish; nor\nwithout reason. Tell me that doctors and graduates maun hae the dead;\nbut tell it not to Mansie Wauch, that our hearts maun be trampled in the\nmire of scorn, and our best feelings laughed at, in order that a bruise\nmay be properly plaistered up, or a sair head cured. Verily, the remedy\nis waur than the disease.\n\nBut what remead? It was to watch in the session-house, with loaded guns,\nnight about, three at a time. I never likit to gang into the kirkyard\nafter darkening, let-a-be to sit there through a lang winter night,\nwindy and rainy, it may be, wi\u2019 nane but the dead around us. Save us! it\nwas an unco thought, and garred a\u2019 my flesh creep; but the cause was\ngude,\u2014my spirit was roused, and I was determined no to be dauntoned.\n\nI counted and counted, but the dread day at length came, and I was\nsummonsed. All the leivelang afternoon, when ca\u2019ing the needle upon the\nbrod, I tried to whistle Jenny Nettles, Niel Gow, and ither funny tunes,\nand whiles crooned to mysel between hands; but my consternation was\nvisible, and a\u2019 wadna do.\n\nIt was in November, and the cauld glimmering sun sank behind the\nPentlands. The trees had been shorn of their frail leaves; and the misty\nnight was closing fast in upon the dull and short day; but the candles\nglittered at the shop windows, and leery-light-the-lamps was brushing\nabout wi\u2019 his ladder in his oxter, and bleezing flamboy sparking out\nbehind him. I felt a kind of qualm of faintness and down-sinking about\nmy heart and stomach, to the dispelling of which I took a thimbleful of\nspirits, and, tying my red comforter about my neck, I marched briskly to\nthe session-house. A neighbour (Andrew Goldie, the pensioner) lent me\nhis piece, and loaded it to me. He took tent that it was only half-cock,\nand I wrapped a napkin round the dog-head, for it was raining. No being\nacquaint wi\u2019 guns, I keepit the muzzle aye awa frae me; as it is every\nman\u2019s duty no to throw his precious life into jeopardy.\n\nA furm was set before the session-house fire, which bleezed brightly,\nnor had I ony thought that such an unearthly place could have been made\nto look half so comfortable, either by coal or candle; so my speerits\nrose up as if a weight had been ta\u2019en aff them, and I wondered in my\nbravery, that a man like me could be afeard of onything. Nobody was\nthere but a touzy, ragged, halflins callant of thirteen (for I speired\nhis age), wi\u2019 a desperate dirty face, and lang carroty hair, tearing a\nspeldrin wi\u2019 his teeth, which lookit lang and sharp eneugh, and throwing\nthe skin and lugs intil the fire.\n\nWe sat for amaist an hour thegither, cracking the best way we could in\nsic a place; nor was onybody mair likely to cast up. The night was now\npit-mirk; the wind soughed amid the headstanes and railings of the\ngentry (for we maun a\u2019 dee); and the black corbies in the steeple-holes\ncackled and crawed in a fearsome manner. A\u2019 at ance we heard a lonesome\nsound; and my heart began to play pit-pat\u2014my skin grew a\u2019 rough, like a\npoukit chicken\u2014and I felt as if I didna ken what was the matter with me.\nIt was only a false alarm, however, being the warning of the clock; and\nin a minute or twa thereafter the bell struck ten. Oh, but it was a\nlonesome and dreary sound! Every chap gaed through my breast like the\ndunt of a forehammer.\n\nThen up and spak the red headed laddie: \u201cIt\u2019s no fair; anither should\nhae come by this time. I wad rin awa hame, only I\u2019m frightened to gang\nout my lane. Do ye think the doup o\u2019 that candle wad carry in my cap?\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na, lad; we maun bide here, as we are here now. Leave me alane!\nLord save us! and the yett lockit, and the bethrel sleepin\u2019 wi\u2019 the key\nin his breek-pouches! We canna win out now, though we would,\u201d answered\nI, trying to look brave, though half frightened out of my seven senses.\n\u201cSit down, sit down; I\u2019ve baith whisky and porter wi\u2019 me. Hae, man,\nthere\u2019s a cauker to keep your heart warm; and set down that bottle,\u201d\nquoth I, wiping the sawdust aff it with my hand, \u201cto get a toast; I\u2019se\nwarrant it for Deacon Jaffrey\u2019s best brown stout.\u201d\n\nThe wind blew higher, and like a hurricane; the rain began to fall in\nperfect spouts; the auld kirk rumbled, and rowed, and made a sad\nsoughing; and the bourtree tree behind the house, where auld Cockburn,\nthat cuttit his throat, was buried, creakit and crazed in a frightful\nmanner; but as to the roaring of the troubled waters, and the bumming in\nthe lum-head, they were past a\u2019 power of description. To make bad worse,\njust in the heart of the brattle, the grating sound of the yett turning\non its rusty hinges was but too plainly heard. What was to be done? I\nthought of our baith running away; and then of our locking oursels in,\nand firing through the door; but wha was to pull the trigger?\n\nGudeness watch ower us! I tremble yet when I think on\u2019t. We were\nperfectly between the deil and the deep sea\u2014either to stand and fire our\ngun, or rin and be shot at. It was really a hang choice. As I stood\nswithering and shaking, the laddie ran to the door, and thrawing round\nthe key, clapped his back till\u2019t. Oh! how I lookit at him, as he stude,\nfor a gliff, like a magpie hearkening wi\u2019 his lug cockit up, or rather\nlike a terrier watching a rotten.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re coming! they\u2019re coming!\u201d he cried out; \u201ccock the piece, ye\nsumph,\u201d while the red hair rose up from his pow like feathers; \u201cthey\u2019re\ncoming, I hear them tramping on the gravel!\u201d Out he stretched his arms\nagainst the wall, and brizzed his back against the door like mad; as if\nhe had been Samson pushing over the pillars in the house of Dagon. \u201cFor\nthe Lord\u2019s sake, prime the gun,\u201d he cried out, \u201cor our throats will be\ncut frae lug to lug, before we can say Jack Robinson! See that there\u2019s\npriming in the pan!\u201d\n\nI did the best I could; but my hale strength could hardly lift up the\npiece, which waggled to and fro like a cock\u2019s tail on a rainy day; my\nknees knockit against ane anither, and though I was resigned to dee\u2014I\ntrust I was resigned to dee\u2014\u2019od, but it was a frightfu\u2019 thing to be out\nof ane\u2019s bed, and to be murdered in an auld session-house, at the dead\nhour of night, by unyearthly resurrection-men\u2014or rather let me call them\ndevils incarnate\u2014wrapt up in dreadnoughts, wi\u2019 blackit faces, pistols,\nbig sticks, and other deadly weapons.\n\nA snuff-snuffing was heard; and through below the door I saw a pair of\nglancing black een. \u2019Od, but my heart nearly loupit aff the bit\u2014a snouff\nand a gur\u2014gurring, and ower a\u2019 the plain tramp of a man\u2019s heavy tackets\nand cuddy-heels amang the gravel. Then cam a great slap like thunder on\nthe wall; and the laddie quitting his grip, fell down, crying, \u201cFire,\nfire!\u2014murder! holy murder!\u201d\n\n\u201cWha\u2019s there?\u201d growled a deep rough voice; \u201copen\u2014I\u2019m a friend.\u201d\n\nI tried to speak, but could not; something like a halfpenny roll was\nsticking in my throat, so I tried to cough it up, but it wadna come.\n\u201cGie the pass-word, then,\u201d said the laddie, staring as if his een wad\nloupen out; \u201cgie the pass-word!\u201d\n\nFirst cam a loud whussle, and then \u201cCopmahagen,\u201d answered the voice. Oh!\nwhat a relief! The laddie started up like ane crazy wi\u2019 joy. \u201cOu! ou!\u201d\ncried he, thrawing round the key, and rubbing his hands, \u201cby jingo! it\u2019s\nthe bethrel\u2014it\u2019s the bethrel\u2014it\u2019s auld Isaac himsel!\u201d\n\nFirst rushed in the dog, and then Isaac, wi\u2019 his glazed hat, slouched\nower his brow, and his horn bowet glimmering by his knee. \u201cHas the\nFrench landit, do ye think? Losh keep us a\u2019!\u201d said he, wi\u2019 a smile on\nhis half-idiot face (for he was a kind of a sort of a natural, wi\u2019 an\ninfirmity in his leg). \u201c\u2019Od sauf us, man, put by your gun. Ye dinna mean\nto shoot me, do ye? What are ye aboot here wi\u2019 the door lockit? I just\nkeppit four resurrectioners louping ower the wa\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cGude guide us!\u201d I said, taking a long breath to drive the blude frae my\nheart, and something relieved by Isaac\u2019s company. \u201cCome now, Isaac,\nye\u2019re just giein\u2019 us a fright. Isn\u2019t that true, Isaac?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I\u2019m joking,\u2014and what for no? But they might have been, for\nonything ye wad hae hindered them to the contrair, I\u2019m thinking. Na, na,\nye maunna lock the door; that\u2019s no fair play.\u201d\n\nWhen the door was put ajee, and the furm set fornent the fire, I gied\nIsaac a dram to keep his heart up on sic a cauld, stormy night. \u2019Od, but\nhe was a droll fallow, Isaac. He sung and leuch as if he had been\nboozing in Lucky Tamson\u2019s, wi\u2019 some of his drucken cronies. Fient a hair\ncared he about auld kirks, or kirkyards, or vouts, or through-stanes, or\ndead folk in their winding-sheets, wi\u2019 the wet grass growing ower them;\nand at last I began to brighten up a wee mysel; so when he had gone ower\na good few funny stories, I said to him, quoth I, \u201cMony folk, I daresay,\nmak mair noise about their sitting up in a kirkyard than it\u2019s a\u2019 worth.\nThere\u2019s naething here to harm us.\u201d\n\n\u201cI beg to differ wi\u2019 ye there,\u201d answered Isaac, taking out his horn mull\nfrom his coat pouch, and tapping on the lid in a queer style\u2014\u201cI could\ngie anither version of that story. Did ye no ken of three young\ndoctors\u2014Eirish students\u2014alang wi\u2019 some resurrectioners, as waff and wild\nas themselves, firing shottie for shottie wi\u2019 the guard at Kirkmabreck,\nand lodging three slugs in ane o\u2019 their backs, forbye firing a ramrod\nthrough anither ane\u2019s hat?\u201d\n\nThis was a wee alarming. \u201cNo,\u201d quoth I\u2014\u201cno, Isaac, man, I ne\u2019er heard\no\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut let alane resurrectioners, do ye no think there is sic a thing as\nghaists? Guide ye, my man, my granny could hae telled ye as muckle about\nthem as wad hae filled a minister\u2019s sermons from June to January.\u201d\n\n\u201cKay\u2014kay\u2014that\u2019s a\u2019 buff,\u201d I said. \u201cAre there nae cutty-stool\nbusinesses\u2014are there nae marriages gaun, Isaac?\u201d for I was keen to\nchange the subject.\n\n\u201cYe may kay\u2014kay\u2014as ye like, though; I can just tell ye this\u2014ye\u2019ll mind\nauld Armstrong, wi\u2019 the leather breeks, and the brown three-storey\nwig\u2014him that was the grave\u2014digger? Weel, he saw a ghaist wi\u2019 his leeving\neen\u2014aye, and what\u2019s better, in this very kirkyard too. It was a cauld\nspring morning, and daylight just coming in, when he cam to the yett\nyonder, thinking to meet his man, paidling Jock\u2014but Jock had sleepit in,\nand wasna there. Weel, to the wast corner ower yonder he gaed, and\nthrowing his coat ower a headstane, and his hat on the tap o\u2019t, he dug\nawa wi\u2019 his spade, casting out the mools, and the coffin-handles, and\nthe green banes, and sic-like, till he stoppit a wee to tak\nbreath.\u2014What! are ye whistling to yoursel?\u201d quo\u2019 Isaac to me, \u201cand no\nhearing what\u2019s God\u2019s truth?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu ay,\u201d said I, \u201cbut ye didna tell me if ony body was cried last\nSunday?\u201d I wad hae given every farthing I had made by the needle to hae\nbeen at that blessed time in my bed wi\u2019 my wife and wean. Ay, how I was\ngruing! I mostly chacked aff my tongue in chitterin\u2019. But a\u2019 wadna do.\n\n\u201cWeel, speaking of ghaists;\u2014when he was resting on his spade, he looked\nup to the steeple, to see what o\u2019clock it was, wondering what way Jock\nhadna come,\u2014when lo, and behold! in the lang diced window of the kirk\nyonder, he saw a lady a\u2019 in white, wi\u2019 her hands clasped thegither,\nlooking out to the kirkyard at him.\n\n\u201cHe couldna believe his een, so he rubbit them wi\u2019 his sark sleeve, but\nshe was still there bodily, and, keeping ae ee on her, and anither on\nhis road to the yett, he drew his coat and hat to him below his arm, and\naff like mad, throwing his shool half a mile ahint him. Jock fand that;\nfor he was coming singing in at the yett, when his maister ran clean\nower the tap o\u2019 him, and capseized him like a toom barrel; and never\nstoppin\u2019 till he was in at his ain house, and the door baith bolted and\nbarred at his tail.\n\n\u201cDid ye ever hear the like of that, Mansie? Weel man, I\u2019ll explain the\nhale history o\u2019t to ye. Ye see,\u2014\u2019od! how sound that callant\u2019s sleeping,\u201d\ncontinued Isaac; \u201che\u2019s snoring like a nine-year-auld.\u201d\n\nI was glad he had stoppit, for I was like to sink through the grund wi\u2019\nfear; but na, it wadna do.\n\n\u201cDinna ye ken\u2014sauf us! what a fearsome night this is! The trees \u2019ll be\na\u2019 broken. What a noise in the lum! I dare say there is some auld hag of\na witch-wife gaun to come rumble doun\u2019t. It\u2019s no the first time, I\u2019ll\nswear. Hae ye a silver sixpence? Wad ye like that?\u201d he bawled up the\nchimley. \u201cYe\u2019ll hae heard,\u201d said he, \u201clang ago, that a wee murdered wean\nwas buried\u2014didna ye hear a voice?\u2014was buried below that corner\u2014the\nhearthstane there, where the laddie\u2019s lying on?\u201d\n\nI had now lost my breath, so that I couldna stop him.\n\n\u201cYe never heard tell o\u2019t, didna ye? Weel, I\u2019se tell\u2019t ye.\u2014Sauf us! what\nswurls o\u2019 smoke coming down the chimley\u2014I could swear something no\ncanny\u2019s stopping up the lum-head\u2014gang out and see!\u201d\n\nAt that moment, a clap like thunder was heard\u2014the candle was driven\nower\u2014the sleeping laddie roared \u201cHelp!\u201d and \u201cMurder!\u201d and \u201cThieves!\u201d and\nas the furm on which we were sitting played flee backwards, cripple\nIsaac bellowed out, \u201cI\u2019m dead!\u2014I\u2019m killed! shot through the head!\u2014oh,\noh, oh!\u201d\n\nSurely I had fainted away; for when I came to mysel, I found my red\ncomforter loosed; my face a\u2019 wet\u2014Isaac rubbing down my waistcoat with\nhis sleeve\u2014the laddie swigging ale out of a bicker\u2014and the brisk brown\nstout, which, by casting its cork, had caused a\u2019 the alarm,\nwhizz\u2014whizz\u2014whizzing in the chimley-lug.\u2014_Mansie Wauch._\n\n\n\n\n MARY WILSON.\n\n On her white arm down sunk her head,\n She shivered, sighed, and died.\n _Mallet._\n\n\nJoseph Wilson was a farmer in the parish of D\u2014\u2014. He possessed enough of\nthe goods of this world to make him be respected by all his neighbours,\nand esteemed by them as the most careful, well-doing man in the parish.\nJoseph knew well enough the value of his riches; but still the jewel\nwhich was nearest and dearest to his heart was his only daughter, the\nbeautiful and innocent Mary Wilson. He loved her\u2014and his love was not\ngreater than that of Marjory, his wife\u2014more than all he possessed; and\nwhen rallied by his neighbours on the depth of his purse, he was wont to\nsay, that the brightest guinea he adored was the face of his own sweet\nMary. While a child she was indulged; and the smiles of her pretty round\nface, and her caresses and kisses, gained all her little wants from her\ndoting parents. While the daughters of other farmers assisted in\nhousehold management, she was never required to soil her fingers, but\nwould skip and dance before her father over the fields and the meadows,\nand sport as the little lamb round her parent. As she advanced from\nchildhood, her days were clad in the same fair livery of joy. She danced\nand she toyed, and though no longer dandled and prattling on the knees\nof her parents, she made them the confidants of all her light amusements\nand secrets, and she sang to them all the legendary ballads which she\nhad picked up, and their hearts were still gladdened in the little\noffspring of their wedlock.\n\nFrom a child to the age of fifteen, she had attended the parish school\nalong with all the boys and girls, both high and low. Here she was a\ngeneral favourite, and the youths would crowd to attend Mary Wilson\nhome, because she had the prettiest little lips, and the kindliest\nlaugh, of any girl in the school; and happy was he, and proud of\nhimself, who obtained her hand to dance at the Candlemas ball. The\nfather and mother saw no harm in the adulations paid to their daughter,\nfor they did not equal their own; and the good old schoolmaster loved to\nsee Mary the favourite of all his youths, because she was a good scholar\nand the best singer in the school and in the church, and on that account\nthe greatest favourite with himself. When he raised the tune on the\nSabbath to the praise of the Lord, he would turn in his desk to the seat\nof Mary Wilson for her accompaniment, and, when her sweet voice was once\nheard through the church, then would the whole congregation join, and\nevery young man emulate himself to gain the approbation of the fair and\ngoodly singer. To those who are in the practice of attending a country\nparish church, I need not mention in how high estimation the best female\nsinger is held amongst all the young men of the country side.\n\nAt the age of fifteen she was removed to a boarding-school in town. Here\nshe remained two years, and though she perfected herself in\naccomplishments, and though many young men dangled after her, yet her\nheart, albeit naturally merry, was sensitive; and vapid appeared to her\nthe revel in the midnight ball compared to the dance on the\nheaven-canopied lawn, when heart panted with heart, and every spirit\ncaught the existing flame of pleasure; and frigid and disagreeable\nseemed to her the lips from whom politeness extorted studied words,\ncompared to the lips of those who spoke the warm and momentary feelings\nof the mind. She returned to the place of her youth, and sought again\nfor mirth and pleasure amongst her old companions; but she was changed\nboth in person and in mind. She was no longer the light airy girl, but\nshe was now the woman glowing in all the richness and luxuriance of\nfemale beauty. She could not now associate with the young men, and be\ntheir umpire in all their disputes and contentions, as in the days of\nher youth; nor could she find that delight in the company of her female\ncompanions which she did ere her departure. Mary was a flower,\u2014\n\n A violet by a mossy stone,\n Half hid from human eyes,\n\nthat, left undisturbed on the wild, would have flourished the loveliest\nof her comrades, but once transplanted for a little time into the\ngarden, she took not so well when removed again to her native soil.\nThough she danced, and though she sung, as she was wont, still part of\nthat which she had seen in town mingled itself with that which she\nenjoyed in the country; the customs of a populous city were not to be\neasily banished from her, and she could not be so happy as formerly. To\nher father and her mother she was the same adored object; both rejoiced\nin her beauty, and while they would at times talk of who might be her\nhusband, they would soon chase away the idea as that of a robber that\nwould deprive them of their all.\n\nA little after Mary\u2019s return to her father\u2019s, Charles Morley returned\nlikewise from the University. He was the son of the laird, but he had\nbeen at the parish school with the young men, and once been their\nconstant companion. He hunted for birds\u2019 nests with them, he had fished\nwith them, he had often broken into his father\u2019s garden with them, and\nMorley was as one of themselves. He had ever been attentive to Mary\nWilson; and she, if the umpire of a race or a wrestle, was always happy\nwhen she could adjudge the honour of victory to Charlie Morley, because\nhe would at times snatch a kiss from her, and would always take her hand\nand assist her when wading through the burns. He had completed his\neducation at the University, and, while he had acquired knowledge, he\nhad lost the command of himself. Long did he withstand the temptations\nlaid in his way by more wicked companions, and long did he endeavour to\nretain the principles his old master had instilled into him; but in\nvain: while the sage was discoursing on the nobleness of man\u2019s nature,\nand the blessings of wisdom, and while he acquiesced in all the learned\nman said, Charles Morley had become one of the most profligate young men\nin the college.\n\nWhen he returned to the country, he often met Mary Wilson, both at her\nfather\u2019s and at the houses of the other tenants. Their meetings became\nfrequent, and though they never made assignations, yet Charles Morley\nwas sure to meet with Mary Wilson in her walks. She saw no harm in\nmeeting with her old school companion, but he had his schemes laid; he\nsaw her leaning on him in all her maiden fondness; he knew human nature,\nand he knew that if he attempted to wrong her in their early meetings,\nhe would discover his baseness and be spurned. He suffered therefore her\naffection to grow upon her, and, when it had fully ripened, he gave her\nhis feigned love, and received hers, as the offerings of a devotee to\nhis God, in return. For some time she was almost happy, and though she\nknew her situation must soon be known, she was certain it would not be\nso till she was the wife of Charles Morley\u2014for so he had promised; and\ncould she doubt him? Time, however, flew on, and Mary becoming\ndiscontented and frightened, Morley, in order to draw her from a place\nwhere discovery would have been ruin to himself, proposed flight. When a\nwoman has once gone astray, the man who has ruined her does not require\ngreat efforts to persuade her to anything. She is his, body and soul.\nMary one night bade adieu to the house of her father, and fled with her\nparamour to an obscure lodging in the capital.\n\nSad was the morning which arose to her parents on the discovery of her\ndeparture, and more especially the cause of it, which neighbours were\nnot slow in surmising and hinting. Her mother wept in all the bitterness\nof woe, but her tears could not express the sorrow of her heart. The\nfather was louder in his grief; he wept and raved by turns. Now he\ngrieved for her helplessness, and prayed to God to grant her mercy; then\nhe cursed the hour in which she was born, and called down curses on him\nwho had ruined the hope of his days. In a little time their violent\ngrief had subsided; the fugitives could not be traced, and neither\nJoseph nor his wife suffered that name which was nearest to their hearts\nto pass their lips. But when Marjory would see the work-basket of her\ndaughter, she would throw herself on her bed and weep; and Joseph, when\nanything came in his way that strongly associated the idea of his Mary,\nwould seize his hat, rush from the house, and give utterance to a grief\nwhich he would fain conceal from an already heart-broken wife.\n\nIt was about five months after the departure of Mary, when Marjory,\nhearing one day a gentle tap at the door, went to open it. It was Mary\nwho knocked; but oh! how changed from her who once was the boast of the\ncountry side! She was pale and emaciated, her eye had lost its lustre,\nand she seemed to be worse than the shadow of her former loveliness. Her\ndress was ragged and torn, and in her arms she bore a child\u2014the\nill-fated offspring of her illicit amour. Her mother held the door for\nsome minutes, while she surveyed with melancholy eyes the woeworn\ncondition of her daughter. \u201cMary,\u201d she said\u2014and her manner was\ncomposed\u2014\u201cMary, you did not need formerly to knock at the door of your\nfather\u2019s house.\u201d Mary stepped over the threshold, and staggering, rather\nthan walking, forward into the kitchen, threw herself on the dais.\n\u201cMary,\u201d said her mother again, \u201cwhere have you been? Are you a married\nwoman? Better be the wife of the poorest man than\u2014\u2014.\u201d Here her daughter\nburied her face in the bosom of her child, and sobbed aloud. \u201cMary,\u201d\nagain said her mother, \u201cI reproach you not. God will grant you His\nforgiveness, as I do mine; I feel I cannot live long after this stroke,\nand we must all meet with trials on this side the grave; but Mary, oh,\nmy darling Mary,\u201d and she threw her arms around her daughter\u2019s neck and\nkissed her, \u201cyour father! how will you bear the look of your father?\u201d\nHer words were scarce finished when Joseph entered. He laid his hat on\nthe table, he shaded back his gray hairs, and clasped his hands, and,\nfrom his hard-knitted brows, he seemed about to pray the vengeance of\nGod on her who had so dishonoured his old age. He looked at his\ndaughter; her eyes were on him, and her once lovely arm was extended as\nif to avoid the threatened curse; his brows relaxed, he unclasped his\nhands, and placing them on his face, wept aloud. She laid her child on\nthe seat, she was at his feet on her knees, and her arms grasped him by\nthe waist. He felt her, he placed one hand in hers, and raised the other\nas he said, \u201cMay God forgive thee, my daughter! Ah, Mary, Mary, thou art\nstill my offspring, though thou art a defiled vessel in the eyes of God\nand man!\u201d\n\nOn the second Sunday after her return to her father\u2019s, she prepared to\nattend her purification in the kirk. She had gone through all\npreliminary forms, and was now once more to take her seat in the house\nof God. She went muffled up and attended by her father and mother, and\nwas not recognised. During the singing of the first and second psalms\nshe was silent; but at the third, her father desired her to sing to the\npraise of that God who had brought her back as a lost sheep into His\nfold. In the second line she joined the tune; but weakly and feebly\ncompared to that voice which used to lead the whole kirk. It was,\nhowever, recognised; there was a more than momentary stop while all eyes\nwere turned towards her; and her old master, turning towards the seat of\nhis old favourite, strove, while the big tears rolled down his cheeks,\nand his voice faltered, to bear her through the tune. The minister again\nrose to prayer: he stretched his hands to heaven, and prayed for all\nmankind; he prayed for the sinner that had gone astray, and that the\nFather of mercies would have compassion on the wretched, and again take\nher into his bosom. There was not a dry eye in the kirk. Humanity for\nonce prevailed, and human selfishness forgot itself in the woes of a\nfellow-mortal. She, for whom they were supplicating, stood with her\nhands firmly clasped, her eyes closed, and her head bowed to the earth;\nand though her father and mother sobbed and wept, she moved not, but,\nwhen service was over, she walked with a firm step, and uncovered face\nand head, through all the parishioners, to her father\u2019s dwelling. She\nlaid herself down on her bed, and in three weeks the grave yawned and\nclosed on the unfortunate Mary Wilson.\n\nA few weeks ago, I made it in my way to pass through D\u2014\u2014. Many\nrevolutions of a tropical sun had passed over my head since I had left\nmy native land, and, on my return, I was anxious to visit that spot\nwhere I passed many of my happiest days, even though I knew that all my\nrelatives were long since in the cold grave. As I turned round the hill,\nthe well-known cottage of Joseph Wilson came in view, and the story of\nhis daughter flashed vividly on my mind. I approached a countryman, who\nwas standing with his plough and horses at the end of a furrow, wiping\nthe sweat from his brow, and inquired, if Joseph Wilson was still\nliving.\n\n\u201cNa,\u201d replied he, \u201cnor ane o\u2019 his kith or kindred. The poor wean that\nsuckled frae an unfortunate breast died soon after his mother, like a\nyoung shoot or sapling that has been rashly cut down. Then Marjory soon\nfollowed, and Joseph became a heart-broken man; a\u2019thing gaed to wreck,\nand he died on the parish. There are sad ups and downs in life, and nae\nthe lightest thing to disturb our balance is the waywardness of a\nchild.\u201d\n\n\u201cPoor Mary Wilson!\u201d said I. She became as visible to my mind\u2019s eye as\nwhen I saw her winding in the mazes of a dance in all her maiden beauty\nand innocence; and the lines of my favourite poet came to my lips:\u2014\n\n When lovely woman stoops to folly,\n And finds, too late, that men betray,\n What charms can soothe her melancholy?\n What art can wash her guilt away?\n\n The only art her guilt to cover,\n To hide her shame from every eye,\n To give repentance to her lover,\n And wring his bosom, is\u2014to die.\n\n\u201cAnd what has become of the laird?\u201d said I, looking to the well-known\nmansion.\n\n\u201cThe old laird is dead, and the young one, that was once expected to be\nlaird, lies rotting with many carcases in a foreign trench. He broke his\nfather\u2019s heart, spent his substance, and died a common soldier. The\ncomforting dew of heaven seldom falls on him who disregards its\ncommands: seldom does the friendly hands of woman smooth the dying bed\nof the seducer; and still more rarely does the insulter of a parent\u2019s\ngray hairs sleep in the same grave wi\u2019 him. Ye canna lament Mary Wilson\nmair than I do.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you possess her father\u2019s land?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cAy do I,\u201d replied the rustic,\u2014apparently much moved; \u201cand it may be\nthat I would hae ploughed them mair pleasantly, and whistled mair\ncheerfully to my horses, had Mary shared it with a plain man, as became\nher station; but we maunna repine.\u201d\n\nI had no wish to proceed farther; and in my ride back I enjoyed one of\nthose deep, melancholy musings, far more congenial to my mind than the\nmost ecstatic dreams of the most ambitious men.\u2014_Aberdeen Censor._\n\n\n\n\n THE LAIRD OF CASSWAY.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nThere is an old story which I have often heard related, about a great\nLaird of Cassway, in an outer corner of Dumfriesshire, of the name of\nBeattie, and his two sons. The incidents of the story are of a very\nextraordinary nature. This Beattie had occasion to be almost constantly\nin England, because, as my informant said, he took a great hand in\ngovernment affairs, from which I conclude that the tradition had its\nrise about the time of the civil wars; for about the close of that time\nthe Scotts took advantage of the times to put the Beatties down, who for\nsome previous ages had maintained the superiority of that district.\n\nBe that as it may, the Laird of Cassway\u2019s second son, Francis, fell\ndesperately in love with a remarkably beautiful girl, the eldest\ndaughter of Henry Scott of Drumfielding, a gentleman, but still only a\nretainer, and far beneath Beattie of Cassway, both in point of wealth\nand influence. Francis was a scholar newly returned from the university;\nwas tall, handsome, of a pale complexion, and gentlemanly appearance,\nwhile Thomas, the eldest son, was fair, ruddy, and stout made, a perfect\npicture of health and good humour,\u2014a sportsman, a warrior, and a jovial\nblade; one who would not suffer a fox to get rest in the whole moor\ndistrict. He rode the best horse, kept the best hounds, played the best\nfiddle, danced the best country bumpkin, and took the stoutest draught\nof mountain dew, of any man between Erick Brae and Teviot Stone, and was\naltogether the sort of young man, that whenever he cast his eyes on a\npretty girl, either at chapel or at weapon-shaw, she would hide her\nface, and giggle as if tickled by some unseen hand.\n\nNow, though Thomas, or the Young Laird, as he was called, had only\nspoken once to Ellen Scott in his life, at which time he chucked her\nbelow the chin, and bid the deil take him if ever he saw as bonny a face\nin his whole born days; yet for all that, Ellen loved him. It could not\nbe said that she was \u201cin love\u201d with him, for a maiden\u2019s heart must be\nwon before it is given absolutely away; but hers gave him the preference\nto any other young man. She loved to see him, to hear of him, and to\nlaugh at him; and it was even observed by the domestics, that Tam\nBeattie o\u2019 the Cassway\u2019s name came oftener into her conversation than\nthere was any good reason for.\n\nSuch was the state of affairs when Francis came home, and fell\ndesperately in love with Ellen Scott; and his father being in England,\nand he under no restraint, he went frequently to visit her. She received\nhim with a kindness and affability that pleased him to the heart; but he\nlittle wist that this was only a spontaneous and natural glow of\nkindness towards him because of his connections, and rather because he\nwas the young laird of Cassway\u2019s only brother, than the poor but\naccomplished Francis Beattie, the scholar from Oxford.\n\nHe was, however, so much delighted with her, that he asked her father\u2019s\npermission to pay his addresses to her. Her father, who was a prudent\nand sensible man, answered him in this wise:\u2014\u201cThat nothing would give\nhim greater delight than to see his beloved Ellen joined with so\naccomplished and amiable a young gentleman in the bonds of holy wedlock,\nprovided his father\u2019s assent was previously obtained. But as he himself\nwas subordinate to another house, not on the best terms with the house\nof Cassway, he would not take it on him to sanction any such connection\nwithout the old Laird\u2019s full consent. That, moreover, as he, Francis\nBeattie, was just setting out in life as a lawyer, there was but too\nmuch reason to doubt that a matrimonial connection with Ellen at that\ntime would be highly imprudent; therefore it was not to be thought\nfurther of till the old laird was consulted. In the meantime, he should\nalways be welcome to his house, and to his daughter\u2019s company, as he had\nthe same confidence in his honour and integrity as if he had been a son\nof his own.\u201d\n\nThe young man thanked him affectionately, and could not help acquiescing\nin the truth of his remarks, promised not to mention matrimony farther\ntill he had consulted his father, and added,\u2014\u201cBut indeed you must excuse\nme, if I avail myself of your permission to visit here often, as I am\nsensible that it will be impossible for me to live for any space of time\nout of my dear Ellen\u2019s sight.\u201d He was again assured of welcome, and the\ntwo parted mutually pleased.\n\nHenry Scott of Drumfielding was a widower, with six daughters, over whom\npresided Mrs Jane Jerdan, their maternal aunt, an old maid, with\nfashions and ideas even more antiquated than herself. No sooner had the\nyoung wooer taken his leave than she bounced into the room, the only\nsitting apartment in the house, and said, in a loud, important whisper,\n\u201cWhat\u2019s that young swankey of a lawyer wanting, that he\u2019s aye hankering\nsae muckle about our town? I\u2019ll tell you what, brother Harry, it strikes\nme that he wants to make a wheelwright o\u2019 your daughter Nell. Now, gin\nhe axes your consent to ony siccan thing, dinna ye grant it. That\u2019s a.\u2019\nTak an auld fool\u2019s advice gin ye wad prosper. Folk are a\u2019 wise ahint the\nhand, and sae will ye be.\u201d\n\n\u201cDear Mrs Jane, what objections can you have to Mr Francis Beattie, the\nmost accomplished young gentleman of the whole country?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Complished gentleman! \u2019Complished kirn-milk! I\u2019ll tell ye what,\nbrother Harry,\u2014afore I were a landless lady, I wad rather be a tailor\u2019s\nlay-board. What has he to maintain a lady spouse with? The wind o\u2019 his\nlungs, forsooth!\u2014thinks to sell that for goud in goupins. Hech me! Crazy\nwad they be wha wad buy it; and they wha trust to crazy people for their\nliving will live but crazily. Tak an auld fool\u2019s advice gin ye wad\nprosper, else ye\u2019ll be wise ahint the hand. Have nae mair to do with\nhim\u2014Nell\u2019s bread for his betters; tell him that. Or, by my certie, gin I\nmeet wi\u2019 him face to face, _I\u2019ll_ tell him!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt would be unfriendly in me to keep aught a secret from you, sister,\nconsidering the interest you have taken in my family. I _have_ given him\nmy consent to visit my daughter, but at the same time have restricted\nhim from mentioning matrimony until he has consulted his father.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what has the visiting to gang for, then? Awa wi\u2019 him! Our Nell\u2019s\nfood for his betters. What wad you think an she could get the young\nlaird, his brother, wi\u2019 a blink o\u2019 her ee?\u201d\n\n\u201cNever speak to me of that, Mrs Jane. I wad rather see the poorest of\nhis shepherd lads coming to court my child than see him;\u201d and with these\nwords Henry left the room.\n\nMrs Jane stood long, making faces, shaking her apron with both hands,\nnodding her head, and sometimes giving a stamp with her foot. \u201cI have\nset my face against that connexion,\u201d said she. \u201cOur Nell\u2019s no made for a\nlady to a London lawyer. It wad set her rather better to be Lady of\nCassway. The young laird for me! I\u2019ll hae the branks of love thrown ower\nthe heads o\u2019 the twasome, tie the tangs thegither, and then let them\ngallop like twa kippled grews. My brother Harry\u2019s a simple man; he disna\nken the credit that he has by his daughters\u2014thanks to some other body\nthan him! Niece Nell has a shape, an ee, and a lady-manner that wad\nkilhab the best lord o\u2019 the kingdom, were he to come under their\ninfluence and my manoovres. She\u2019s a Jerdan a\u2019 through; and that I\u2019ll let\nthem ken! Folk are a\u2019 wise ahint the hand; credit only comes by catch\nand keep. Good night to a\u2019 younger brothers, puffings o\u2019 love vows, and\nsabs o\u2019 wind! Gie me the good green hills, the gruff wedders, and\nbobtailed yowes; and let the law and the gospel-men sell the wind o\u2019\ntheir lungs as dear as they can!\u201d\n\nIn a few days, Henry of Drumfielding was called out to attend his chief\non some expedition; on which Mrs Jane, not caring to trust her message\nto any other person, went over to Cassway, and invited the young laird\nto Drumfielding to see her niece, quite convinced that her charms and\nendowments would at once enslave the elder brother, as they had done the\nyounger. Tam Beattie was delighted at finding such a good back friend as\nMrs Jane, for he had not failed to observe, for a twelvemonth back, that\nEllen Scott was very pretty, and either through chance or design, he\nasked Mrs Jane if the young lady was privy to this invitation.\n\n\u201c_She_ privy to it!\u201d exclaimed Mrs Jane, shaking her apron. \u201cHa, weel I\nwat, no! She wad soon hae flown in my face wi\u2019 her gibery and her\njaukery, had I tauld her my errand; but the gowk kens what the tittling\nwants, although it is no aye crying, \u2018Give, give,\u2019 like the horse\nloch-leech.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes the horse-leech really cry that, Mrs Jane? I should think, from a\nview of its mouth, that it could scarcely cry anything,\u201d said Tom.\n\n\u201cAre ye sic a reprobate as to deny the words o\u2019 the Scripture, sir?\nHech, wae\u2019s me! what some folk hae to answer for! We\u2019re a\u2019 wise ahint\nthe hand. But hark ye,\u2014come ye ower in time, else I am feared she may be\nsettled for ever out o\u2019 your reach. Now, I canna bide to think on that,\nfor I have always thought you twa made for ane anither. Let me take a\nlook o\u2019 you frae tap to tae\u2014O yes\u2014made for ane anither. Come ower in\ntime, before billy Harry come hame again; and let your visit be in\ntimeous hours, else I\u2019ll gie you the back of the door to keep.\u2014Wild\nreprobate!\u201d she exclaimed to herself, on taking her leave; \u201cto deny that\nthe horse loch-leech can speak! Ha\u2014ha\u2014the young laird is the man for\nme!\u201d\n\nThomas Beattie was true to his appointment, as may be supposed, and Mrs\nJane having her niece dressed in style, he was perfectly charmed with\nher; and really it cannot be denied that Ellen was as much delighted\nwith him. She was young, gay, and frolicsome, and she never spent a more\njoyous and happy afternoon, or knew before what it was to be in a\npresence that delighted her so much. While they sat conversing, and\napparently better satisfied with the company of each other than was\nlikely to be regarded with indifference by any other individual aspiring\nto the favour of the young lady, the door was opened, and there entered\nno other than Francis Beattie! When Ellen saw her devoted lover appear\nthus suddenly, she blushed deeply, and her glee was damped in a moment.\nShe looked rather like a condemned criminal, or at least a guilty\ncreature, than what she really was,\u2014a being over whose mind the cloud of\nguilt had never cast its shadow.\n\nFrancis loved her above all things on earth or in heaven, and the moment\nhe saw her so much abashed at being surprised in the company of his\nbrother, his spirit was moved to jealousy\u2014to maddening and\nuncontrollable jealousy. His ears rang, his hair stood on end, and the\ncontour of his face became like a bent bow. He walked up to his brother\nwith his hand on his sword-hilt, and, in a state of excitement which\nrendered his words inarticulate, addressed him thus, while his teeth\nground together like a horse-rattle:\u2014\n\n\u201cPray, sir, may I ask you of your intentions, and of what you are\nseeking here?\u201d\n\n\u201cI know not, Frank, what right you have to ask any such questions; but\nyou will allow that I have a right to ask at you what you are seeking\nhere at present, seeing you come so very inopportunely?\u201d\n\n\u201cSir,\u201d said Francis, whose passion could stay no farther parley, \u201cdare\nyou put it to the issue of the sword this moment?\u201d\n\n\u201cCome now, dear Francis, do not act the fool and the madman both at a\ntime. Rather than bring such a dispute to the issue of the sword between\ntwo brothers who never had a quarrel in their lives, I propose that we\nbring it to a much more temperate and decisive issue here where we\nstand, by giving the maiden her choice. Stand you there at that corner\nof the room, I at this, and Ellen Scott in the middle; let us both ask,\nand to whomsoever she comes, the prize be his. Why should we try to\ndecide, by the loss of one of our lives, what we cannot decide, and what\nmay be decided in a friendly and rational way in one minute?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is easy for you, sir, to talk temperately and with indifference of\nsuch a trial, but not so with me. This young lady is dear to my heart.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, but so is she to mine. Let us, therefore, appeal to the lady at\nonce whose claim is the best; and, as your pretensions are the highest,\ndo you ask her first.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dearest Ellen,\u201d said Francis, humbly and affectionately, \u201cyou know\nthat my whole soul is devoted to your love, and that I aspire to it only\nin the most honourable way; put an end to this dispute, therefore, by\nhonouring me with the preference which the unequivocal offer of my hand\nmerits.\u201d\n\nEllen stood dumb and motionless, looking stedfastly down at the hem of\nher jerkin, which she was nibbling with her hands. She dared not lift an\neye to either of the brothers, though apparently conscious that she\nought to have recognised the claims of Francis.\n\n\u201cEllen, I need not tell you that I love you,\u201d said Thomas, in a light\nand careless manner, as if certain that his appeal would be successful;\n\u201cnor need I attempt to tell how dearly and how long I will love you,\nfor, in faith, I cannot. Will you make the discovery for yourself, by\ndeciding in my favour?\u201d\n\nEllen looked up. There was a smile on her face; an arch, mischievous,\nand happy smile, but it turned not on Thomas. Her face turned to the\ncontrary side, but yet the beam of that smile fell not on Francis, who\nstood in a state of as terrible suspense between hope and fear, as a\nRoman Catholic sinner at the gate of heaven, who has implored St Peter\nto open the gate, and awaits a final answer. The die of his fate was\nsoon cast; for Ellen, looking one way, yet moving another, straightway\nthrew herself into Thomas Beattie\u2019s arms, exclaiming, \u201cAh, Tom! I fear I\nam doing that which I shall rue, but I must trust to your generosity;\nfor, bad as you are, I like you the best!\u201d\n\nThomas took her in his arms, and kissed her; but before he could say a\nword in return, the despair and rage of his brother, breaking forth over\nevery barrier of reason, interrupted him.\n\n\u201cThis is the trick of a coward, to screen himself from the chastisement\nhe deserves. But you escape me not thus. Follow me, if you dare!\u201d And as\nhe said this, Francis rushed from the house, shaking his naked sword at\nhis brother.\n\nEllen trembled with agitation at the young man\u2019s rage; and while Thomas\nstill continued to assure her of his unalterable affection, Mrs Jane\nJerdan entered, plucking her apron so as to make it twang like a\nbowstring.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s a\u2019 this, Squire Tummas? Are we to be habbled out o\u2019 house and\nhadding by this outrageous young lawyer o\u2019 yours? By the souls o\u2019 the\nJerdans, I\u2019ll kick up sic a stour about his lugs as shall blind the\njuridical een o\u2019 him! Its\u2019 queer that men should study the law only to\nlearn to break it. Sure am I, nae gentleman, that hasna been bred a\nlawyer, wad come into a neighbour\u2019s house bullyragging that gate, wi\u2019\nsword in han\u2019, malice prepense in his eye, and venom on his tongue. Just\nas if a lassie hadna her ain freedom o\u2019 choice, because a fool has been\npleased to ask her! Haud the grip you hae, niece Nell; ye hae made a\nwise choice for aince. Tam\u2019s the man for my money! Folk are a\u2019 wise\nahint the hand, but real wisdom lies taking time by the forelock. But,\nSquire Tam, the thing that I want to ken is this\u2014Are you going to put up\nwi\u2019 a\u2019 that bullying and threatening, or do you propose to chastise the\nfool according to his folly?\u201d\n\n\u201cIn truth, Mrs Jane, I am very sorry for my brother\u2019s behaviour, and\ncould not, with honour, yield any more than I did to pacify him. But he\nmust be humbled. It would not do to suffer him to carry matters with so\nhigh a hand.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, wad ye be but advised and leave him to me, I would play him sic a\nplisky as he shouldna forget till his dying day. By the souls o\u2019 the\nJerdans, I would! Now, promise to me that ye winna fight him.\u201d\n\n\u201cO promise, promise!\u201d cried Ellen, vehemently; \u201cfor the sake of Heaven\u2019s\nlove, promise my aunt that.\u201d\n\nThomas smiled and shook his head, as much as if he had said, \u201cYou do not\nknow what you are asking.\u201d Mrs Jane went on.\n\n\u201cDo it then\u2014do it with a vengence; and remember this, that wherever ye\nset the place o\u2019 combat, be it in hill or dale, deep linn or moss hag, I\nshall have a thirsdman there to encourage you on. I shall give you a\nmeeting you little wot of!\u201d\n\nThomas Beattie took all this for words of course, as Mrs Jane was well\nknown for a raving, ranting old maid, whose vehemence few regarded,\nthough a great many respected her for the care she had taken of her\nsister\u2019s family, and a greater number still regarded her with terror, as\na being possessed of superhuman powers; so after many expressions of the\nfondest love for Ellen, he took his leave, his mind being made up how it\nbehoved him to deal with his brother.\n\nI forgot to mention before, that old Beattie lived at Nether Cassway\nwith his family; and his eldest son Thomas at Over Cassway, having, on\nhis father\u2019s entering into a second marriage, been put in possession of\nthat castle and these lands. Francis, of course, lived in his father\u2019s\nhouse when in Scotland; and it was thus that his brother knew nothing of\nhis frequent visits to Ellen Scott.\n\nThat night, as soon as Thomas went home, he despatched a note to his\nbrother to the following purport: That he was sorry for the rudeness and\nunreasonableness of his behaviour. But if, on coming to himself, he was\nwilling to make an apology before his mistress, then he (Thomas) would\ngladly extend to him the right hand of love and brotherhood; but if he\nrefused this, he would please to meet him on the Crook of Glendearg next\nmorning by the sunrising. Francis returned for answer, that he would\nmeet him at the time and place appointed. There was then no farther door\nof reconciliation left open, but Thomas still had hopes of managing him\neven on the combat field.\n\nFrancis slept little that night, being wholly set on revenge for the\nloss of his beloved mistress; and a little after daybreak he arose, and\nputting himself in light armour, proceeded to the place of rendezvous.\nHe had farther to go than his elder brother, and on coming in sight of\nthe Crook of Glendearg, he perceived the latter there before him. He was\nwrapt in his cavalier\u2019s cloak, and walking up and down the Crook with\nimpassioned strides, on which Francis soliloquized as follows, as he\nhasted on:\u2014\u201cAh, ha! so Tom is here before me! This is what I did not\nexpect, for I did not think the flagitious dog had so much spirit or\ncourage in him as to meet me. I am glad he has! for how I long to\nchastise him, and draw some of the pampered blood from that vain and\ninsolent heart, which has bereaved me of all I held dear on earth.\u201d\n\nIn this way did he cherish his wrath till close at his brother\u2019s side,\nand then, addressing him in the same insolent terms, he desired him to\ncease his cowardly cogitations and draw. His opponent instantly wheeled\nabout, threw off his horseman\u2019s cloak, and presented his sword; and,\nbehold, the young man\u2019s father stood before him, armed and ready for\naction! The sword fell from Francis\u2019 hand, and he stood appalled, as if\nhe had been a statue, unable either to utter a word or move a muscle.\n\n\u201cTake up thy sword, caitiff, and let it work thy ruthless work of\nvengeance here. Is it not better that thou shouldst pierce this old\nheart, worn out with care and sorrow, and chilled by the ingratitude of\nmy race, than that of thy gallant and generous brother, the\nrepresentative of our house, and the chief of our name? Take up thy\nsword, I say, and if I do not chastise thee as thou deservest, may\nheaven reft the sword of justice from the hand of the avenger!\u201d\n\n\u201cThe God of heaven forbid that I should ever lift my sword against my\nhonoured father!\u201d said Francis.\n\n\u201cThou darest not, thou traitor and coward!\u201d returned the father. \u201cI\nthrow back the disgraceful terms in thy teeth which thou usedst to thy\nbrother. Thou camest here boiling with rancour to shed his blood; and\nwhen I appear in person for him, thou darest not accept the challenge.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou never did me wrong, my dear father; but my brother has wronged me\nin the tenderest part.\u201d\n\n\u201cThy brother never wronged thee intentionally, thou deceitful and\nsanguinary fratricide. It was thou alone who forced this quarrel upon\nhim; and I have great reason to suspect thee of a design to cut him off,\nthat the inheritance and the maid might both be thine own. But here I\nswear by Him that made me, and the Redeemer that saved me, if thou wilt\nnot go straight and kneel to thy brother for forgiveness, confessing thy\ninjurious treatment, and swearing submission to thy natural chief, I\nwill banish thee from my house and presence for ever, and load thee with\na parent\u2019s curse.\u201d\n\nThe young scholar, being utterly astounded at his father\u2019s words, and at\nthe awful and stern manner in which he addressed him, whom he had never\nbefore reprimanded, was wholly overcome. He kneeled to his parent, and\nimplored his forgiveness, promising, with tears, to fulfil every\ninjunction which it would please him to enjoin; and on this\nunderstanding, the two parted on amicable and gracious terms.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nFrancis went straight to the tower of Over Cassway, and inquired for his\nbrother, resolved to fulfil his father\u2019s stern injunctions to the very\nletter. He was informed his brother was in his chamber in bed, and\nindisposed. He asked the porter farther, if he had not been forth that\nday, and was answered, that he had gone forth early in the morning in\narmour, but had quickly returned, apparently in great agitation, and\nbetaken himself to his bed. Francis then requested to be taken to his\nbrother, to which the servant instantly assented, and led him up to the\nchamber, never suspecting that there could be any animosity between the\ntwo only brothers; but on John Burgess opening the door, and announcing\nthe Tutor, Thomas, being in a nervous state, was a little alarmed.\n\u201cRemain in the room there, Burgess,\u201d said he. \u201cWhat, brother Frank, are\nyou seeking here at this hour, armed cap-a-pie? I hope you are not come\nto assassinate me in my bed?\u201d\n\n\u201cGod forbid, brother,\u201d said the other; \u201chere John, take my sword down\nwith you, I want some private conversation with Thomas.\u201d John did so,\nand the following conversation ensued; for as soon as the door closed,\nFrancis dropt on his knees, and said, \u201cO, my dear brother, I have erred\ngrievously, and am come to confess my crime, and implore your pardon.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have both erred, Francis, in suffering any earthly concern to incite\nus against each other\u2019s lives. We have both erred, but you have my\nforgiveness cheerfully; here is my hand on it, and grant me thine in\nreturn. Oh, Francis, I have got an admonition this morning, that never\nwill be erased from my memory, and which has caused me to see my life in\na new light. What or whom think you I met an hour ago on my way to the\nCrook of Glendearg to encounter you?\u201d\n\n\u201cOur father, perhaps.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have seen him, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed I have, and he has given me such a reprimand for severity as son\nnever before received from a parent.\u201d\n\n\u201cBrother Frank, I must tell you, and when I do, you will not believe\nme\u2014It _was not_ our father whom we both saw this morning.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was no other whom I saw. What do you mean? Do you suppose that I do\nnot know my own father?\u201d\n\n\u201cI tell you it was not, and could not be. I had an express from him\nyesterday. He is two hundred miles from this, and cannot be in Scotland\nsooner than three weeks hence.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou astonish me, Thomas. This is beyond human comprehension.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is true\u2014that I avouch, and the certainty of it has sickened me at\nheart. You must be aware that he came not home last night, and that his\nhorse and retinue have not arrived.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe was not at home, it is true, nor have his horse and retinue arrived\nin Scotland. Still there is no denying that our father is here, and that\nit was he who spoke to and admonished me.\u201d\n\n\u201cI tell you it is impossible. A spirit has spoken to us in our father\u2019s\nlikeness, for he is not, and cannot be, in Scotland at this time. My\nfaculties are altogether confounded by the event, not being able to\ncalculate on the qualities or condition of our monitor. An evil spirit\nit certainly could not be, for all its admonitions pointed to good. I\nsorely dread, Francis, that our father is no more: that there has been\nanother engagement, that he has lost his life, and that his soul has\nbeen lingering around his family before taking its final leave of this\nsphere. I believe that our father is dead; and for my part I am so sick\nat heart, that my nerves are all unstrung. Pray, do you take horse and\npost off for Salop, from whence his commission to me yesterday was\ndated, and see what hath happened to our revered father.\u201d\n\n\u201cI cannot, for my life, give credit to this, brother, or that it was any\nother being but my father himself who rebuked me. Pray allow me to tarry\nanother day at least before I set out. Perhaps our father may appear in\nthe neighbourhood, and may be concealing himself for some secret\npurpose. Did you tell him of our quarrel?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo. He never asked me concerning it, but charged me sharply with my\nintent on the first word, and adjured me, by my regard for his blessing,\nand my hope of heaven, to desist from my purpose.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen he knew it all intuitively; for when I first went in view of the\nspot appointed for our meeting, I perceived him walking sharply to and\nfro, wrapped in his military cloak. He never so much as deigned to look\nat me, till I came close to his side, and thinking it was yourself, I\nfell to upbraiding him, and desired him to draw. He then threw off his\ncloak, drew his sword, and, telling me he came in your place, dared me\nto the encounter. But he knew all the grounds of our quarrel minutely,\nand laid the blame on me. I own I am a little puzzled to reconcile\ncircumstances, but am convinced my father is near at hand. I heard his\nwords, and saw his eyes flashing anger and indignation. Unfortunately, I\ndid not touch him, which would have put an end to all doubts; for he did\nnot present the hand of reconciliation to me, as I expected he would\nhave done, on my yielding implicitly to all his injunctions.\u201d\n\nThe two brothers then parted, with protestations of mutual forbearance\nin all time coming, and with an understanding, as that was the morning\nof Saturday, that if their father, or some word of him, did not reach\nhome before the next evening, the Tutor of Cassway was to take horse for\nthe county of Salop early on Monday morning.\n\nThomas, being thus once more left to himself, could do nothing but toss\nand tumble in his bed, and reflect on the extraordinary occurrence of\nthat morning; and, after many troubled cogitations, it at length\noccurred to his recollection what Mrs Jane Jerdan had said to him:\u2014\u201cDo\nit, then. Do it with a vengeance!\u2014But remember this, that wherever ye\nset the place of combat, be it in hill or dale, deep linn or moss hag, I\nshall have a thirdsman there to encourage you on. I shall give you a\nmeeting you little wot of.\u201d\n\nIf he was confounded before, he was ten times more so at the remembrance\nof these words of most ominous import.\n\nAt the time he totally disregarded them, taking them for mere\nrhodomontade; but now the idea was to him terrible, that his father\u2019s\nspirit, like the prophet\u2019s of old, should have been conjured up by\nwitchcraft; and then again he bethought himself that no witch would have\nemployed her power to prevent evil. In the end he knew not what to\nthink, and so, taking the hammer from its rest, he gave three raps on\nthe pipe drum (for there were no bells in the towers of those days), and\nup came John Burgess, Thomas Beattie\u2019s henchman, huntsman, and groom of\nthe chambers, one who had been attached to the family for fifty years,\nand he says, in his slow west-border tongue, \u201cHow\u2019s thou now,\ncallan\u2019?\u2014Is thou ony better-lins? There has been tway stags seen in the\nBloodhope-Linns this morning already.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, and there has been something else seen, John, that lies nearer to\nmy heart to-day.\u201d John looked at his master with an inquisitive eye and\nquivering lip, but said nothing. The latter went on: \u201cI am very unwell\nto-day, John, and cannot tell what is the matter with me. I think I am\nbewitched.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s very like thou is, callan\u2019. I pits nae doubt on\u2019t at a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs there anybody in this moor district whom you ever heard blamed for\nthe horrible crime of witchcraft?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, that there is; mair than ane or tway. There\u2019s our neighbour, Lucky\nJerdan, for instance, and her niece Nell,\u2014the warst o\u2019 the pair, I\ndoubt.\u201d John said this with a sly stupid leer, for he had admitted the\nold lady to an audience with his master the day before, and had eyed him\nafterwards bending his course towards Drumfielding.\n\n\u201cJohn, I am not disposed to jest at this time; for I am disturbed in\nmind, and very ill. Tell me, in reality, did you ever hear Mrs Jane\nJerdan accused of being a witch?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, look thee, master, I dare nae say she\u2019s a witch; for Lucky has\nmony good points in her character. But it\u2019s weel kenned she has mair\npower nor her ain, for she can stop a\u2019 the plews in Eskdale wi\u2019 a wave\no\u2019 her hand, and can raise the dead out o\u2019 their graves, just as a\nmatter of coorse.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat, John, is an extraordinary power indeed. But did you never hear of\nher sending any living men to their graves? For as that is rather the\ndanger that hangs over me, I wish you would take a ride over and desire\nMrs Jane to come and see me. Tell her I am ill, and request her to come\nand see me.\u201d\n\n\u201cI shall do that, callan\u2019. But are thou sure it is the auld witch I\u2019m to\nbring? For it strikes me the young ane maybe has done the deed; and if\nsae, she is the fittest to effect the cure. But I shall bring the auld\nane.\u2014Dinna flee intil a rage, for I shall bring the auld ane; though,\ngude forgie me! it is unco like bringing the houdie.\u201d\n\nAway went John Burgess to Drumfielding; but Mrs Jane would not move for\nall his entreaties. She sent back word to his master, to \u201crise out o\u2019\nhis bed, for he wad be waur if ony thing ailed him; and if he had aught\nto say to auld Jane Jerdan, she would be ready to hear it at hame,\nthough he behoved to remember that it wasna ilka subject under the sun\nthat she could thole to be questioned anent.\u201d\n\nWith this answer John was forced to return, and there being no accounts\nof old Beattie having been seen in Scotland, the young men remained all\nthe Sabbath-day in the utmost consternation at the apparition of their\nfather they had seen, and the appalling rebuke they had received from\nit. The most incredulous mind could scarce doubt that they had had\ncommunion with a supernatural being; and not being able to draw any\nother conclusion themselves, they became persuaded that their father was\ndead; and accordingly, both prepared for setting out early on Monday\nmorning toward the county of Salop, from whence they had last heard of\nhim.\n\nBut just as they were ready to set out, when their spurs were buckled on\nand their horses bridled, Andrew Johnston, their father\u2019s confidential\nservant, arrived from the place to which they were bound. He had ridden\nnight and day, never once stinting the light gallop, as he said, and had\nchanged his horse seven times. He appeared as if his ideas were in a\nstate of derangement and confusion; and when he saw his young masters\nstanding together, and ready-mounted for a journey, he stared at them as\nif he scarcely believed his own senses. They of course asked immediately\nabout the cause of his express; but his answers were equivocal, and he\nappeared not to be able to assign any motive. They asked him concerning\ntheir father, and if anything extraordinary had happened to him. He\nwould not say either that there had, or that there had not; but\ninquired, in his turn, if nothing extraordinary had happened with them\nat home. They looked to one another, and returned him no answer; but at\nlength the youngest said, \u201cWhy, Andrew, you profess to have ridden\nexpress for the distance of two hundred miles; now you surely must have\nsome guess for what purpose you have done this? Say, then, at once, what\nyour message is: Is our father alive?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2014es; I think he is.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou _think_ he is? Are you uncertain, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am certain he is not dead,\u2014at least, was not when I left him.\nBut\u2014hum\u2014certainly there has a change taken place. Hark ye, masters\u2014can a\nman be said to be in life when he is out of himself?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, man, keep us not in this thrilling suspense. Is our father well?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo\u2014not _quite_ well. I am sorry to say, honest gentlemen, that he is\nnot. But the truth is, my masters, now that I see you well and hearty,\nand about to take a journey in company, I begin to suspect that I have\nbeen posted all this way on a fool\u2019s errand; and not another syllable\nwill I speak on the subject, till I have some refreshment, and if you\nstill insist on hearing a ridiculous story, you will hear it then.\u201d\n\nWhen the matter of the refreshment had been got over to Andrew\u2019s full\nsatisfaction, he began as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cWhy, faith, you see, my masters, it is not easy to say my errand to\nyou, for in fact I have none. Therefore, all that I can do is to tell\nyou a story\u2014a most ridiculous one it is, as ever sent a poor fellow out\non the gallop for the matter of two hundred miles or so. On the morning\nbefore last, right early, little Isaac, the page, comes to me, and he\nsays,\u2014\u2018Johnston, thou must go and visit master. He\u2019s bad.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cBad!\u201d says I, \u201cWhatever way is he bad?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Why,\u2019 says he, \u2018he\u2019s so far ill as he\u2019s not well, and desires to see\nyou without one moment\u2019s delay. He\u2019s in fine taking, and that you\u2019ll\nfind; but what for do I stand here? Lord, I never got such a fright.\nWhy, Johnston, does thou know that master hath lost himself?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How lost himself, rabbit?\u2019 says I; \u2018speak plain out, else I\u2019ll have\nthee lug-hauled, thou dwarf!\u2019 for my blood rose at the imp, for fooling\nat any mishap of my master\u2019s. But my choler only made him worse, for\nthere is not a greater diel\u2019s-buckie in all the Five Dales.\n\n\u201c\u2018Why, man, it is true that I said,\u2019 quoth he, laughing; \u2018the old gurly\nsquire hath lost himself; and it will be grand sport to see thee going\ncalling him at all the stane-crosses in the kingdom, in this here\nway.\u2014Ho, yes! and a two times ho, yes! and a three times ho, yes! Did\nanybody no see the better half of my master, Laird of the twa Cassway\u2019s,\nBloodhope, and Pentland, which was amissing overnight, and is supposed\nto have gone a-woolgathering? If anybody hath seen that better part of\nmy master, whilk contains as much wit as a man could drive on a\nhurlbarrow, let them restore it to me, Andrew Johnston, piper,\ntrumpeter, whacker, and wheedler, to the same great and noble squire;\nand high shall be his reward. Ho, yes!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018The deuce restore thee to thy right mind!\u2019 said I, knocking him down,\nand leaving him sprawling in the kennel, and then hasted to my master,\nwhom I found feverish, restless, and raving, and yet with an earnestness\nin his demeanour that stunned and terrified me. He seized my hand in\nboth his, which were burning like fire, and gave me such a look of\ndespair as I shall never forget. \u2018Johnston, I am ill,\u2019 said he,\n\u2018grievously ill, and know not what is to become of me. Every nerve in my\nbody is in a burning heat, and my soul is as it were torn to fritters\nwith amazement. Johnston, as sure as you are in the body, something most\ndeplorable hath happened to them.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Yes, as sure as I am in the body, there has, master,\u2019 says I. \u2018But\nI\u2019ll have you bled and doctored in style, and you shall soon be as sound\nas a roach,\u2019 says I, \u2018for a gentleman must not lose heart altogether for\na little fire-raising in his outworks, if it does not reach the\ncitadel,\u2019 says I to him. But he cut me short by shaking his head and\nflinging my hand from him.\n\n\u201c\u2018A truce with your talking,\u2019 says he. \u2018That which hath befallen me is\nas much above your comprehension as the sun is above the earth, and\nnever will be comprehended by mortal man; but I must inform you of it,\nas I have no other means of gaining the intelligence I yearn for, and\nwhich I am incapable of gaining personally. Johnston, there never was a\nmortal man suffered what I have suffered since midnight. I believe I\nhave had doings with hell; for I have been disembodied, and embodied\nagain, and the intensity of my tortures has been unparalleled.\u2014I was at\nhome this morning at daybreak.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018At home at Cassway!\u2019 says I. \u2018I am sorry to hear you say so, master,\nbecause you know, or should know, that the thing is impossible, you\nbeing in the ancient town of Shrewsbury on the king\u2019s business.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I was at home in very deed, Andrew,\u2019 returned he; \u2018but whether in the\nbody or out of the body, I cannot tell\u2014the Lord only knoweth. But there\nI was in this guise, and with this heart and all its feelings within me,\nwhere I saw scenes, heard words, and spoke others, which I will here\nrelate to you. I had finished my despatches last night by midnight, and\nwas sitting musing on the hard fate and improvidence of my sovereign\nmaster, when, ere ever I was aware, a neighbour of ours, Mrs Jane\nJerdan, of Drumfielding, a mysterious character, with whom I have had\nsome strange doings in my time, came suddenly into the chamber, and\nstood before me. I accosted her with doubt and terror, asking what had\nbrought her so far from home.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You are not so far from home as you imagine,\u2019 said she; \u2018and it is\nfortunate for some that it is so. Your two sons have quarrelled about\nthe possession of niece Ellen, and though the eldest is blameless of the\nquarrel, yet has he been forced into it, and they are engaged to fight\nat daybreak at the Crook of Glendearg. There they will assuredly fall by\neach other\u2019s hands, if you interpose not; for there is no other\nauthority now on earth that can prevent this woful calamity.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Alas! how can I interfere,\u2019 said I, \u2018at a distance? It is already\nwithin a few hours of the meeting, and before I get from among the\nwindings of the Severn, their swords will be bathed in each other\u2019s\nblood! I must trust to the interference of Heaven.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Is your name and influence, then, to perish for ever?\u2019 said she. \u2018Is\nit so soon to follow your master\u2019s, the great Maxwell of the Dales, into\nutter oblivion? Why not rather rouse into requisition the energies of\nthe spirits that watch over human destinies? At least step aside with\nme, that I may disclose the scene to your eyes. You know I can do it;\nand you may then act according to your natural impulse.\u2019\n\n\u201cSuch was the import of the words she spoke to me, if not the very words\nthemselves. I understood them not at the time; nor do I yet. But when\nshe had done speaking, she took me by the hand, and hurried me towards\nthe door of the apartment, which she opened, and the first step we took\nover the threshold, we stepped into a void space and fell downward. I\nwas going to call out, but felt my descent so rapid, that my voice was\nstifled, and I could not so much as draw my breath. I expected every\nmoment to fall against something, and be dashed to pieces; and I shut my\neyes, clenched my teeth, and held by the dame\u2019s hand with a frenzied\ngrasp, in expectation of the catastrophe. But down we went\u2014down and\ndown, with a celerity which tongue cannot describe, without light,\nbreath, or any sort of impediment. I now felt assured that we had both\nat once stepped from off the earth, and were hurled into the\nimmeasurable void. The airs of darkness sung in my ears with a booming\ndin as I rolled down the steeps of everlasting night, an outcast from\nnature and all its harmonies, and a journeyer into the depths of hell.\n\n\u201cI still held my companion\u2019s hand, and felt the pressure of hers; and so\nlong did this our alarming descent continue, that I at length caught\nmyself breathing once more, but as quick as if I had been in the height\nof a fever. I then tried every effort to speak, but they were all\nunavailing; for I could not emit one sound, although my lips and tongue\nfashioned the words. Think, then, of my astonishment, when my companion\nsung out the following stanza with the greatest glee:\u2014\n\n \u2018Here we roll,\n Body and soul,\n Down to the deeps of the Paynim\u2019s goal\u2014\n With speed and with spell,\n With yo and with yell,\n This is the way to the palace of hell\u2014\n Sing yo! ho!\n Level and low,\n Down to the Valley of Vision we go!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ha, ha, ha! Tam Beattie,\u2019 added she, \u2018where is a\u2019 your courage now?\nCannot ye lift up your voice and sing a stave wi\u2019 your auld crony? And\ncannot ye lift up your een, and see what region you are in now?\u2019\n\n\u201cI did force open my eyelids, and beheld light, and apparently worlds,\nor huge lurid substances, gliding by me with speed beyond that of the\nlightning of heaven. I certainly perceived light, though of a dim,\nuncertain nature; but so precipitate was my descent, I could not\ndistinguish from whence it proceeded, or of what it consisted, whether\nof the vapours of chaotic wastes, or the streamers of hell. So I again\nshut my eyes closer than ever, and waited the event in terror\nunutterable.\n\n\u201cWe at length came upon something which interrupted our farther\nprogress. I had no feeling as we fell against it, but merely as if we\ncame in contact with some soft substance that impeded our descent; and\nimmediately afterwards I perceived that our motion had ceased.\n\n\u201c\u2018What a terrible tumble we hae gotten, Laird!\u2019 said my companion. \u2018But\nye are now in the place where you should be; and deil speed the coward!\u2019\n\n\u201cSo saying, she quitted my hand, and I felt as if she were wrested from\nme by a third object; but still I durst not open my eyes, being\nconvinced that I was lying in the depths of hell, or some hideous place\nnot to be dreamt of; so I lay still in despair, not even daring to\naddress a prayer to my Maker. At length I lifted my eyes slowly and\nfearfully; but they had no power of distinguishing objects. All that I\nperceived was a vision of something in nature, with which I had in life\nbeen too well acquainted. It was a glimpse of green glens, long\nwithdrawing ridges, and one high hill, with a cairn on its summit. I\nrubbed my eyes to divest them of the enchantment, but when I opened them\nagain, the illusion was still brighter and more magnificent. Then\nspringing to my feet, I perceived that I was lying in a little fairy\nring, not one hundred yards from the door of my own hall!\n\n\u201cI was, as you may well conceive, dazzled with admiration; still I felt\nthat something was not right with me, and that I was struggling with an\nenchantment; but recollecting the hideous story told me by the beldame,\nof the deadly discord between my two sons, I hasted to watch their\nmotions, for the morning was yet but dawning. In a few seconds after\nrecovering my senses, I perceived my eldest son Thomas leave his tower\narmed, and pass on towards the place of appointment. I waylaid him, and\nremarked to him that he was very early astir, and I feared on no good\nintent. He made no answer, but stood like one in a stupor, and gazed at\nme. \u2018I know your purpose, son Thomas,\u2019 said I; \u2018so it is in vain for you\nto equivocate. You have challenged your brother, and are going to meet\nhim in deadly combat; but as you value your father\u2019s blessing, and would\ndeprecate his curse\u2014as you value your hope of heaven, and would escape\nthe punishment of hell\u2014abandon the hideous and cursed intent, and be\nreconciled to your only brother.\u2019\n\n\u201cOn this, my dutiful son Thomas kneeled to me, and presented his sword,\ndisclaiming at the same time all intentions of taking away his brother\u2019s\nlife, and all animosity for the vengeance sought against himself, and\nthanked me in a flood of tears for my interference. I then commanded him\nback to his couch, and taking his cloak and sword, hasted away to the\nCrook of Glendearg, to wait the arrival of his brother.\u201d\n\nHere Andrew Johnston\u2019s narrative detailed the selfsame circumstances\nrecorded in a former part of this tale, as having passed between the\nfather and his younger son, so that it is needless to recapitulate them;\nbut beginning where that broke off, he added, in the words of the old\nlaird: \u201cAs soon as my son Francis had left me, in order to be reconciled\nto his brother, I returned to the fairy knowe and ring, where I first\nfound myself seated at daybreak. I know not why I went there, for though\nI considered with myself, I could discover no motive that I had for\ndoing so, but was led thither by a sort of impulse which I could not\nresist, and from the same feeling spread my son\u2019s mantle on the spot,\nlaid his sword beside it, and stretched me down to sleep. I remember\nnothing farther with any degree of accuracy, for I instantly fell into a\nchaos of suffering, confusion, and racking dismay, from which I was only\nof late released by awaking from a trance on the very seat, and in the\nsame guise in which I was the evening before. I am certain I was at home\nin body or in spirit\u2014saw my sons\u2014spake these words to them, and heard\ntheirs in return. How I returned I know even less, if that is possible,\nthan how I went; for it seemed to me that the mysterious force that\npresses us to this sphere, and supports us on it, was in my case\nwithdrawn or subverted, and that I merely fell from one part of the\nearth\u2019s surface and alighted on another. Now I am so ill that I cannot\nmove from this couch; therefore, Andrew, do you mount and ride straight\nhome. Spare no horseflesh, by night or by day, to bring me word of my\nfamily, for I dread that some evil hath befallen them. If you find them\nin life, give them many charges from me of brotherly love and affection;\nif not\u2014what can I say, but, in the words of the patriarch, if I am\nbereaved of my children, I am bereaved.\u201d\n\nThe two brothers, in utter amazement, went together to the green ring on\nthe top of the knoll above the castle of Cassway, and there found the\nmantle lying spread, and the sword beside it. They then, without letting\nJohnston into the awful secret, mounted straight, and rode off with him\nto their father. They found him still in bed, and very ill; and though\nrejoiced at seeing them, they soon lost hope of his recovery, his\nspirits being broken and deranged in a wonderful manner. Their\nconversations together were of the most solemn nature, the visitation\ndeigned to them having been above their capacity. On the third or fourth\nday, their father was removed by death from this terrestrial scene, and\nthe minds of the young men were so much impressed by the whole of the\ncircumstances, that it made a great alteration in their after life.\nThomas, as solemnly charged by his father, married Ellen Scott, and\nFrancis was well known afterwards as the celebrated Dr Beattie of\nAmherst. Ellen was mother to twelve sons; and on the night that her\nseventh son was born, her aunt Jerdan was lost, and never more heard of,\neither living or dead.[9]\n\nFootnote 9:\n\n This will be viewed as a most romantic and unnatural story, as without\n doubt it is; but I have the strongest reasons for believing that it is\n founded on a literal fact, of which all the three were sensibly and\n positively convinced. It was published in England in Dr Beattie\u2019s\n lifetime, and by his acquiescence, and owing to the respectable source\n from whence it came, it was never disputed in that day that it had its\n origin in truth. It was again republished, with some miserable\n alterations, in a London collection of 1770, by J. Smith, at No. 15,\n Paternoster Row, and though I have seen none of these accounts, but\n relate the story wholly from tradition, yet the assurance obtained\n from a friend of their existence, is a curious corroborative\n circumstance, and proves that if the story was not true, the parties\n at least believed it to be so.\u2014_Note by the Author._\n\n\n\n\n THE ELDER\u2019S FUNERAL.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nHow beautiful to the eye and to the heart rise up, in a pastoral region,\nthe green silent hills from the dissolving snow-wreaths that yet linger\nat their feet! A few warm sunny days, and a few breezy and melting\nnights, have seemed to create the sweet season of spring out of the\nwinter\u2019s bleakest desolation. We can scarcely believe that such\nbrightness of verdure could have been shrouded in the snow, blending\nitself, as it now does, so vividly with the deep blue of heaven. With\nthe revival of nature our own souls feel restored. Happiness becomes\nmilder, meeker, and richer in pensive thought; while sorrow catches a\nfaint tinge of joy, and reposes itself on the quietness of earth\u2019s\nopening breast. Then is youth rejoicing\u2014manhood sedate\u2014and old age\nresigned. The child shakes his golden curls in his glee; he of riper\nlife hails the coming year with temperate exultation; and the eye that\nhas been touched with dimness, in the general spirit of delight, forgets\nor fears not the shadows of the grave.\n\nOn such a vernal day as this did we, who had visited the Elder on his\ndeath-bed,[10] walk together to his house in the Hazel Glen, to\naccompany his body to the place of burial. On the night he died, it\nseemed to be the dead of winter. On the day he was buried, it seemed to\nbe the birth of spring. The old pastor and I were alone for awhile as we\npursued our path up the glen, by the banks of the little burn. It had\ncleared itself off from the melted snow, and ran so pellucid a race that\nevery stone and pebble was visible in its yellow channel. The willows,\nthe alders, and the birches, the fairest and the earliest of our native\nhill-trees, seemed almost tinged with a verdant light, as if they were\nbudding; and beneath them, here and there peeped out, as in the pleasure\nof new existence, the primrose lonely, or in little families and flocks.\nThe bee had not yet ventured to leave his cell, yet the flowers reminded\none of his murmur. A few insects were dancing in the air, and here and\nthere some little moorland bird, touched at the heart with the warm and\nsunny change, was piping his love-sweet song among the braes. It was\njust such a day as a grave meditative man, like him we were about to\ninter, would have chosen to walk over his farm in religious contentment\nwith his lot. That was the thought that entered the pastor\u2019s heart, as\nwe paused to enjoy one brighter gleam of the sun in a little\nmeadow-field of peculiar beauty.\n\nFootnote 10:\n\n See _ante_, page 280.\n\n\u201cThis is the last day of the week, and on that day often did the Elder\nwalk through this little happy kingdom of his own, with some of his\ngrandchildren beside and around him, and often his Bible in his hand. It\nis, you feel, a solitary place,\u2014all the vale is one seclusion\u2014and often\nhave its quiet bounds been a place of undisturbed meditation and\nprayer.\u201d\n\nWe now came in sight of the cottage, and beyond it the termination of\nthe glen. There the high hills came sloping gently down; and a little\nwaterfall, in the distance, gave animation to a scene of perfect repose.\nWe were now joined by various small parties coming to the funeral\nthrough openings among the hills; all sedate, but none sad, and every\ngreeting was that of kindness and peace. The Elder had died full of\nyears; and there was no need why any out of his household should weep. A\nlong life of piety had been beautifully closed; and, therefore, we were\nall going to commit the body to the earth, assured, as far as human\nbeings may be so assured, that the soul was in heaven. As the party\nincreased on our approach to the house, there was even cheerfulness\namong us. We spoke of the early and bright promise of spring\u2014of the\nsorrows and joys of other families\u2014of marriages and births\u2014of the new\nschoolmaster\u2014of to-morrow\u2019s Sabbath. There was no topic of which, on any\ncommon occasion, it might have been fitting to speak, that did not now\nperhaps occupy, for a few moments, some one or other of the group, till\nwe found ourselves ascending the greensward before the cottage, and\nstood below the bare branches of the sycamores. Then we were all silent,\nand, after a short pause, reverently entered into the house of death.\n\nAt the door the son received us with a calm, humble, and untroubled\nface; and in his manner towards the old minister, there was something\nthat could not be misunderstood, expressing penitence, gratitude, and\nresignation. We all sat down in the large kitchen; and the son decently\nreceived each person at the door, and showed him to his place. There\nwere some old gray heads, more becoming gray, and many bright in manhood\nand youth. But the same solemn hush was over them all, and they sat all\nbound together in one uniting and assimilating spirit of devotion and\nfaith. Wine and bread were to be sent round; but the son looked to the\nold minister, who rose, lifted up his withered hand, and began a\nblessing and a prayer.\n\nThere was so much composure and stillness in the old man\u2019s attitude, and\nsomething so affecting in his voice, tremulous and broken, not in grief\nbut age, that no sooner had he begun to pray, than every heart and every\nbreath at once were hushed. All stood motionless, nor could one eye\nabstain from that placid and patriarchal countenance, with its closed\neyes, and long silvery hair. There was nothing sad in his words, but\nthey were all humble and solemn, and at times even joyful in the\nkindling spirit of piety and faith. He spoke of the dead man\u2019s goodness\nas imperfect in the eyes of his Great Judge, but such as, we were\ntaught, might lead, through intercession, to the kingdom of heaven.\nMight the blessing of God, he prayed, which had so long rested on the\nhead now coffined, not forsake that of him who was now to be the father\nof this house. There was more\u2014more joy, we were told, in heaven, over\none sinner that repenteth, than over ninety and nine just persons which\nneed no repentance. Fervently, too, and tenderly, did the old man pray\nfor her, in her silent chamber, who had lost so kind a parent, and for\nall the little children round her knees. Nor did he end his prayer\nwithout some allusion to his own gray hairs, and to the approaching day\non which many then present would attend his burial.\n\nJust as he ceased to speak, one solitary stifled sob was heard, and all\neyes turned kindly round to a little boy who was standing by the side of\nthe Elder\u2019s son. Restored once more to his own father\u2019s love, his heart\nhad been insensibly filled with peace since the old man\u2019s death. The\nreturning tenderness of the living came in place of that of the dead,\nand the child yearned towards his father now with a stronger affection,\nrelieved at last from all his fear. He had been suffered to sit an hour\neach day beside the bed on which his grandfather lay shrouded, and he\nhad got reconciled to the cold but silent and happy looks of death. His\nmother and his Bible told him to obey God without repining in all\nthings; and the child did so with perfect simplicity. One sob had found\nits way at the close of that pathetic prayer; but the tears that bathed\nhis glistening cheeks were far different from those that, on the day and\nnight of his grandfather\u2019s decease, had burst from the agony of a\nbreaking heart. The old minister laid his hand silently upon his golden\nhead; there was a momentary murmur of kindness and pity over the room;\nthe child was pacified, and again all was repose and peace.\n\nA sober voice said all was ready, and the son and the minister led the\nway reverently out into the open air. The bier stood before the door,\nand was lifted slowly up with its sable pall. Silently each mourner took\nhis place. The sun was shining pleasantly, and a gentle breeze, passing\nthrough the sycamore, shook down the glittering raindrops upon the\nfuneral velvet. The small procession, with an instinctive spirit, began\nto move along; and as I cast up my eyes to take a farewell look of that\nbeautiful dwelling, now finally left by him who so long had blessed it,\nI saw at the half-open lattice of the little bedroom window above, the\npale weeping face of that stainless matron, who was taking her last\npassionate farewell of the mortal remains of her father, now slowly\nreceding from her to the quiet field of graves.\n\nWe proceeded along the edges of the hills, and along the meadow-fields,\ncrossed the old wooden bridge over the burn, now widening in its course\nto the plain, and in an hour of pensive silence, or pleasant talk, we\nfound ourselves entering, in a closer body, the little gateway of the\nchurchyard. To the tolling of the bell we moved across the green mounds,\nand arranged ourselves, according to the plan and order which our\nfeelings suggested, around the bier and its natural supporters. There\nwas no delay. In a few minutes the Elder was laid among the mould of his\nforefathers, in their long-ago chosen spot of rest. One by one the\npeople dropped away, and none were left by the new made grave but the\nson and his little boy, the pastor and myself. As yet nothing was said,\nand in that pause I looked around me, over the sweet burial-ground.\n\nEach tombstone and grave over which I had often walked in boyhood arose\nin my memory, as I looked steadfastly upon their long-forgotten\ninscriptions; and many had then been erected. The whole character of the\nplace was still simple and unostentatious, but from the abodes of the\ndead I could see that there had been an improvement in the condition of\nthe living. There was a taste visible in their decorations, not without\nmuch of native feeling, and occasionally something even of native grace.\nIf there was any other inscription than the name and age of the poor\ninhabitants below, it was, in general, some short text of Scripture; for\nit is most pleasant and soothing to the pious mind, when bereaved of\nfriends, to commemorate them on earth by some touching expression taken\nfrom that Book which reveals to them a life in heaven.\n\nThere is a sort of gradation, a scale of forgetfulness, in a country\nchurchyard, where the processes of nature are suffered to go on over the\ngreen place of burial, that is extremely affecting in the contemplation.\nThe soul goes from the grave just covered up, to that which seems\nscarcely joined together, on and on to those folded and bound by the\nundisturbed verdure of many, many unremembered years. It then glides at\nlast into nooks and corners where the ground seems perfectly calm and\nwaveless, utter oblivion having smoothed the earth over the long\nmouldered bones. Tombstones, on which the inscriptions are hidden in\ngreen obliteration, or that are mouldering, or falling to a side, are\nclose to others which last week were brushed by the chisel;\u2014constant\nrenovation and constant decay\u2014vain attempts to adhere to memory\u2014and\noblivion, now baffled and now triumphant, smiling among all the\nmemorials of human affection, as they keep continually crumbling away\ninto the world of undistinguishable dust and ashes.\n\nThe churchyard, to the inhabitants of a rural parish, is the place to\nwhich, as they grow older, all their thoughts and feelings turn. The\nyoung take a look of it every Sabbath-day, not always perhaps a careless\nlook, but carry away from it, unconsciously, many salutary impressions.\nWhat is more pleasant than the meeting of a rural congregation in the\nchurchyard before the minister appears? What is there to shudder at in\nlying down, sooner or later, in such a peaceful and sacred place, to be\nspoken of frequently on Sabbath among the groups of which we used to be\none, and our low burial-spot to be visited, at such times, as long as\nthere remains on earth any one to whom our face was dear? To those who\nmix in the strife and dangers of the world, the place is felt to be\nuncertain wherein they may finally lie at rest. The soldier\u2014the\nsailor\u2014the traveller\u2014can only see some dim grave dug for him when he\ndies, in some place obscure, nameless, and unfixed to the imagination.\nAll he feels is, that his burial will be\u2014on earth\u2014or in the sea. But the\npeaceful dwellers who cultivate their paternal acres, or tilling at\nleast the same small spot of soil, shift only from a cottage on the\nhillside to one on the plain, still within the bounds of one quiet\nparish; they look to lay their bones at last in the burial-place of the\nkirk in which they were baptised, and with them it almost literally is\nbut a step from the cradle to the grave.\n\nSuch were the thoughts that calmly followed each other in my reverie, as\nI stood beside the Elder\u2019s grave, and the trodden grass was again\nlifting up its blades from the pressure of many feet, now all, but a\nfew, departed. What a simple burial had it been! Dust was consigned to\ndust\u2014no more. Bare, naked, simple, and austere is in Scotland the\nservice of the grave. It is left to the soul itself to consecrate, by\nits passion, the mould over which tears, but no words, are poured.\nSurely there is a beauty in this; for the heart is left unto its own\nsorrow\u2014according as it is a friend\u2014a brother\u2014a parent\u2014or a child, that\nis covered up from our eyes. Yet call not other rites, however different\nfrom this, less beautiful or pathetic. For willingly does the soul\nconnect its grief with any consecrated ritual of the dead. Sound or\nsilence\u2014music\u2014hymns\u2014psalms\u2014sable garments, or raiment white as snow\u2014all\nbecome holy symbols of the soul\u2019s affection; nor is it for any man to\nsay which is the most natural, which is the best, of the thousand shows\nand expressions, and testimonies of sorrow, resignation, and love, by\nwhich mortal beings would seek to express their souls when one of their\nbrethren has returned to his parent dust.\n\nMy mind was recalled from all these sad, yet not unpleasant fancies, by\na deep groan, and I beheld the Elder\u2019s son fling himself down upon the\ngrave and kiss it passionately, imploring pardon from God. \u201cI distressed\nmy father\u2019s heart in his old age\u2014I repented\u2014and received thy forgiveness\neven on thy death-bed! But how may I be assured that God will forgive me\nfor having so sinned against my old, grayheaded father, when his limbs\nwere weak and his eyesight dim!\u201d The old minister stood at the head of\nthe grave without speaking a word, with his solemn and pitiful eyes\nfixed upon the prostrate and contrite man. His sin had been great, and\ntears that till now had, on this day at least, been compressed within\nhis heart by the presence of so many of his friends, now poured down\nupon the sod as if they would have found their way to the very body of\nhis father. Neither of us offered to lift him up, for we felt awed by\nthe rueful passion of his love, his remorse, and his penitence; and\nnature, we felt, ought to have her way. \u201cFear not, my son,\u201d at length\nsaid the old man, in a gentle voice\u2014\u201cfear not, my son, but that you are\nalready forgiven. Dost thou not feel pardon within thy contrite spirit?\u201d\nHe rose up from his knees with a faint smile, while the minister, with\nhis white head yet uncovered, held his hands over him as in benediction;\nand that beautiful and loving child, who had been standing in a fit of\nweeping terror at his father\u2019s agony, now came up to him and kissed his\ncheek\u2014holding in his little hand a few faded primroses which he had\nunconsciously gathered together as they lay on the turf of his\ngrandfather\u2019s grave.\n\n\n\n\n MACDONALD, THE CATTLE-RIEVER.\n\n\nArchibald Macdonald was perhaps the most perfect master of his hazardous\nprofession of any who ever practised it. Archibald was by birth a\ngentleman, and proprietor of a small estate in Argyleshire, which he\nhowever lost early in life. He soon distinguished himself as a\ncattle-lifter on an extensive scale; and weak as the arm of the law\nmight then have been, he found it advisable to remove further from its\ninfluence, and he shifted his residence from his native district of\nAppin to the remote peninsula of Ardnamurchan, which was admirably\nadapted to his purpose, from its geographical position. He obtained a\nlease of an extensive farm, and he fitted up a large cowhouse, though\nhis whole visible live-stock consisted of one filly. His neighbours\ncould not help making remarks on this subject, but he begged of them to\nhave no anxiety on that head, assuring them that his byre would be full\nere Christmas; and he was as good as his word. He had trained the filly\nto suit his purpose, and it was a practice of his to tie other horses to\nher tail; she then directed her course homeward by unfrequented routes,\nand always found her way in safety.\n\nHis expeditions were generally carried on by sea, and he annoyed the\nmost distant of the Hebrides, both to the south and north. He often\nchanged the colour of his boats and sails, and adopted whatever appeared\nbest suited to his immediate purpose. In consequence of this artifice,\nhis depredations were frequently ascribed to others, and sometimes to\nmen of the first distinction in that country, so dexterously did he\nimitate their birlings and their insignia. He held his land from\nCampbell of Lochnell, into whose favour he had insinuated himself by his\nknowledge and address.\n\nWhen Lochnell resided at the castle of Mingary, Archibald was often\nordered to lie on a mattress in his bedroom, to entertain him at night\nwith the recitation of the poems of Ossian, and with tales. Archibald\ncontrived means to convert this circumstance to his advantage. He\nordered his men to be in readiness, and that night he selected one of\nhis longest poems. As he calculated, Lochnell fell asleep before he had\nfinished the recital; the robber slunk out and soon joined his\nassociates. He steered for the island of Mull, where some of his men had\nbeen previously sent to execute his orders; he carried off a whole fold\nof cattle, which he landed safely, and returned to his mattress before\nLochnell awoke. When he lay down he purposely snored so loudly that the\nsleeping chief was disturbed, and complained of the tremendous noise the\nfellow made, observing that, fond as he was of poetry, he must deprive\nhimself of it in future on such conditions. To this Archibald had no\nobjections; his principal object was then accomplished, and taking up\nthe tale where he had stopped when his patron fell asleep, he finished\nit, and slept soundly to an advanced hour.\n\nThe cattle were immediately missed, and suspicion fell on Archibald; but\nhe triumphantly referred to Lochnell for a proof of his innocence, and\nthis he obtained. That gentleman solemnly declared that the robber had\nnever been out of his room during that night, and the charge was of\ncourse dropped.\n\nA wealthy man who resided in the neighbourhood was noted for his\npenurious habits, and he had incurred particular odium by refusing a\nsupply of meal to a poor widow in distress. This man had sent a\nconsiderable quantity of grain to the mill, which, as usual, he attended\nhimself, and was conveying the meal home at night on horseback. The\nhorses were tied in a string, the halter of one fixed to the tail of\nanother; and the owner led the foremost by a long tether. His road lay\nthrough a wood, and Archibald there watched his approach. The night was\ndark, and the man walked slowly, humming a song; the ground was soft,\nand the horses having no shoes (as is still usual in that country),\ntheir tread made no noise. Archibald ordered one of his men to loosen\nthe tether from the head of the front horse, and to hold it, himself\noccupying the place of the horse, and walking on at the same pace. He\nthus got possession of the whole. The miser soon arrived at his own\ndoor, and called for assistance to deposit his winter store in safety,\nbut, to his astonishment, found he had but the halter!\n\nAvailing himself of the credulity of his countrymen, he pretended to\nhold frequent intercourse with a spirit or genii, still much\ndistinguished in the West Highlands under the appellation of Glastig.\nThis he turned to excellent account, as the stories which his partisans\nfabricated of the command he had over the Glastig, and the connexion\nbetween them, terrified the people so much, that few could be prevailed\nupon to watch their cattle at night, and they thus fell an easy prey to\nthis artful rogue.\n\nArchibald\u2019s father having died early, his mother afterwards married a\nsecond husband, who resided in a neighbouring island. When she died, her\nson was out of favour with his stepfather, and he was refused the\nprivilege of having the disposal of his mother\u2019s remains, nor did he\nthink it prudent to appear openly at her funeral. He however obtained\naccurate information of the place where the corpse was lying. One dark\nnight, he made an opening in the thatched roof of the earthen hut, and\nthe wakers being occupied in the feats of athletic exercise usually\npractised on these occasions, the body being excluded from their sight\nby a screen which hung across the house, Archibald carried it off to his\nboat like another \u00c6neas. He also got possession of the stock of whisky\nintended for the occasion, as it lay in the same place\u2014thus discharging\nthe last duties of a pious son with little expense to himself.\n\nA fatal event at length occurred, which rendered it necessary for the\nman to retire from trade. He made a descent on one of the small islands\non that coast, and had collected the cattle, when the proprietor (who\nhad information of the circumstance), made his appearance to rescue\nthem. Archibald was compelled to yield up his prey, but one of the\nvillains who accompanied him levelled his musket at the gentleman, and\nshot him dead from the boat.\n\nThe robber was fully aware of his danger, and, with the assistance of a\nfair wind, he shaped his course for the mainland. He pushed on with all\npossible speed, and arrived at Inveraray before sunrise the following\nmorning. Having information that Stewart of Appin was then in town, he\nwatched his motions, and at an early hour saw him on the street in\nconversation with the sheriff of the county. Archibald, who was an old\nacquaintance, saluted him, and his salute was returned. When Appin\nparted with the sheriff, Archibald complained that he had taken no\nnotice of him the preceding day, when he accosted him in the same place.\nAppin said he was conscious of having seen him, but that he was much\nhurried at the time, and hoped he would excuse him. The robber\u2019s object\nwas accomplished. Appin had no doubt of the truth of what he said; and\non his trial for the murder, an alibi was established in his favour,\nfrom this very extraordinary piece of address. Some of his crew were\nafterwards taken in Ross-shire, and executed there by order of the Earl\nof Seaforth, though the actual murderer escaped punishment. Archibald,\nhowever, never again plundered on a large scale. He died about the\nmiddle of the 17th century, and his name still stands unrivalled for\ncunning and address in his calling.\u2014_\u201cTraditions of the Western\nHighlands,\u201d in the London Literary Gazette._\n\n\n\n\n THE MURDER HOLE:\n\n AN ANCIENT LEGEND OF GALLOWAY.\n\n Ah, frantic Fear!\n I see, I see thee near;\n I know thy hurried step, thy haggard eye!\n Like thee I start, like thee disordered fly!\n _Collins._\n\n\nIn a remote district of country belonging to Lord Cassilis, between\nAyrshire and Galloway, about three hundred years ago, a moor of\napparently boundless extent stretched several miles along the road, and\nwearied the eye of the traveller by the sameness and desolation of its\nappearance: not a tree varied the prospect\u2014not a shrub enlivened the eye\nby its freshness\u2014not a native flower bloomed to adorn this ungenial\nsoil. One \u201clonesome desert\u201d reached the horizon on every side, with\nnothing to mark that any mortal had ever visited the scene before,\nexcept a few rude huts that were scattered near its centre; and a road,\nor rather pathway, for those whom business or necessity obliged to pass\nin that direction. At length, deserted as this wild region had always\nbeen, it became still more gloomy. Strange rumours arose that the path\nof unwary travellers had been beset on this \u201cblasted heath,\u201d and that\ntreachery and murder had intercepted the solitary stranger as he\ntraversed its dreary extent. When several persons, who were known to\nhave passed that way, mysteriously disappeared, the inquiries of their\nrelatives led to a strict and anxious investigation; but though the\nofficers of justice were sent to scour the country, and examine the\ninhabitants, not a trace could be obtained of the persons in question,\nnor of any place of concealment which could be a refuge for the lawless\nor desperate to horde in. Yet as inquiry became stricter, and the\ndisappearance of individuals more frequent, the simple inhabitants of\nthe neighbouring hamlet were agitated by the most fearful apprehensions.\nSome declared that the death-like stillness of the night was often\ninterrupted by sudden and preternatural cries of more than mortal\nanguish, which seemed to arise in the distance; and a shepherd one\nevening, who had lost his way on the moor, declared he had approached\nthree mysterious figures, who seemed struggling against each other with\nsupernatural energy, till at length one of them, with a frightful\nscream, suddenly sunk into the earth.\n\nGradually the inhabitants deserted their dwellings on the heath, and\nsettled in distant quarters, till at length but one of the cottages\ncontinued to be inhabited by an old woman and her two sons, who loudly\nlamented that poverty chained them to this solitary and mysterious spot.\nTravellers who frequented this road now generally did so in groups to\nprotect each other; and if night overtook them, they usually stopped at\nthe humble cottage of the old woman and her sons, where cleanliness\ncompensated for the want of luxury, and where, over a blazing fire of\npeat, the bolder spirits smiled at the imaginary dangers of the road,\nand the more timid trembled as they listened to the tales of terror and\naffright with which their hosts entertained them.\n\nOne gloomy and tempestuous night in November, a pedlar-boy hastily\ntraversed the moor. Terrified to find himself involved in darkness\namidst its boundless wastes, a thousand frightful traditions, connected\nwith this dreary scene, darted across his mind: every blast, as it swept\nin hollow gusts over the heath, seemed to teem with the sighs of\ndeparted spirits; and the birds, as they winged their way above his\nhead, appeared, with loud and shrill cries, to warn him of approaching\ndanger. The whistle, with which he usually beguiled his weary\npilgrimage, died away into silence, and he groped along with trembling\nand uncertain steps, which sounded too loudly in his ears. The promise\nof Scripture occurred to his memory, and revived his courage: \u201cI will be\nunto thee as a rock in the desert, and as an hiding-place in the storm.\u201d\n\u201cSurely,\u201d thought he, \u201cthough alone, I am not forsaken;\u201d and a prayer\nfor assistance hovered on his lips.\n\nA light now glimmered in the distance which would lead him, he\nconjectured, to the cottage of the old woman; and towards that he\neagerly bent his way, remembering, as he hastened along, that when he\nhad visited it the year before, it was in company of a large party of\ntravellers, who had beguiled the evening with those tales of mystery\nwhich had so lately filled his brain with images of terror. He\nrecollected, too, how anxiously the old woman and her sons had\nendeavoured to detain him when the other travellers were departing; and\nnow, therefore, he confidently anticipated a cordial and cheering\nreception. His first call for admission obtained no visible marks of\nattention, but instantly the greatest noise and confusion prevailed\nwithin the cottage. \u201cThey think it is one of the supernatural visitants\nof whom the old lady talks so much,\u201d thought the boy, approaching a\nwindow, where the light within showed him all the inhabitants at their\nseveral occupations; the old woman was hastily scrubbing the stone\nfloor, and strewing it thickly with sand, while her two sons seemed,\nwith equal haste, to be thrusting something large and heavy into an\nimmense chest, which they carefully locked.\n\nThe boy, in a frolicsome mood, thoughtlessly tapped at the window, when\nthey all instantly started up with consternation so strongly depicted on\ntheir countenances, that he shrunk back involuntarily with an undefined\nfeeling of apprehension; but before he had time to reflect a moment\nlonger, one of the men suddenly darted out at the door, and seizing the\nboy roughly by the shoulder, dragged him violently into the cottage.\n\n\u201cI am not what you take me for,\u201d said the boy, attempting to laugh; \u201cbut\nonly the poor pedlar who visited you last year.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre you _alone_?\u201d inquired the old woman, in a harsh, deep tone, which\nmade his heart thrill with apprehension.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said the boy, \u201cI am alone _here_; and alas!\u201d he added with a\nburst of uncontrollable feeling, \u201cI am alone in the wide world also! Not\na person exists who would assist me in distress, or shed a single tear\nif I died this very night.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen you are welcome!\u201d said one of the men with a sneer, while he cast\na glance of peculiar expression at the other inhabitants of the cottage.\n\nIt was with a shiver of apprehension, rather than of cold, that the boy\ndrew towards the fire, and the looks which the old woman and her sons\nexchanged made him wish that he had preferred the shelter of any one of\nthe roofless cottages which were scattered near, rather than thrust\nhimself among persons of such dubious aspect. Dreadful surmises flitted\nacross his brain; and terrors which he could neither combat nor examine\nimperceptibly stole into his mind; but alone, and beyond the reach of\nassistance, he resolved to smother his suspicions, or at least not\nincrease the danger by revealing them. The room to which he retired for\nthe night had a confused and desolate aspect: the curtains seemed to\nhave been violently torn down from the bed, and still hung in tatters\naround it; the table seemed to have been broken by some violent\nconcussion, and the fragments of various pieces of furniture lay\nscattered upon the floor. The boy begged that a light might burn in his\napartment till he was asleep, and anxiously examined the fastenings of\nthe door; but they seemed to have been wrenched asunder on a former\noccasion, and were still left rusty and broken.\n\nIt was long ere the pedlar attempted to compose his agitated nerves to\nrest, but at length his senses began to \u201csteep themselves in\nforgetfulness,\u201d though his imagination remained painfully active, and\npresented new scenes of terror to his mind, with all the vividness of\nreality. He fancied himself again wandering on the heath, which appeared\nto be peopled with spectres, who all beckoned to him not to enter the\ncottage, and as he approached it, they vanished with a hollow and\ndespairing cry. The scene then changed, and he found himself again\nseated by the fire, where the countenances of the men scowled upon him\nwith the most terrifying malignity, and he thought the old woman\nsuddenly seized him by the arms, and pinioned them to his side.\n\nSuddenly the boy was startled from these agitated slumbers, by what\nsounded to him like a cry of distress; he was broad awake in a moment,\nand sat up in bed; but the noise was not repeated, and he endeavoured to\npersuade himself it had only been a continuation of the fearful images\nwhich had disturbed his rest, when, on glancing at the door, he observed\nunderneath it a broad red stream of blood silently stealing its course\nalong the floor. Frantic with alarm, it was but the work of a moment to\nspring from his bed, and rush to the door, through a chink of which, his\neye nearly dimmed with affright, he could watch unsuspected whatever\nmight be done in the adjoining room.\n\nHis fear vanished instantly when he perceived that it was only a goat\nthat they had been slaughtering; and he was about to steal into his bed\nagain, ashamed of his groundless apprehensions, when his ear was\narrested by a conversation which transfixed him aghast with terror to\nthe spot.\n\n\u201cThis is an easier job than you had yesterday,\u201d said the man who held\nthe goat. \u201cI wish all the throats we\u2019ve cut were as easily and quietly\ndone. Did you ever hear such a noise as the old gentleman made last\nnight? It was well we had no neighbours within a dozen miles, or they\nmust have heard his cries for help and mercy.\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t speak of it,\u201d replied the other; \u201cI was never fond of bloodshed.\u201d\n\n\u201cHa! ha!\u201d said the other, with a sneer, \u201cyou say so, do you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do,\u201d answered the first, gloomily; \u201cthe Murder Hole is the thing for\nme\u2014that tells no tales; a single scuffle,\u2014a single plunge,\u2014and the\nfellow\u2019s dead and buried to your hand in a moment. I would defy all the\nofficers in Christendom to discover any mischief there.\n\n\u201cAy, Nature did us a good turn when she contrived such a place as that.\nWho that saw a hole in the heath, filled with clear water, and so small\nthat the long grass meets over the top of it, would suppose that the\ndepth is unfathomable, and that it conceals more than forty people, who\nhave met their deaths there? It sucks them in like a leech!\u201d\n\n\u201cHow do you mean to despatch the lad in the next room?\u201d asked the old\nwoman in an undertone. The elder son made her a sign to be silent, and\npointed towards the door where their trembling auditor was concealed;\nwhile the other, with an expression of brutal ferocity, passed his\nbloody knife across his throat.\n\nThe pedlar boy possessed a bold and daring spirit, which was now roused\nto desperation; but in any open resistance the odds were so completely\nagainst him that flight seemed his best resource. He gently stole to the\nwindow, and having forced back the rusty bolt by which the casement had\nbeen fastened, he let himself down without noise or difficulty. \u201cThis\nbetokens good,\u201d thought he, pausing an instant, in dreadful hesitation\nwhat direction to take. This momentary deliberation was fearfully\ninterrupted by the hoarse voice of the men calling aloud, \u201c_The boy has\nfled\u2014let loose the bloodhound!_\u201d These words sunk like a death-knell on\nhis heart, for escape appeared now impossible, and his nerves seemed to\nmelt away like wax in a furnace. \u201cShall I perish without a struggle?\u201d\nthought he, rousing himself to exertion, and, helpless and terrified as\na hare, pursued by its ruthless hunters, he fled across the heath. Soon\nthe baying of the bloodhound broke the stillness of the night, and the\nvoice of its masters sounded through the moor, as they endeavoured to\naccelerate its speed. Panting and breathless, the boy pursued his\nhopeless career, but every moment his pursuers seemed to gain upon his\nfailing steps. The hound was unimpeded by the darkness which was to him\nso impenetrable, and its noise rung louder and deeper on his ear,\u2014while\nthe lanterns which were carried by the men gleamed near and distinct\nupon his vision.\n\nAt his fullest speed the terrified boy fell with violence over a heap of\nstones, and having nothing on but his shirt, he was severely cut in\nevery limb. With one wild cry to Heaven for assistance, he continued\nprostrate on the earth, bleeding and nearly insensible. The hoarse\nvoices of the men, and the still louder baying of the dog, were now so\nnear, that instant destruction seemed inevitable; already he felt\nhimself in their fangs, and the bloody knife of the assassin appeared to\ngleam before his eyes. Despair renewed his energy, and once more, in an\nagony of affright that seemed verging towards madness, he rushed forward\nso rapidly that terror seemed to have given wings to his feet. A loud\ncry near the spot he had left arose in his ears without suspending his\nflight. The hound had stopped at the place where the pedlar\u2019s wounds\nbled so profusely, and deeming the chase now over, it lay down there,\nand could not be induced to proceed. In vain the men beat it with\nfrantic violence, and cried again to put the hound on the scent,\u2014the\nsight of blood satisfied the animal that its work was done, and it\nobstinately resisted every inducement to pursue the same scent a second\ntime.\n\nThe pedlar boy in the meantime paused not in his flight till morning\ndawned; and still as he fled, the noise of steps seemed to pursue him,\nand the cry of his would-be assassins sounded in the distance. He at\nlength reached a village, and spread instant alarm throughout the\nneighbourhood; the inhabitants were aroused with one accord into a\ntumult of indignation\u2014several of them had lost sons, brothers, or\nfriends on the heath, and all united in proceeding immediately to seize\nthe old woman and her sons, who were nearly torn to pieces in their\nfurious wrath. Three gibbets were at once raised on the moor, and the\nwretched culprits confessed before their execution to the destruction of\nnearly fifty victims in the Murder Hole, which they pointed out, and\nnear which they suffered the penalty of their crimes. The bones of\nseveral murdered persons were with difficulty brought up from the abyss\ninto which they had been thrust; but so narrow is the aperture, and so\nextraordinary the depth, that all who see it are inclined to coincide in\nthe tradition of the country people, that it is unfathomable.\n\nThe scene of these events still continues nearly as it was three hundred\nyears ago: the remains of the old cottage, with its blackened walls\n(haunted, of course, by a thousand evil spirits), and the extensive\nmoor, on which a more modern inn (if it can be dignified with such an\nepithet) resembles its predecessor in everything but the character of\nits inhabitants. The landlord is deformed, but possesses extraordinary\ngenius; he has himself manufactured a violin, on which he plays with\nuntaught skill,\u2014and if any _discord_ be heard in the house, or any\nmurder committed in it, _this_ is his only instrument. His daughter (who\nhas never travelled beyond the heath) has inherited her father\u2019s talent,\nand learned all his tales of terror and superstition, which she relates\nwith infinite spirit; but when you are led by her across the heath to\ndrop a stone into that deep and narrow gulf to which our story\nrelates,\u2014when you stand on its slippery edge, and, parting the long\ngrass with which it is covered, gaze into its mysterious depths,\u2014when\nshe describes, with all the animation of an eye-witness, the struggle of\nthe victims clutching the grass as a last hope of preservation, and\ntrying to drag in their assassin as an expiring effort of\nvengeance,\u2014when you are told that for three hundred years the clear\nwaters in this diamond of the desert have remained untasted by mortal\nlips, and that the solitary traveller is still pursued at night by the\nhowling of the bloodhound,\u2014it is then only that it is possible fully to\nappreciate the terrors of \u201cThe Murder Hole.\u201d\u2014_Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_,\n1829.\n\n\n\n\n THE MILLER OF DOUNE:\n _A TRAVELLER\u2019S TALE_.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nIn the reign of James the Fifth, the mill on the Teath, near Doune, was\npossessed, as it had been for abune a century, by a family of the name\nof Marshall.\n\nThey were a bauld and a strong race of men, and when the miller of whom\nwe\u2019re now to speak was in his prime, it used to be a common saying in\nthe kintra, \u201cBetter get a kick frae a naig\u2019s foot, than a stroke frae\nJohn Marshall;\u201d and even now that he was threescore and one, there were\nunco few that liked to come to grips wi\u2019 him. But though John kent he\nneed fear nae man, and would carry things wi\u2019 a high hand when needfu\u2019,\nyet he was onything but quarrelsome, and was aye mair ready to gree wi\u2019\na man than to fight wi\u2019 him; and as he was a gash sensible man, and\nthoroughly honest, he had mony frien\u2019s and weel-wishers, and was muckle\nrespeckit in the hale kintra side.\n\nJohn\u2019s family consisted of twa sons and a dochter, who had lost their\nmither when they were but weans. The eldest, James, was as like what his\nfather was at the same age, as twa peas; only, if onything, a thought\nstronger. William, the next, was mair slender; but though he couldna put\nthe stane, nor fling the fore-hammer, within mony an ell o\u2019 James, yet\nhe could jump higher than ony man he had ever met wi\u2019; and as for\nrinnin\u2019, naebody could come near him. Of Jeanie Marshall we need say nae\nmair than that she was a sensible, spirited, light-hearted lassie, the\npride of her brothers, and her father\u2019s darling.\n\nIt happened ae night, as the miller was coming back frae gien his horse\na drink at the water, that he heard something cheep-cheeping in the\ngrass at the roadside, and every now and then it gied a bit flee up in\nthe air, and then doun again; and upon looking at it again, the miller\nsaw that it was a robin chased by a whuttrit, which was trying to grip\nit; and the miller said to himsel, \u201cI canna thole to see the puir bit\nburdie riven a\u2019 to coopens afore my very een;\u201d so he banged aff the\nhorse, and ran and got it up in his hand, and he let drive sic a kick at\nthe whuttrit, that the beast gaed up in the lift, and ower the hedge,\njust as if it had been a kuisten snawba\u2019.\n\nOn lookin\u2019 at the robin, John saw some straes stickin\u2019 to\u2019t wi\u2019\nburd-lime, which had stoppit it frae fleein\u2019, and he begood to pike them\naff; but Clod, who was a restless brute, and was wearyin\u2019 for his\nstable, tuggit and ruggit sae at the helter, that the miller could come\nnae speed ava. \u201cAnd now,\u201d says the miller, \u201cgif I set you doun, puir\nthing, as ye are, some beast or anither will come and worry ye; and it\u2019s\nno in my power to get on that dancing deevil\u2019s back wi\u2019 ae hand\u2014sae gang\nye in there;\u201d and he lifted up the flap o\u2019 his pouch, and pat in the\nrobin.\n\nNow, John Marshall kentna that a\u2019 this time there was a man at the back\no\u2019 the hedge wi\u2019 a cockit gun in his hand, ready to shoot the whuttrit;\nbut who, when he saw the miller jump aff his horse, took doun the gun\nfrae his shouther, to watch the upshot o\u2019t; and when he heard what the\nmiller said, and saw him put the robin in his pouch, he thought to\nhimsel, \u201cI maun ken something mair about this man;\u201d sae he follows the\nmiller at a distance. And when he sees him come out o\u2019 the stable, and\ninto the house, and the door steekit, and a\u2019 quiet, he slips up to a\nwindow which was a wee bit open, and whaur he could hear and see a\u2019 that\ngaed on. The first thing he sees is the miller and his family preparing\nfor family worship, for that was a thing John Marshall ne\u2019er missed; and\nafter the psalm was dune, the miller spreads the Bible before him, and\npittin\u2019 his hand into his pouch for his napkin, to dight his spectacles,\nout comes napkin, an\u2019 burd, an\u2019 a\u2019.\n\n\u201c\u2019Od,\u201d says Jeanie, saftly, \u201cgif my father hasna brought hame a robin.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhaur got ye the bit robin, father?\u201d said William.\n\n\u201cNe\u2019er ye mind, William, my man,\u201d said the miller; \u201cI\u2019m gaun to read ye\na part o\u2019 the Word o\u2019 God, and that will do ye mair gude than onything I\nhae to tell ye;\u201d and as he pat out his hand to tak the corner o\u2019 his\nnapkin, the robin gied him a dab. \u201cAye, neebor!\u201d says the miller. \u201cBut\nye\u2019re no to blame, puir beastie, for ye wasna to ken whether I meant ye\nill or gude. And now that I think o\u2019t,\u201d continued the miller, \u201cI\u2019ll pass\nby our regular order the night, and read ye that chapter whaur we\u2019re\ntauld that no even a sparrow shall fa\u2019 to the grund without the Lord\nwills it.\u201d\n\nWhen he had finished it, they a\u2019 went doun on their knees, and the\nmiller, amang ither things, prayed that He, wha took care even o\u2019 the\nbit burds o\u2019 the air, would watch for their welfare, and gie them grace\nto resist a\u2019 temptation, and to live a gude and a godly life, like men\nand like Christians. And when it was ower, and Jeanie was putting by the\nBible, a dirl comes to the door.\n\n\u201cSee wha\u2019s that, Jeanie,\u201d cried the miller. Sae Jeanie opens it, and\nwhen she comes back, she says, \u201cIt\u2019s ane John Murdoch, father, wha\u2019s\ntravell\u2019t a gey lang bit the day; but gif it\u2019s no convenient to tak him\nin, he\u2019ll just trudge on.\u201d\n\n\u201cBring him ben, lassie,\u201d quoth the miller. Sae in walks John Murdoch, a\nplain, honest, kintra-like chiel; and \u201cGuid e\u2019en to you, miller,\u201d says\nhe.\n\n\u201cThe same to you, frien\u2019,\u201d says John Marshall; \u201cand sit ye doun, and pit\nby your bonnet. We\u2019re gaun to hae our parritch belyve, and if ye\u2019ll tak\nyour share o\u2019 them, and stay a\u2019 night wi\u2019 us, we\u2019ll mak ye welcome.\u201d\n\n\u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart,\u201d says John Murdoch, sitting himsel down. \u201cAnd ye\u2019ve\ngotten a bit burdie on the table, I see,\u2014but it\u2019s a wee douf ways, I\nthink.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu aye,\u201d quoth the miller, \u201cthe puir thing\u2019s gotten a bit fright the\nnight; and it\u2019s a\u2019 stickin\u2019 wi\u2019 burd-lime, and I kenna how to get it\naff.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet me see\u2019t,\u201d says John Murdoch, \u201cI hae some bit notion o\u2019 thae\nthings.\u201d An\u2019 he took a\u2019 the straes aff it, and dighted and cleaned its\nfeathers, and made it just as right\u2019s ever.\n\n\u201cAnd whaur\u2019ll we put it now?\u201d said he.\n\n\u201c\u2019Od,\u201d quoth the miller, \u201cit would amaist be a pity to put it out at the\nwindow the night; sae, Jeanie, see, if there\u2019s naething to haud it till\nthe morn\u2019s morning.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe\u2019ll sune manage that,\u201d said Jeanie, takin\u2019 doun an auld cage.\n\nThe robin being safely disposed of, John Murdoch began to speak to the\nmiller of a heap o\u2019 things, and he had the best o\u2019t on maist o\u2019 them;\nbut when he cam to speak o\u2019 kye, and on kintra matters, \u201cI hae ye now,\nman,\u201d thought the miller; but faith he found John Murdoch his match\nthere too; and he said to himsel, \u201cOd, but he\u2019s a queer man that, sure\neneugh.\u201d And John Murdoch gaed on tellin\u2019 a wheen funny stories. The\nmiller leugh and better leugh, and Jeanie was sae ta\u2019en up about them,\nthat in she rins twa handfu\u2019s o\u2019 saut instead o\u2019 meal into the parritch,\nand them sauted afore. Sae when they\u2019re set on the table, John Murdoch\ngets the first platefu\u2019; and when he tastes them, he says very gravely,\n\u201cNo that ill; but maybe ye\u2019ll hae run out o\u2019 saut?\u201d\n\n\u201cSaut!\u201d cried William, \u201cdo they want saut?\u201d and in gangs a spoonfu\u2019.\n\n\u201cGudesake!\u201d cried he, turning roun\u2019 to John Murdoch.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s wrang with them, William?\u201d said the miller.\n\n\u201cOu, naething, naething, father\u2014only they\u2019re as saut\u2019s lick, that\u2019s a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cGae awa wi\u2019 your havers,\u201d cried Jeanie; \u201clet me taste them. Bless me!\nan\u2019 how in a\u2019 the wide warl\u2019 could that happen? I ne\u2019er made sic a\nmistak in a\u2019 my days, an\u2019 I canna account for\u2019t in no gate.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow dinna ye gang and vex yoursel about it,\u201d said John Murdoch, \u201cfor\nthey\u2019ll just gaur the yill there gang doun a\u2019 the better.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf that\u2019s the gate o\u2019t,\u201d cried the miller, \u201cthey\u2019ll need strong yill\nfrae the first; sae, Jeanie, put ye that sma\u2019 thing by, and bring the\nither.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na, gudeman,\u201d says John Murdoch, \u201cif we do that, wee\u2019l be fou; sae\nlet\u2019s begin wi\u2019 the sma\u2019 thing first, and we can tak the strong yill\nafterwards, at our leisure.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d said the miller, \u201csae be\u2019t.\u201d\n\nSae after supper they fell to the strong yill, and to crackin\u2019, and the\nmiller took his share in\u2019t, but nane o\u2019 his family said onything maist;\nbut they couldna keep their een aff John Murdoch when he was lookin\u2019 at\ntheir father, though they found that they couldna look him steady in the\nface when he turned to them, just frae something in his ee, they couldna\ntell what.\n\n\u201cAnd it\u2019s a bonnie place this o\u2019 yours, miller,\u201d said John Murdoch; \u201cand\nnae doubt you and your folk afore ye hae been a gey while in\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed hae we,\u201d said the miller, a wee gravely, \u201cand, as ye say, it\u2019s a\ngey bonnie bit place.\u201d\n\nJohn Murdoch was gaun to ask something mair about it, but he stopped on\ngetting a particular look frae Jeanie, and changed the subject; but the\nmiller noticed it, and guessing the reason, said to John Murdoch, \u201cYe\nsee, frien\u2019, that me and my forefathers hae had this place for about twa\nhunder years, and we\u2019re sweert to leave\u2019t, and my bairns ken that, and\ndinna like to speak o\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what\u2019s makin\u2019 ye leave\u2019t?\u201d says John Murdoch; \u201cthat\u2019s to say, if\nits no ony secret.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, nane ava,\u201d says the miller; \u201cit\u2019s just this, ye see: its owner\nthinks that it\u2019s worth mair rent, and maybe he counts on our gien him\nmair than the value o\u2019t rather than gang awa, sae he\u2019s just put the\ndouble on\u2019t, and gang we maun; for to stay here at that rate, would just\nrin awa wi\u2019 the wee thing I hae laid by for my bairns, which I would be\nsweert to see. It\u2019s no very muckle, to be sure; but I can say this, John\nMurdoch, that it wasna gotten either by cheating or idleness. However,\nwe needna weary you wi\u2019 our concerns, sae come, we\u2019s drink King James,\nand lang life to him.\u201d\n\n\u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart, miller,\u201d quoth John Murdoch. \u201cAnd nae doubt ye\u2019ll a\u2019\nbe gaun to the sports that\u2019s sune to be hauden at Stirling; they say\nthere\u2019ll be grand fun, and I was just thinking that your auld son there\nwadna hae a bad chance o\u2019 winning at puttin\u2019 the stane, or flinging the\nmell.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I ken,\u201d cried Jeanie, \u201cwha wad hae some chance at the race, gif\nthere\u2019s to be ane.\u201d\n\n\u201cDinna brag, bairns,\u201d said the miller, \u201cand then, if ye\u2019re waured,\nthere\u2019s naething to be ashamed o\u2019; but whether we gang there or no, time\nwill show; in the meantime, Jeanie, bring anither bottle o\u2019 strong\nyill.\u201d\n\n\u201cMiller,\u201d quoth John Murdoch, \u201cken ye what hour it\u2019s?\u201d\n\n\u201cMe!\u201d said the miller, \u201cnot I\u2014maybe half an hour after nine.\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause it just wants five minutes of eleven,\u201d quoth John Murdoch.\n\n\u201cFive minutes o\u2019 eleven!\u201d cried the miller, \u201cand me no in my bed! Faith,\nthen, frien\u2019, since ye dinna seem for\u2019t yoursel, we\u2019ll just let the yill\nstan\u2019, and be aff to our nests; sae a gude soun\u2019 sleep to you.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd the same to you and yours,\u201d quoth John Murdoch, as he raise and\ngaed awa wi\u2019 William.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nNext morning the miller\u2019s family were up and out at the usual hour; but\nJohn Murdoch, who had wearied himsel the day before, and who hadna,\nmaybe, been used to sae muckle strong yill at ance, lay still; and it\nwas aught o\u2019clock when he cam into the kitchen and bade Jeanie gude\nmornin\u2019.\n\n\u201cAnd how\u2019s the gudeman? and is he out or in?\u201d\n\n\u201cHow!\u201d cries Jeanie, \u201che and the lave hae been up and out at their wark\nthree hours syne.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what are _ye_ gaun to be about, my dawtie?\u201d says John Murdoch.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m gaun to wash the kirn,\u201d says Jeanie.\n\n\u201cAnd suppose I haud it for ye, and help ye?\u201d says he.\n\n\u201cWeel aweel,\u201d says Jeanie, \u201cgin ye like; we\u2019ll hae\u2019t the sooner ower.\u201d\n\nAnd John Murdoch did his best, and was very active; and when a\u2019 was\ndune, he says, \u201cAn\u2019 now, my dawtie, what am I to get for helping ye?\u201d\n\n\u201cNae mair,\u201d quoth Jeanie, \u201cthan the thanks ye hae gotten already.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut in my kintra,\u201d says John Murdoch, \u201cwhen a lad helps a lass to clean\nout a kirn, he aye gets _ae_ kiss at least.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe ken naething about thae fashions hereabouts,\u201d says Jeanie, \u201csae haud\nye out o\u2019 my gate!\u201d\n\nBut as she passed him, John Murdoch, who thought she wasna in earnest,\ndrew her suddenly to him, and he had ta\u2019en twa or three kisses before\nJeanie could recollect herself; but the next minute she threw him frae\nher, and catching the ladle, she ran to the parritch-pat on the fire,\nand whipped aff the lid; and if John Murdoch, who saw what was coming,\nhadna darted out at the back door, he wad hae had it a\u2019 about him; as it\nwas, a part o\u2019 the het parritch played splarge aff the wa\u2019 on his coat.\n\n\u201cAnd now,\u201d thought John Murdoch, \u201cis this real anger, or is\u2019t put on?\u201d\nand he stood a wee bit aff, joking an\u2019 jeering her.\n\n\u201cAye, aye,\u201d says he, \u201cye\u2019re makin\u2019 an unco wark about it, just as if ye\nhadna been kissed a dozen times frae lug to lug, an\u2019 by as mony lads,\nand no said a word about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe notorious vagabond that ye are,\u201d cried Jeanie,\u2014\u201cbut I\u2019se sort ye\nfor\u2019t;\u201d and she flung down the ladle and ran to loose the muckle dog.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re surely no gaun to set the dog on me?\u201d says John Murdoch.\n\n\u201cAm I no?\u201d says Jeanie, drawing and working wi\u2019 the collar wi\u2019 a\u2019 her\nmight.\n\nJohn Murdoch, seeing her sae determined, slips to ae side, and gets his\ngun frae whaur he had hidden\u2019t.\n\n\u201cAnd now, Jeanie,\u201d cries he, \u201chaud your hand, for see, I\u2019ve a gun.\u201d\n\n\u201cI dinna care gin ye had twenty guns,\u201d said Jeanie, who had now\nunbuckled the collar, an\u2019 held it in her hands; \u201csae tak leg-bail an\u2019\naff wi\u2019 ye, my man, or Bawtie comes to ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cJeanie,\u201d quoth John Murdoch, \u201cI\u2019m ready to walk awa peaceably, since it\nmaun be sae; but I\u2019ll no be hunted frae your father\u2019s house like a thief\nan\u2019 a scoundrel; sae keep up your dog, if ye\u2019re wise.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe\u2019ll sune try that,\u201d says Jeanie, loosening the collar; \u201csae at him,\nBawtie! an\u2019 we\u2019ll sune see him rin.\u201d\n\nBut John Murdoch stirredna ae step, and when Bawtie made at him, he\nkeepit him aff for a while, till the brute gettin\u2019 below the muzzle,\nmade a dart at him; and if John Murdoch hadna jumped quickly to ae side,\nhe wad hae gripped him; as it was, he took awa ane o\u2019 the tails o\u2019 his\ncoat. And when Jeanie saw that, she was in a terrible fright, for she\ndidna wish him hurt, and thought he wad hae ran for\u2019t when she loosed\nthe dog, and she cried wi\u2019 a\u2019 her might for Bawtie to come back. But the\nbeast wadna mind her, for he had gotten twa or three gude paps on the\nnose, which made him furious; and sae when he\u2019s gaun to mak anither\nspring, John Murdoch, who saw there was naething else for it, levels at\nhim and lets drive; and round and round the beast gaed, and then ower\nwi\u2019 him; and when Jeanie saw he was killed, she set up a great screigh,\nand ran till him, abusing John Murdoch.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m sorry for\u2019t, but it\u2019s a\u2019 your ain faut, Jeanie,\u201d says he, \u201can\u2019\ncanna now be helpit; sae fare-ye-weel.\u201d An\u2019 as he gaed awa, William\ncomes runnin\u2019 in at the other side o\u2019 the house, an\u2019 cries to Jeanie to\nken what\u2019s the matter.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a\u2019 John Murdoch\u2019s doings,\u201d cried Jeanie; \u201che first affronted me,\nan\u2019 now he\u2019s killed poor Bawtie.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 which way is he gane?\u201d cried William.\n\n\u201cOut that gate,\u201d said Jeanie; and away went William like a shot.\n\nBut John Murdoch, who had heard what passed, and didna want to hae ony\nmair to do in the matter, coured down ahint some bushes till William was\npassed; then rising up, he took anither direction, an\u2019 thought he had\ngot clear o\u2019 him, but as he was stappin\u2019 ower a dike, William got a\nglimpse o\u2019 him. Doun he comes after him at a bonnie rate; an\u2019 as he gets\nnear him, \u201cStop, ye rascal!\u201d he cries to him; \u201cye may just as weel stop\nat ance, for ye may depend on my laying a dizzen on ye for every hunder\nell ye mak me rin after ye.\u201d\n\nAnd when John Murdoch heard that, the blude gaed up into his brow, an\u2019\nhe was thinking o\u2019 standin\u2019 still, when he hears James cry out,\u2014\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter, William? An\u2019 what are ye chasing the man for?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s misbehaved to Jeanie, an\u2019 shot Bawtie,\u201d cried William.\n\n\u201cThen taigle him, just taigle him, till I come up,\u201d cried James.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s needless,\u201d thought John Murdoch to himself, \u201cto fight wi\u2019 twa o\u2019\nthem, an\u2019 ane o\u2019 them a second Samson, and to mak an explanation or\napology wad be ten times waur, sae I\u2019ll e\u2019en pit on;\u201d an\u2019 aff he gaed at\nnearly the tap o\u2019 his fit. After rinning a gude bit, he looks o\u2019er his\nshouther, an\u2019 seeing naebody near him, he thinks they\u2019ve gien\u2019t up; but\njust as he\u2019s coming to the end o\u2019 a bit wood, he sees William, wha had\nta\u2019en a nearer cut, just afore him; an\u2019 round he comes on him, crying,\n\u201cNow, my man, I hae ye now,\u201d putting out his hand to catch John Murdoch;\nbut John drave down his hand in a moment, an\u2019 clapping his foot ahint\nWilliam\u2019s, an\u2019 whirling him to ae side, \u201cTak ye that, my man,\u201d says he;\nan\u2019 William gaed down wi\u2019 sic a breinge, that the blude spouted out frae\nhis nose, an\u2019 the hale warld gaed round wi\u2019 him.\n\nIt was a wee while or James cam up, an\u2019 when he saw William lying\ncovered wi\u2019 blude, \u201cThe Lord preserve us,\u201d cried he, \u201cthe callant\u2019s\nkilled!\u201d an\u2019 he sat down beside him, an\u2019 got William\u2019s head on his knee,\nan\u2019 tried to recover him. By an\u2019 by, William opens his een, an\u2019 when he\nsees James, \u201cAfter him, after him,\u201d cries he, \u201can\u2019 no mind me.\u201d\n\n\u201cAfter him,\u201d says James, \u201can\u2019 the man a mile agate already? It wad be\nnonsense for me to try\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen let me up, an\u2019 I\u2019ll try it mysel,\u201d cried William.\n\nBut James held him fast. \u201cThe deil\u2019s in the callant,\u201d says he, \u201cto think\no\u2019 runnin\u2019, an\u2019 him no able to stand his lane. Lie still, I tell ye!\u201d\nAnd William, who knew it was in vain for him to strive with his strong\nbrither, thought it best no to struggle ony mair. When he had gotten\nquite round again, James helpit him up, an\u2019 as they\u2019re gaun down to the\nwater for William to wash himsel, they meet Jeanie coming fleein\u2019 up the\npath; and when she saw William\u2019s bloody face and claes, she clasped her\nhands thegither, an\u2019 would hae fa\u2019en, if James hadna keppit her. When\nthey questioned her about what had happened, she tell\u2019t it to them\nhonestly frae first to last, and blamed hersel sair for being sae angry\nan\u2019 rash, when, after a\u2019, the man meant nae ill; but the thought o\u2019 what\nGeordie Wilson might think if he heard o\u2019t, an\u2019 the shootin\u2019 o\u2019 Bawtie\nthegither, had perfectly dumfoundered her. \u201cHowever,\u201d continued Jeanie,\n\u201cI\u2019m thankfu\u2019 that things are nae waur, an\u2019 that the man\u2019s awa.\u201d\n\n\u201cAye, he\u2019s awa,\u201d says James, \u201cbut gin him an\u2019 me foregather again, I\u2019se\npromise him the best paid skin he e\u2019er got since he was kirstened.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d said Jeanie, \u201cbut I hope ye\u2019ll ne\u2019er meet; an\u2019 now we must\ngang and pit puir Bawtie out o\u2019 the gate, an\u2019 think on something to say\nabout him, and about John Murdoch\u2019s gangin\u2019 awa sae early, before our\nfather comes in to his breakfast.\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\nThe time was now drawing near for the sports to be held at Stirling, and\nWilliam was aye wanting to speak to his father about it, and to ken if\nthey were gaun; but Jeanie advised against it. \u201cIf ye speak till him,\nand fash him about it enow,\u201d says she, \u201cit\u2019s ten to ane but he\u2019ll say\nno, and then, ye ken, there\u2019s an\u2019 end o\u2019t; but gif ye say naething, and\nkeep steady to your wark, like enough he may speak o\u2019 gaun himsel; sae\ntak my advice an\u2019 sae naething ava about it.\u201d\n\nWilliam did as Jeanie wanted him, but still the miller didna speak, an\u2019\nnow it was the afternoon of the day before the sports were to come on,\nan\u2019 no a word had been said about them; an\u2019 William was unco vexed, an\u2019\ndidna weel ken what to do. When he\u2019s sitting thinking about it, the door\nopens, an\u2019 in steps their neebour, Saunders Mushet, just to crack a wee;\nan\u2019 by an\u2019 by he says, \u201cWeel, miller, an\u2019 what time will ye be for\nsetting aff the morn\u2019s morning?\u201d\n\n\u201cMe!\u201d said the miller, \u201can\u2019 what to do?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat to do?\u201d says Saunders, \u201cwhy, to see the sports at Stirling, to be\nsure; you\u2019ll surely never think o\u2019 missing sic a grand sight?\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 troth, Saunders,\u201d says the miller, \u201cI had clean forgotten\u2019t. \u2019Od, I\ndaursay there\u2019ll be grand fun, an\u2019 my bairns wad maybe like to see\u2019t;\nan\u2019 now that I think o\u2019t, they\u2019ve dune unco weel this while past,\nespecially William there, wha\u2019s wrought mair than e\u2019er I saw him do\nafore in the same space o\u2019 time; sae get ye ready, bairns, to set out at\nfive o\u2019clock the morn\u2019s morning, an\u2019 we\u2019ll tak Saunders up as we gae\nby.\u201d\n\nThis was glad news to the miller\u2019s family, an\u2019 ye needna doubt but they\nwere a\u2019 ready in plenty o\u2019 time; an\u2019 when they cam to Stirling, they got\ntheir breakfast, an\u2019 a gude rest before aught o\u2019clock cam, which was the\nhour when the sports were to begin; an\u2019 grand sports they were, an\u2019\nmuckle diversion gaed on; but nane o\u2019 the miller\u2019s family took ony share\nin them, till they cam to puttin\u2019 the stane, and flingin\u2019 the mell.\n\n\u201cNow James, my man,\u201d says Jeanie, squeezing his arm.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll do my best, Jeanie,\u201d says James, \u201cye may depend on that; and if\nI\u2019m beaten, I canna help it, ye ken.\u201d\n\nJames lost at the puttin\u2019-stane,\u2014by about an inch just; the folk said by\nthe ither man\u2019s slight o\u2019 hand, an\u2019 having the art o\u2019t. But when they\ncam to fling the mell, there wasna a man could come within twa ell o\u2019\nhim. Sae James got the prize, which was a grand gun an\u2019 a fine pouther\nhorn.\n\nAn\u2019 now the cry gaed round to clear the course, and for the rinners to\ncome forrit; and Jeanie she helps William aff wi\u2019 his coat and\nwaistcoat, and maks him tie it round his waist, and gies him mony a\ncaution no to rin ower fast at first, but to hain himsel for the push;\nan\u2019 when she has him a\u2019 right and sorted, she begins to look at the\naught that\u2019s to rin wi\u2019 him. When her ee cam to the middle\nane,\u2014\u201cGudesake,\u201d says she, \u201cwha\u2019s that? Surely\u2014yes\u2014no\u2014an\u2019 yet, if he had\nbut yellow hair in place o\u2019 red, I could swear to him. Friend,\u201d\ncontinues Jeanie to the man next to her, \u201ccan ye tell me what\u2019s his name\namang the rinners there,\u2014the man in the middle, I mean, wi\u2019 the red\nhead?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, honest woman,\u201d said he, hesitating a little, \u201cI\u2019m not just\nsure,\u2014that is to say,\u2014but why do you ask?\u201d\n\n\u201cFor a reason I ken mysel,\u201d said Jeanie; \u201cbut since ye canna, or winna,\ntell me, I\u2019ll try somebody else.\u201d\n\nShe then turned to look for James, but the signal was given, an\u2019 awa\nthey went helter skelter, as if it was deil tak the hindmost. But mony\no\u2019 them couldna rin lang at that rate, and they drapped aff ane after\nanither, till naebody was left but William and the red-headed man; an\u2019\nthe cry got up that the miller\u2019s son wad win, for William had keepit\nforemost from the first. But some gash carles noticed that though the\nred-headed man was hindmost, he lost nae grund, an\u2019 there was nae saying\nhow it might end. William himsel began to be a wee thing feared, for he\nhad mair than ance tried to leave the ither man farer ahint him; but as\nhe quickened his pace, sae did the ither, an\u2019 he was never nearer nor\never farer frae him than about ten yards. In a little while afterwards\nthey cam up to the distance-post, and when they had passed it a wee\nbit,\u2014\u201cNow\u2019s my time,\u201d thought William to himsel; and he puts on faster,\nan\u2019 the cry raise that the miller\u2019s son had it clean, an\u2019 was leaving\nthe ither ane fast, fast; but that was sune followed by anither cry,\nthat the red-haired man was coming up again. William heard him gaining\non him, an\u2019 he gained an\u2019 gained, till he was fairly up wi\u2019 him; an\u2019 now\nthey ran awhile breast an\u2019 breast thegither; but in spite o\u2019 a\u2019 that\nWilliam could do, the red-headed man gaed by him, little by little, an\u2019\nwan the race by four yards.\n\n\u201cMy ain puir William,\u201d cried Jeanie, dawtin\u2019 an\u2019 makin\u2019 o\u2019 him, \u201cno to\nbe first. But ne\u2019er mind it,\u201d continued she, \u201cfor ye hae muckle credit\nby it; for a\u2019 the folk round me said that they ne\u2019er saw sic a race\nsince Stirling was a toun, sae ye\u2019re no to tak it to heart.\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely no,\u201d said William; \u201can yet it\u2019s gey hard to be beaten.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d said Jeanie, \u201cso it is\u2014so it is; but dinna speak,\u2014dinna\nspeak yet; just tak breath an\u2019 rest ye.\u201d\n\nA cry now got up to mak room, an\u2019 gie air; an\u2019 the crowd fell back an\u2019\nmade an open space between the twa runners; an\u2019 when Jeanie turned\nround, lo and behold! she sees John Murdoch, standing wi\u2019 his red wig in\nae hand, an\u2019 rubbin\u2019 his lang yellow hair wi\u2019 a napkin in the tither.\nAn\u2019 what he had dune to her an\u2019 to Bawtie, an\u2019 makin\u2019 William lose the\nrace too, made her sae angry, that up she flees to him,\u2014\u201cAn\u2019 how daured\nye kill our Bawtie?\u201d she cries; \u201cI say, how daured ye kill our Bawtie?\u201d\n\nWi\u2019 that up starts James, \u201cAn\u2019 by my faith, John Murdoch, but ye\u2019ll hae\nthe weight o\u2019 my nieve now;\u201d but before he could do anything, in comes\nthe Earl o\u2019 Lennox between them,\u2014\u201cWhat, sir, dare to strike your\nsovereign?\u201d\n\n\u201cPreserve us a\u2019,\u201d cried Jeanie, jumping back, and turning white and red,\ntime about.\n\n\u201cHere,\u201d continued the earl, \u201cseize this fellow, and keep him fast till\nwe can examine into it.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no, Lennox,\u201d cried the King, panting for breath; \u201cdon\u2019t touch\nhim,\u2014don\u2019t touch him; there\u2019s no harm done. But where\u2019s the Miller o\u2019\nDoune?\u2014Bring John Marshall.\u201d An\u2019 the cry raise up for the Miller o\u2019\nDoune.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 wha wants me?\u201d quoth John Marshall. \u201cI\u2019m here.\u201d\n\n\u201cYour sovereign wants ye,\u201d says ane o\u2019 the courtiers; \u201csae come ye to\nKing James. An\u2019 now tak aff yer bonnet, an\u2019 stand there.\u201d John Marshall\nstood still without lookin\u2019 up, waiting to hear what King James wanted\nwi\u2019 him.\n\nAn\u2019 he hears a voice say,\u2014\u201cLook at me, miller, an\u2019 tell me if you think\nwe e\u2019er met before.\u201d\n\nJohn Marshall raised his een, and after a pause, he says, \u201cAn please\nyour Majesty, if it wadna offend your Grace, I wad say that ye had ance\nbeen at the Mill o\u2019 Doune.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re right, miller,\u201d said James, \u201cye\u2019re quite right. An\u2019 little did ye\nken, when ye louped aff your horse to save the robin, an\u2019 to tak it hame\nwi\u2019 ye, that your sovereign was so near ye, an\u2019 saw it all, as well as\nthe way that ye bring up your family to serve their Maker; an\u2019 it gied\nme a gude opinion o\u2019 ye, miller, an\u2019 all that I hae learned since has\nconfirmed me in it, an\u2019 makes me say, before a\u2019 the folk here present,\nthat ye\u2019re a gude and an honest man. Ye tell\u2019t me, miller, that ye wad\nhae to leave the mill; but I tell ye that I hae settled it, an\u2019 that\nit\u2019s yours at the auld rent, while grass grows an\u2019 water rins, an\u2019 lang\nmay you an\u2019 yours possess it.\u201d\n\nKing James having finished, the miller tried to say something; but his\nlip began to quiver, an\u2019 his ee to fill, an\u2019 he couldna speak; sae he\nclaspit his bonnet between his twa hands, laid it to his breast, and\nbowed his head in silence to the king.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s enough,\u201d said King James; \u201can\u2019 now call Geordie Wilson o\u2019 the\nHope.\u201d Sae Geordie was brought and placed before him, and the king said\nto him, \u201cI hear, young man, that ye hae met wi\u2019 some misfortunes of\nlate, an\u2019 I hae been askin\u2019 about you, an\u2019 find that ye\u2019re an\nindustrious man, an\u2019 a man o\u2019 character, an\u2019 hae behaved yoursel weel in\na\u2019 respects; sae gang ye hame to the Hope, an\u2019 ye\u2019ll maybe find\nsomething, baith in the house an\u2019 out o\u2019 the house, that will please ye.\nAn\u2019 hear ye, Geordie Wilson,\u201d continued King James, \u201cif it happens, as\nit _may_ happen, that ye court a lass, tak ye gude care that she\u2019s no\nquick o\u2019 the temper\u201d (an\u2019 he glanced at Jeanie); \u201can\u2019 dinna mak ower\nmuckle o\u2019 her, or gie her a\u2019 her ain way; for there\u2019s a saying, A birkie\nwife, an\u2019 a new lightit candle, are the better o\u2019 haein\u2019 their heads\nhauden doun.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome hither, William Marshall,\u201d said King James; \u201cthis prize was for\nthe best runner among his subjects, and the king canna tak it, sae it\u2019s\nyours; and, young man,\u201d continued the king, in a lower voice, \u201cye got a\nsairer fa\u2019 than I intended ye, but my blude was up at the time,\u2014for\nkings are no muckle used to haein\u2019 hands laid on them.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy liege,\u201d cried the Earl of Lennox, \u201cthe Queen fears that danger may\narise from your Majesty\u2019s remaining so long uncovered after your late\nexertion, and her Majesty entreats that you will be pleased to throw\nthis cloak around you.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Tis well thought of, Lennox,\u201d said the king; \u201cand now for a brisk\nwalk, and a change of dress, and all will be well;\u201d and as he went away\nthe people threw up their hats and bonnets, and the air resounded with\ncries of, \u201cLong live the good King James!\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER IV.\n\nAn\u2019 now the folk set aff for their ain hames, an\u2019 the miller and his\nfamily crackit wi\u2019 their neebours till they parted at the road that led\nto the mill; and then nane o\u2019 them said onything, for they were a\u2019 busy\nwi\u2019 their ain thoughts; an\u2019 when the miller gaed into the kitchen, the\nrobin chirped and chirped, for he aye fed it, an\u2019 it was glad to see\nhim.\n\nThe miller gets some seed in his hand, an\u2019 as he\u2019s feeding the robin,\nhis heart begins to swell, an\u2019 his ee to fill, an\u2019 he says, \u201cBairns, wha\nwad hae thought it; I say,\u201d clearing his throat, \u201cwha wad hae thought\nit, bairns, that sae muckle gude wad hae fa\u2019en to our lot, an\u2019 a\u2019 coming\nout o\u2019 saving the life o\u2019 a bit burdie?\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 wha kens, father,\u201d said Jeanie, \u201cbut ye may be now rewarded for a\u2019\nthe gude that grandfather Thomas did, an\u2019 about which ye hae often\ntell\u2019t us? For ye ken there\u2019s a promise to that effect in the Bible, an\u2019\nas the Bible canna lie, I ken wha\u2019ll hae a gude chance too.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re right, Jeanie,\u201d quoth the miller, \u201cye\u2019re very right; and gie me\ndoun the Bible, and I\u2019se read it to you.\u201d\n\nJust as it was dune, the door flees open, an\u2019 in comes Geordie Wilson,\nclean out o\u2019 breath wi\u2019 running.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter now, man?\u201d says William.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m sure it\u2019s something gude,\u201d says James; \u201cI ken by his ee.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu aye, ou aye,\u201d cries Geordie, \u201cgrand news! grand news!\u201d an\u2019 he gaspit\nfor breath.\n\n\u201cTak a wee thought time,\u201d says James; \u201cand now tell us.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, ye ken,\u201d says Geordie, \u201cthat we lost four cows, and an auld horse\nand a young ane, by the fire, an\u2019 a sair loss it was; an\u2019 when I heard\nwhat the king said, I wonder\u2019t, and I better wonder\u2019t, what could be the\nmeaning o\u2019t. An\u2019 Jeanie, she says to me, \u2018If I was you, in place o\u2019\nstanding wondering there, I wad be aff to the Hope;\u2019 sae aff I rins; and\nwhen I gets up till\u2019t, lo and behold! I sees sax fine cows, an\u2019 twa as\npretty naigs as e\u2019er I set een on, a\u2019 thrang puing awa at the grass; an\u2019\nas I\u2019m standing glowerin\u2019 at them, an\u2019 wondering whaur they cam frae, a\nman comes up to me, an\u2019 he says, \u2018Are ye Geordie Wilson?\u2019 says he.\n\u2018That\u2019s me,\u2019 says I.\n\n\u201c\u2018Weel then,\u2019 says he, \u2018there\u2019s a paper for ye\u2019; an\u2019 as he put it into\nmy hand he began to move awa.\n\n\u201c\u2018But will ye no stap in, frien\u2019, an\u2019 tak something?\u2019 says I.\n\n\u201c\u2018No, no,\u2019 cries he, \u2018I daurna bide;\u2019 an\u2019 aff he rins.\n\n\u201cSae I opens the paper, an\u2019 there I sees a letter from our landlord,\ntelling me that as I was a man o\u2019 gude character, an\u2019 very industrious,\nhe had sent me the kye an\u2019 the horse in a compliment to mak up my loss;\nan\u2019 saying that as he had a gude opinion o\u2019 me, he wad gie me a twa\nnineteen years\u2019 lease o\u2019 the Hope at the auld rent; and sae we\u2019ll be\nhappy yet, Jeanie.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat, sir!\u201d cries the miller, \u201care ye thinking o\u2019 my Jeanie, an\u2019 we sae\nhonour\u2019t as we hae been this day?\u201d\n\n\u201cGude Heaven!\u201d exclaimed Geordie Wilson, grippin\u2019 the back o\u2019 a chair to\nkeep himsel up;\u2014an\u2019 nae wonder at it, when the miller spak sae gravely,\nthat Jeanie hersel gied a great start. But weel can a bairn read what\u2019s\nin a parent\u2019s ee, though anither canna; an\u2019 the next minute she had the\nmiller round the neck,\u2014\u201cAn\u2019 how daured ye, father, gie me sic a fright?\u201d\n\n\u201cIs\u2014is\u2014is your father only joking, Jeanie?\u201d stammered Geordie Wilson.\n\n\u201cAtweel was I,\u201d said the miller; \u201csae, tak her; an\u2019 a\u2019 that I hae to say\nis, that if I kent ony man that deserved her better, ye wadna hae gotten\nher. But dinna ye dawt her ower muckle, my man, or gie her a\u2019 her ain\nway,\u2014but mind ye what King James said the day.\u201d\n\nGeordie held up his hand, an\u2019 lookit at Jeanie, as much as to say, \u201cDo\nye hear that, madam?\u201d\n\nBut Jeanie, she half steekit her een, an\u2019 made a mouth at him, just\nlike, \u201cAn\u2019 wha cares?\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 now, bairns,\u201d continued the miller, \u201cI\u2019m gaun to my room, and mauna\nbe disturbit.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s awa to pray to his Maker,\u201d says Jeanie, \u201cfor a\u2019 that\u2019s happened to\nus, an\u2019 I think we should a\u2019 do the same. At ony rate, I can read the\nBible.\u201d\n\n\u201cHout now, woman,\u201d says Geordie Wilson, \u201ccan ye no just let it stand a\nwee, an\u2019 gang outby for a little?\u201d\n\n\u201cI dinna think it,\u201d says Jeanie.\n\n\u201cBut just a wee bit,\u201d says Geordie; \u201cnae mair than ten staps, unless ye\nlike.\u201d\n\n\u201cAweel,\u201d says Jeanie, \u201cbut mind, I\u2019ll gang nae farer than just the end\no\u2019 the lane.\u201d\n\n\u201cJeanie,\u201d says William, \u201cye\u2019d better put on the pat for the kail.\u201d\n\n\u201cPut on the pat!\u201d exclaimed Jeanie, \u201can\u2019 it no muckle past eleven\no\u2019clock! Is the man gane gyte?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s time eneugh, nae doubt,\u201d said William, \u201cgif ye\u2019re back in\ntime.\u201d\n\n\u201cBack in time!\u201d echoed Jeanie, \u201can\u2019 me only gaun to the end o\u2019 the\nlane\u2014gae awa wi\u2019 your havers, man!\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d said William, \u201cwe\u2019ll see, we\u2019ll see.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu aye,\u201d said Jeanie, \u201cye\u2019re aye thinking yoursel wiser than ither\nfolk.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n\u201cI really maist dinna ken what to do wi\u2019 mysel the day,\u201d said William;\n\u201cI can neither settle to work, nor yet sit still; \u2019od, by-the-by, I\u2019ll\ngang an\u2019 \u2019oup my fishing rod, to be ready for the neist shower.\u201d\n\nSae he taks it doun an\u2019 begins working at it, and presently he sees\nJames rise and put on his bonnet.\n\n\u201cWhaur are ye gaun, James,\u201d says he.\n\n\u201cI was thinking,\u201d says James, \u201co\u2019 gaun up to Wattie Simpson\u2019s to see if\nthey want ony potatoes.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust as if they didna get a bow o\u2019 them last Tuesday!\u201d said William.\n\n\u201cWeel, I can stap in an\u2019 speir how they like them.\u201d\n\n\u201cAre ye sure, James, you\u2019re gaun there?\u201d asked William, a wee slily.\n\n\u201cWhere\u2019er I\u2019m gaun, William,\u201d said James, \u201cI\u2019m gaun for nae harm.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ve gane far eneugh wi\u2019 Samson,\u201d thought William; \u201csae I\u2019ll say nae\nmair.\u201d An\u2019 sae he keeps tying his fishing-rod; but no muckle minding\nwhat he\u2019s doing, the string plays snap in twa.\n\n\u201cToots!\u201d says William, a wee angered, \u201cand me sae near dune!\u201d Sae he\nbegins ower again, wi\u2019 mair care; but he sune forgets himsel again, an\u2019\nsnap gangs the twine a second time.\n\n\u201cThe deil tak the string and the whaun too!\u201d cried he, \u201cI\u2019ll meddle nae\nmair wi\u2019t the day.\u201d Sae he hangs it up, and then draws out his watch and\nexamines it again. \u201cIt\u2019s really a grand siller watch, an\u2019 a grand siller\nchain too, an\u2019 mony a ane will be asking to look at it;\u2014and I think Elie\nAllison wad like to see it;\u2014and now that I mind o\u2019t, gif I didna promise\nto ca\u2019 and tell her a\u2019 the news, and me to forget it a\u2019 this time!\u201d\n\nSae awa William fares to Elie\u2019s, and there he sits crackin\u2019 and laughin\u2019\nat an unco rate, and never thinking o\u2019 the time o\u2019 day. And Elie\u2019s\nauntie, she says to him, \u201cAnd now, William, are ye for takin\u2019 a potato\nwi\u2019 us, or are ye gaun hame?\u201d\n\nAn\u2019 his face turned a wee red, for he thought she wantit him awa; and he\nsaid he was gaun hame, to be sure.\n\n\u201cBut dinna tak it amiss,\u201d said the auntie, \u201cfor I thought ye wad be ower\nlate for hame.\u201d\n\n\u201cNae fear o\u2019 that,\u201d said William, \u201cfor we dinna dine till twa o\u2019clock.\u201d\n\n\u201cI kent that,\u201d said she, \u201cbut it\u2019s past it already.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe deuce it is!\u201d cried William, jumping up; \u201cthen fareweel\u2014I\u2019ll maybe\nsee ye the morn.\u201d\n\nAs he\u2019s hurrying hame, he sees somebody coming frae the road to the\nHope, and walking unco fast.\n\n\u201c\u2019Od,\u201d thought he, \u201ccan that be Jeanie?\u2014\u2019deed is\u2019t, an\u2019 I\u2019ll lay my lugs\nshe hasna been hame yet. But I maun get before her, and then see if I\ndinna gie her\u2019t, for what she said to me the day.\u201d\n\nSae awa he sets wi\u2019 a\u2019 his might, an\u2019 as he gets near the mill, aff wi\u2019\nhis coat, an\u2019 up wi\u2019 a spade, an\u2019 begins delving; an\u2019 keeking ower his\nshouther, he sees Jeanie turning the corner o\u2019 the plantin\u2019, but he\nnever lets on, nor looks round, till she\u2019s just beside him, an\u2019 speaks\nto him.\n\n\u201cHech!\u201d says he, \u201cI\u2019m glad he\u2019s ready at last;\u2014\u2019od, I really thought we\nwere to get nae dinner the day.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs my father in the house?\u201d says Jeanie.\n\n\u201cIs your father in the house!\u201d repeated William, \u201c\u2019odsake, lassie, hae\nye no been hame yet?\u201d\n\n\u201cI was taigled,\u201d answered Jeanie, looking a wee foolish.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 the kail will no be on yet,\u201d cried he; \u201cI was sure o\u2019t now\u2014quite\nsure o\u2019t!\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 what for did ye no gang in and put them on yoursel, then, if ye was\nsae sure o\u2019t?\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 sae I wad, if you hadna threepit, and better threepit, that ye was\ngaun nae farer than the lane. But dinna put aff time here, for I\u2019se\nwarrant my father\u2019s in a bonny kippidge already.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m no fear\u2019t for that,\u201d says Jeanie but she wasna very easy for a\u2019\nthat.\n\nSae when she comes in at the kitchen door, she sees the kail-pat\nstandin\u2019 on the floor, and her father gien a bit pick to the robin.\n\n\u201cDid ever mortal ken the like o\u2019 this?\u201d cried she: \u201cnaething to be dune,\nand my gude auld father sitting just as contentit there as if the dinner\nwas ready to be put on the table; but we\u2019ll no be lang o\u2019 makin\u2019\nsomething.\u201d An\u2019 she up wi\u2019 the stoup, and aff wi\u2019 the lid o\u2019 the pat,\nwhen the miller cries to her, \u201cTak care, Jeanie, an\u2019 no spoil the kail!\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, I declare,\u201d she exclaimed, \u201cif that callant shouldna get his\npaiks, for gauring me believe that the kail wasna ready: but it was\nthoughtfu\u2019 o\u2019 him, after a\u2019, to pit them on; and troth,\u201d says she,\n\u201cthey\u2019re uncommon gude.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 what for no, Jeanie?\u201d asked the miller. \u201cDid ye think that your\nfather had forgotten how to mak a patfu\u2019 o\u2019 kail?\u201d\n\n\u201cDid ye mak them, father?\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth did I; wha else was there to do it?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut couldna ye hae cried in William, father? I\u2019m sure it wad hae been\nbetter for him to hae been in the house, than puttin\u2019 himsel into sic a\nterrible heat wi\u2019 delving this warm day.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf William\u2019s in a heat,\u201d quoth the miller, \u201cit\u2019s no wi\u2019 delving, for I\nhaena seen him near the house the hale day, an\u2019 I was out twa or three\ntimes.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen I\u2019ll lay onything I ken whaur he\u2019s been,\u201d said Jeanie; \u201cand him to\nhae the impudence to speak to me yon gate\u2014but I\u2019se gie him\u2019t;\u2014an\u2019 yet\nwhat right hae I to be angry wi\u2019 him, me that\u2019s forgotten mysel sae\nmuckle?\u201d\n\n\u201cDinna vex yoursel about that, my bairn,\u201d quoth the miller; \u201cwhat has\nhappened the day\u2019s enough to put us a\u2019 out o\u2019 sorts; but we\u2019ll a come to\noursels belyve. An\u2019 now, Jeanie, gang ye out an\u2019 look if ye can see\nJames coming hame, an\u2019 then we\u2019ll hae our dinner.\u201d\n\nSae awa she gangs, and when William sees her coming, he pretends to be\nunco busy working.\n\n\u201cWilliam,\u201d cries she, \u201cken ye whaur James is gane?\u201d\n\n\u201cMe!\u201d said William, \u201chow should I ken whaur folk stravaig to? I might\nrather hae askit you gif ye had fa\u2019en in wi\u2019 him, I think.\u201d\n\n\u201cAye, aye, my man, but ye\u2019re speaking rather crouse. And whaur hae ye\nbeen yoursel a\u2019 day, I wonder? No delvin\u2019, I\u2019m sure, gif ane may judge\nby the wee pickle yird that\u2019s turned up.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 do ye think,\u201d said William, \u201cthat after a\u2019 my racing and rinnin\u2019, I\nshould hae been delving a\u2019 day, and lighter wark to do about the farm?\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 whaur was ye, then, that father couldna see you when he was out?\u201d\n\n\u201cDid my father cry on me?\u201d asked William.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Jeanie; \u201cat least he didna say\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen that\u2019s it,\u2014just it; for he cries sae loud, that it wad hae wakened\na man wi\u2019 the hale haystack abune him, forbye lyin\u2019 at the side o\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 sae ye\u2019ll hae me to believe,\u201d says Jeanie, \u201cthat ye was sleepin\u2019;\nbut I\u2019m thinking ye was anither gate. I\u2019se find it out yet.\u201d\n\n\u201cWomen\u2019s tongues, women\u2019s tongues!\u201d said William, beating a piece yird\nas if he wad mak pouther o\u2019t; \u201cthey\u2019re aye either fleechin\u2019 or flytin\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid ye ever say that to Elie Allison? Ye\u2019ve been there, I\u2019ve a notion.\nBut we\u2019ll say nae mair about it enow, for yonder\u2019s James; sae pit ye on\nyour coat, and bring in your spade; or if ye\u2019ll wait, James will carry\nit for ye, for your arms maun be unco wearit!\u201d\n\nWhen William saw James coming alang, as grave-like as frae a preaching,\nand thought on whaur he had been, he kent he wad laugh in his face\ndownright if he met him, and that might anger Samson; sae he set aff by\nhimsel an\u2019 put by his spade. An\u2019 when he saw him fairly in the house,\nan\u2019 had his laugh out alane, he composed himsel, and walked into the\nkitchen as if naething had happened.\n\n\n CHAPTER V.\n\nNeist day the miller spoke to James anent his marriage, an\u2019 tell\u2019t him,\nas they were no to move frae the mill, it needna be putten aff ony\nlanger; sae it was settled to be in a fortnight, an\u2019 that created an\nunco bustle in the house. An\u2019 Jeanie was every now and then speakin\u2019 o\u2019\nhow they were a\u2019 to manage, but the miller ne\u2019er seemed to mind her.\n\nSo ae day, when they\u2019re in the kitchen by themsels, she begins on\u2019t\nagain: \u201cAn\u2019 James an\u2019 his wife will hae to get the room that he an\u2019\nWilliam are in; an\u2019 then William he maun either get mine, or sleep\noutby, for there\u2019ll be nae puttin\u2019 him in yon cauld, damp bed, unless we\nwant him to gang like a cripple; sae I dinna ken what\u2019s to be dune.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe forget, Jeanie,\u201d said the miller, \u201cthat John Murdoch sleepit there,\nan\u2019 he didna seem to be the waur o\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cAye, for ae night, nae doubt, and in fine weather; but how lang will\nthat last?\u201d\n\nThe miller gies her nae answer; but after sittin\u2019 thinking a wee, he\nrises and taks down his bonnet.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a fine day for being out,\u201d says Jeanie; \u201cbut are ye gaun far,\nfather?\u201d\n\n\u201cNae farer than the Hope,\u201d said the miller.\n\n\u201cThe Hope!\u201d exclaimed Jeanie, as her face reddened.\n\n\u201cAy,\u201d says the miller; \u201cand I\u2019m thinking o\u2019 speirin\u2019 if there\u2019s room\nthere for ane o\u2019 ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow God bless my gude auld father,\u201d said Jeanie; \u201che sees brawly what I\nwanted, and wadna even look me in the face to confuse me.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n\u201cGeordie Wilson,\u201d cries the miller, \u201cwhen will it suit you to marry my\ndochter?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe day\u2014the morn\u2014ony day,\u201d answers Geordie, as happy\u2019s a prince.\n\n\u201cBecause I was thinking,\u201d says the miller, \u201cthat it might be as weel to\npit James\u2019s waddin\u2019 and yours ower thegither.\u201d\n\n\u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart,\u201d says Geordie, \u201cwi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart!\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, then,\u201d quoth the miller, \u201cI\u2019ll awa hame and see what our Jeanie\nsays to\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I\u2019ll gang wi\u2019 you,\u201d cries Geordie.\n\n\u201cCome your wa\u2019s then, my man,\u201d says the miller.\n\nAnd sae as they\u2019re gaun down the road thegither, they meets William, an\u2019\nGeordie tells him how matters stood. An\u2019 when William hears o\u2019t, he\nshakes Geordie by the hand, an\u2019 awa he flees ower ditch and dyke, an\u2019 is\nhame in nae time. An\u2019 after resting himsel a minute, an\u2019 to tak breath,\nin he gangs to the kitchen; an\u2019 when Jeanie sees him, she says, \u201cYe\u2019re\nwarm-like, William,\u2014ye\u2019ve surely been running?\u201d\n\n\u201cIs onything wrang wi\u2019 my father?\u201d asked he.\n\n\u201cGude forbid!\u201d said Jeanie; \u201cbut what maks ye speir?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, naething ava, amaist; but only I met him walking unco grave-like,\nan\u2019 he scarcely spak to me; an\u2019 I met wi\u2019 Geordie Wilson too, and he\ndidna say muckle either.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreserve us a\u2019!\u201d cries Jeanie; \u201cif onything has happened atween the\ntwa!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat could put that nonsense in your head, lassie?\u201d said William.\n\u201cBy-the-by,\u201d continues he, after a pause, \u201cGeordie\u2019s at the end o\u2019 the\nlane, an\u2019 wishing muckle to speak to ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 what for did ye no tell me that at first, ye haverel?\u201d cried\nJeanie; and out she flees. An\u2019 just as she\u2019s turning the corner, she\nruns against her father wi\u2019 a great drive.\n\n\u201cThe lassie\u2019s in a creel, I think!\u201d quoth the miller; \u201cbut it\u2019s the same\nwi\u2019 them a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cJeanie! my ain Jeanie!\u201d whispers Geordie, \u201can\u2019 it\u2019s a\u2019 settled for\nneist week, and we\u2019ll be sae happy!\u201d\n\nJeanie held him at arm\u2019s length frae her, that she might look him in the\nface.\n\n\u201cI see it\u2019s true! I see it\u2019s true!\u201d she said, \u201can\u2019 ye\u2019re no joking me!\nAn\u2019 that wicked callant, to gang and gie me sic a fright! Hech! I haena\ngotten the better o\u2019t yet!\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 now, Jeanie, that I hae seen ye,\u201d says Geordie, \u201cI maun rin awa\nhame and tell my gude auld mither that it\u2019s a\u2019 fixed; for she wasna in\nwhen your father cam to the Hope; and then I maun awa to the toun for\nthings. An\u2019 what\u2019ll I bring ye, Jeanie? what\u2019ll I bring?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, just onything ye like,\u201d said she; \u201cbring back yoursel, that\u2019s a\u2019\nJeanie cares about.\u201d\n\nAn\u2019 she stands an\u2019 looks after him till he\u2019s out o\u2019 sight; an\u2019 as she\nturns about, \u201cJeanie! my ain Jeanie!\u201d says James, takin\u2019 her in his\narms.\n\n\u201cMy ain gude and aye kind brither!\u201d said Jeanie, resting her head on his\nshouther.\n\n\u201cShe\u2019ll no speak to _me_, nae doubt,\u201d says William, his voice shakin\u2019 a\nwee.\n\n\u201cAh, ye wicked callant!\u201d says Jeanie, kissing his cheek. \u201cBut ye mauna\nplague me nae mair; na, ye\u2019ll no daur do\u2019t!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo!\u201d cries William, \u201cI\u2019m sure I\u2019m fit for a\u2019 that Geordie Wilson can do\nony day, an\u2019 maybe mair.\u201d\n\nJeanie was gaun to answer, but she got her ee on the miller standing at\nthe door.\n\n\u201cI maun hae _his_ blessing first,\u201d she cries, \u201cand then Jeanie\u2019s heart\nwill be at peace.\u201d\n\nWhen the miller saw her coming, he gaes slowly back to his ain room, an\u2019\nin she comes after him, and, \u201cBless me, bless your bairn, my gude auld\nfather!\u2014you that\u2019s been father an\u2019 mither, an\u2019 a\u2019 to her since before\nshe could guide hersel! Bless your Jeanie, an\u2019 she\u2019ll hae naething mair\nto wish for!\u201d\n\n\u201cHow like she\u2019s to her mither!\u201d said the miller in a low voice; \u201cbut\nye\u2019ll no mind her sae weel, Jeanie. I mind weel, that on the night\nbefore she dee\u2019t, an\u2019 when I was like ane distrackit, \u2018It\u2019s the will o\u2019\nProvidence, John,\u2019 says she, \u2018and we maun a\u2019 bow till\u2019t; but dinna ye\ngrieve sae sair for my loss, John; for young as she is yet, my heart\ntells me that I\u2019m leaving ane ahint me, wha\u2019ll be a blessing an\u2019 a\ncomfort to ye when I\u2019m awa;\u2019 and ne\u2019er were truer words spoken,\u201d\ncontinued the miller, \u201cfor ne\u2019er frae that day to this was her father\u2019s\nheart wae for Jeanie; sae bless you, my bairn, an\u2019 may a\u2019 that\u2019s gude\nattend ye, an\u2019 may ye be spared to be a comfort and an example to a\u2019\naround ye, lang, lang after your auld father\u2019s head\u2019s laid low.\u201d An\u2019 as\nhe raised her frae her knees he kissed her, an\u2019 then turned slowly frae\nher, an\u2019 Jeanie slippit saftly awa.\n\nOn the neist Friday the twa marriages took place, an\u2019 a\u2019 the folk sat\ndown to a gude an\u2019 a plentifu\u2019 dinner, an\u2019 there was an unco deal o\u2019 fun\nan\u2019 laughing gaed on. An\u2019 when dinner was ower and thanks returned, the\nmiller cried for a\u2019 to fill a fu\u2019, fu\u2019 bumper. \u201cAn\u2019 now,\u201d says he,\n\u201cwe\u2019ll dring King James\u2019s health, an\u2019 lang may he and his rule ower us.\u201d\n\nThis led them to speak o\u2019 his coming there as John Murdoch; and some o\u2019\nthem that hadna heard the hale story, askit the miller to tell\u2019t.\n\n\u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart,\u201d quoth the miller; \u201cbut first open that cage-door,\nJeanie, for it\u2019s no fitting that _it_, wha had sae muckle share in\u2019t,\nshould be a prisoner at sic a time.\u201d\n\nAn\u2019 the robin cam fleein\u2019 out to the miller\u2019s whistle, an\u2019 lightit on\nthe table beside him.\n\nWhen the miller was dune wi\u2019 the story, \u201cAn\u2019 now, frien\u2019s,\u201d said he, \u201cye\nmay learn this frae it, that it\u2019s aye best to do as muckle gude and as\nlittle ill as we can. But there\u2019s a time for a\u2019thing,\u201d continued he;\n\u201csae here, Jeanie, my dawtie, put ye by the robin again; and now, lads,\nround wi\u2019 the whisky.\u201d\n\nThey a\u2019 sat crackin\u2019 an\u2019 laughin\u2019 thegither, till it was time for\nGeordie an\u2019 his wife to be settin\u2019 aff for the Hope, and the rest o\u2019 the\nfolk gaed wi\u2019 them, an\u2019 a\u2019 was quiet at the mill again.\n\nIn twa year after that, William was married to Elie Allison. And when he\nwas three score and ten, the miller yielded up his spirit to Him that\ngied it; an\u2019 when King James heard that he was dead, he said publicly,\nthat he had lost a gude subject and an honest man, and that he wished\nthere was mair folk in the kintra like John Marshall.\n\nAnd James succeeded to his father; an\u2019 after James cam James\u2019s sons, and\ntheir sons after them for never sae lang; and, for aught I ken to the\ncontrair, there\u2019s a Marshall in the Mill o\u2019 Doune at this day.\u2014\u201c_The Odd\nVolume._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE HEADLESS CUMINS.\n\n BY SIR THOMAS DICK LAUDER.\n\n\nIn the parish of Edinkellie, a place towards the centre of Morayshire,\nin the northern part of Scotland, there is a romantic and fearful chasm,\nsupposed to have been at one time the bed of the river Divie. It has two\nentrances at the upper end, and the ancient courses which led the river\ninto these successively are easily traceable. The lower extremity of the\nravine terminates abruptly about forty feet high above the Divie, that\nflows at its base. This spot is one of a very interesting nature. Its\nname in Gaelic signifies \u201cthe Hollow of the Heads;\u201d a name originating,\nit is said, in the following transaction:\u2014\n\nNear the upper end of the ravine there is a curious cavern, formed of\nhuge masses of fallen crags, that cover the bottom of the place. It\nenters downwards like a pit, and the mouth, which is no more than wide\nenough to admit a man, is not easily discovered. Here it was that the\nbrave Allister Bane secreted himself after the Battle of the Lost\nStandard. At this time the Castle of Dunphail was besieged by Randolph,\nEarl of Moray; and Allister Bane, who could no longer make head against\nhim in the open field, contented himself with harassing the enemy.\nKnowing that his father and his garrison were reduced to great want, he\nand a few of his followers disguised themselves as countrymen, and,\ndriving a parcel of horses, yoked in rude sledges, laden with sacks,\nthey came to the edge of the glen where Randolph\u2019s beleaguering party\nlay, and, pretending to be peasants carrying meal from the low country\nto the Highlands, they entreated their protection from one Allister\nBane, of whom they were afraid. Their prayer being granted, they unyoked\ntheir horses, and took care to leave their sledges at the brink of the\nprecipice, so that, on a given signal agreed on with the garrison, they\ntumbled sledges, sacks, and all over into the glen below, and the\ngarrison, making a sally at the same time, each man bore off a sack on\nhis back, whilst the pretended peasants sprang on their horses, and were\nout of sight before the astonished sentinels of the enemy had well given\nthe alarm.\n\nRandolph was so provoked on learning who the author of this trick was,\nthat he set a price upon his head. A certain private pique led a Cumin\nto betray his master\u2019s lurking-place. His enemies hurried to the spot to\nmake sure of their game; but when they saw the small uncouth-looking\naperture, they paused in a circle round it. One only could descend at a\ntime, and the death of him who should attempt it was certain; for the\nred glare of the Cumin\u2019s eye in the obscurity within, and the flash of\nhis dirk-blade, showed that he had wound up his dauntless soul to die\nwith the \u201c_courage_\u201d of the lion on his crest. They called on him to\nsurrender at discretion. He replied by howling a deep note of defiance\nfrom the dark womb of the rocks,\u2014\u201cLet me but come out, and with my back\nto that crag, I will live or die like a Cumin!\u201d \u201cNo!\u201d exclaimed the\nleader of his foes; \u201cthou shalt die like a fox as thou art!\u201d Brushwood\nwas quickly piled over the hole, but no word of entreaty for mercy\nascended from below. Heap after heap was set fire to, and crammed\nblazing down upon him. His struggles to force a way upwards were easily\nrepelled by those above, and after a sufficient quantity of burning\nmatter had been thrust in to ensure his suffocation, they rolled stones\nover the mouth of the hole.\n\nWhen the cruel deed was done, and the hole opened, Allister Bane was\nfound reclining in one corner, his head muffled in his plaid, and\nresting on the pummel of his sword, with two or three attendants around\nhim, all dead. To make sure of them, their heads were cut off and\nthrown, one after another, into the fortress, with this horrible taunt\nto the old man,\u2014\u201cYour son provided you with meal, and we now send you\nflesh to eat with it.\u201d The veteran warrior recognised the fair head of\nhis son. \u201cIt is a bitter morsel indeed,\u201d said he, as he took it up,\nkissed it, and wept over it; \u201cbut I will gnaw the last bone of it before\nI surrender.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE LADY ISABEL:\n _A LEGENDARY TALE OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY_.\n\n\nThe Lady Isabel was a Scottish baron\u2019s daughter, and far was she famed.\nWere others fair, she was fairer; were others rich, she was richer. In\nshort, all perfections were said to be centred in the Lady Isabel, and\nyet that quality for which she ought to have been most prized, seemed\nthe one which made the least noise in the world,\u2014this was her devoted\nduty to her father. She was his only child\u2014the child of his old age, the\nidol of his heart, and the lamp of his life. But still was he a cruel\nfather; for in return for her duteous affection, he had determined to\nwed her to a man she had never seen, while he knew that her heart was\nanother\u2019s.\n\nThe Lord of Ormisdale was the son of his ancient friend, and the\npossessor of broad lands in a distant part of Scotland. The two old men\nhad sworn to each other that their children should be united, but ere\nthis paction, the youth had been sent abroad to be initiated in the art\nof war\u2014an art but too much practised in his native country at that time;\nfor be it known that our peerless beauty bloomed in the 15th century,\nwhen the feuds of the Scottish nobility were frequent and deadly. Much\nwas bruited abroad of the goodly person and brave qualities of the young\nearl, but of this Lady Isabel had no opportunity of judging, for never,\nas has been told, had she seen him. She had, however, but too often seen\nhis cousin Roderick, and to him was her heart devoted. It was true he\nhad neither title, nor lands, nor vassals; but he was a handsome, a\nnoble, and a gallant youth, and he had knelt at her feet, confessed his\nlove, and swore eternal constancy; and though, when she thought of her\nfather, she turned coldly away, it was but to treasure his image in her\nheart, and to weep most bitter tears for the hapless fate which doomed\nher to wed another. Roderick, by-and-by, went away to a foreign land,\ndistraught by his passion for the Lady Isabel; and the time was long,\nand he returned not, and none spoke of him, or seemed to think of him,\nsave his disconsolate love. But it was not so; for the old Baron loved\nhim for his worth and manly bearing; and when he saw his daughter\ndrooping her head like a lily, he too was unhappy, and repented him of\nhis rash vow, though he would rather have sacrificed his own life, and\nhers too, than have broken his oath. And so time passed on, and many\nwere the suitors that sought the hand of the Lady Isabel. Some loved her\nfor herself, some for her great possessions, and some for both; but all\nwere sent hopeless away.\n\nAnd now the time was at hand when the sun was to shine upon the\nnineteenth birthday of the baron\u2019s daughter, and multitudes were invited\nto his castle to celebrate the festival with mirth and revelry. Many\nwere the reasons on which he had thrown wide his castle gates and\nwelcomed numerous guests, and ample the hospitable provision he had made\nfor them; but never, during his life, or that of his forefathers, had\nthere been such doings as now. Whole hecatombs of sheep and oxen bled on\nthe occasion, with wain-loads of deer, wild and tame fowl, and other\ncreatures. Every country seemed to have been taxed for fruit and other\ndelicacies, while beer of the strongest, and wines of the richest,\nseemed, by the quantities provided, to be intended absolutely to flow in\nrivers. The birthday of the Lady Isabel had been celebrated, as it came\nround, ever since that on which she first drew her breath, but never had\nthere been even imagined such preparations as this. The tongues of all\nthe gossiping old dowagers in the kingdom were set a-going on the\noccasion: some assigned one reason for this extraordinary entertainment,\nand some another. There were several whose eager curiosity caused them\nso much uneasiness, that they went so far as to ask an explanation of\nthe old baron himself. They were all, however, foiled in the attempt to\npenetrate the mystery, and therefore settled in their own minds that the\nold man had either lost his wits altogether, or was in his dotage.\n\nNor, to speak the truth, did the young lady, on whose account was all\nthis turmoil, feel less surprised than other people at her father\u2019s\nunbounded extravagance, especially as there arrived from the capital\nchest after chest, packed with the richest vestments, cut in the\napproved fashion of the day, and boxes filled with jewellery, which,\nadded to the family gems she already possessed, might have furnished the\ndowry of a princess.\n\nThe day at length arrived for which all this extraordinary preparation\nhad been made; and the baron, not content with charging his daughter to\napparel herself in a suit which, by its exceeding splendour, seemed to\nhave been particularly intended for the occasion, and to wear her most\ncostly jewels, also commanded her maidens to tax their wits in\nornamenting and setting off, to the best advantage, the charms of their\nyoung mistress.\n\nAnd now, after having arranged all things, and being promised implicit\nobedience by his daughter, the mystery of all his magnificent\nproceedings was partly unravelled by his telling her that they were that\nnight to expect the arrival of the Earl of Ormisdale. He moreover\npresented her with a mask, and informed her that he had taken order that\neach of his guests should put on a visor before they enter the\nball-room, after they left the banqueting-hall, and that he had done\nthis for her sake, that the eye of idle curiosity should not read in her\nfeatures what was passing in her mind when she first met her betrothed.\nIt was in vain that the afflicted Lady Isabel pled most movingly for a\nmore private meeting, for her father was deaf to her entreaties, while\nhe affirmed that his precaution of the visor would do away all\nobjections, and was so peremptory in the matter, that, as usual, she\nacquiesced; and having thanked and kissed his dutiful daughter, he\nwithdrew from her with renewed youth in his step, and joy in his eye.\nHow different, however, were the feelings of his daughter on this\nmomentous subject! and sore averse was she to meet the man she was sure\nthat she could never love; and many were the tears shed, and many the\nresolves she made to retract all her promises, and live and die in\nsolitude. But then she bethought her of the despair of her poor old\nfather\u2014of his tender, though mistaken love\u2014of the few remaining years of\nhis life embittered by disappointment\u2014and his death probably hurried on\nthrough her means. All this was too much when laid in the balance with\nonly her own happiness, and she still sustained the character of a\ndutiful daughter, by heroically determining to sacrifice all selfishness\nat the altar of filial duty and affection.\n\nBut though this was her ultimate resolve, we need not be surprised that,\nwhen decked in her splendid attire, and presiding in the gorgeous\nbanqueting-hall of her father, she looked and felt as if assisting at a\nfuneral feast, and that she even then would have been the better of the\nvisor to prevent many conjectures on what her saddened looks might mean.\nBut the time for assuming the mask arrived, and the nobles of the land,\nwith their haughty dames, and many a knight, and many a damsel fair,\nbedight in silk and cloth of gold, and blazing with jewels, graced the\ntapestried ball-room, on which a flood of brilliant light was poured\nfrom lamp and torch. And each in joyous mood, cheered by the merry\nminstrels, and by the sound of harp and viol, impatiently awaited the\ncommencement of the dance, when they were informed that it was stayed\nfor an expected and honourable guest. And now again curiosity was at its\nheight. But presently there was a flourish of the music, and a cry of\nthe ushers to make way for the noble Earl of Ormisdale, and the large\ndoors at the foot of the hall were flung wide open, and the gallant\nyoung earl, masked, and attended by a train of young gentlemen, all his\nkinsmen, or picked and chosen friends, advanced amid murmurs of\nadmiration to the middle of the hall. Here they were met and welcomed by\nthe baron, who led the earl to his lovely daughter, and having presented\nhim to her, the guests were presently gratified by seeing the gallant\nyoung nobleman take the hand of the Lady Isabel, and lead her out to\ndance. Nor were there any present whose eyes did not follow them with\nadmiration, though the measure chosen by the high-born damsel savoured\nmore that night of grace and dignity than lightness of either heart or\nheel. Meantime, the old baron was so full of joy and delight, that it\nwas remarked by all, as he was still seen near his daughter and her\npartner. But their hearts were both quaking: the unhappy Lady Isabel\u2019s\nwith thinking of her promise to her father, and that of her betrothed\nwith a fear known only to himself, for he had heard that she had loved,\nand now observed her narrowly. And, not content with this, he asked her,\nas he sat beside her, many a wily question, till at last he spoke his\nfears in plain guise, and she, with many sighs and tears shed within her\nmask, confessed the truth; still saying, that for her father\u2019s sake she\nwould be his wife, if he accepted of her on such terms. But now her\nfather whispered to her that she must presently prepare to keep her\nword, as this must be her bridal-night, for to that purpose alone was\nthis high wassail kept. Her lover, too, no way daunted by his knowledge\nof her heart, pressed on his suit to have it so. And now was the\ndespairing damsel almost beside herself, when her father, announcing\naloud his purpose to the astonished guests, called for the priest, and\ncaused all to unmask. But in what words shall we paint the surprise, the\ndelight, the flood of joy that came upon the heart of the Lady Isabel,\nwhen the earl\u2019s mask was removed, and she beheld in him her much beloved\nRoderick, who, his cousin being dead, was now the Earl of Ormisdale!\n\nAnd now was each corner of the castle, from basement stone to turret\nheight, filled with joyous greetings, and the health and happiness of\nthe noble Earl Roderick, and of his bride, the dutiful Lady Isabel,\ndeeply drank in many a wassail bowl.\n\nThe stately castle and its revels, the proud baron and his pomp, the\nbeauteous dame and her children\u2019s children, have now passed away into\noblivion, save this slight record, which has only been preserved in\nremembrance of the daughter\u2019s virtue, who preferred her father\u2019s\nhappiness to her own.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh Journal_, 1833.\n\n\n\n\n THE DESPERATE DUEL.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR, M.D.\n\n Nay, never shake thy gory locks at me;\n Thou canst not say I did it!\u2014_Macbeth._\n\n\nIt was on a fine summer morning, somewhere about four o\u2019clock, when I\nwaukened from my night\u2019s rest, and was about thinking to bestir mysel,\nthat I heard the sound of voices in the kail-yard, stretching south frae\nour back windows. I listened\u2014and I listened\u2014and I better listened\u2014and\nstill the sound of the argle-bargling became more distinct, now in a\nfleeching way, and now in harsh angry tones, as if some quarrelsome\ndisagreement had ta\u2019en place. I hadna the comfort of my wife\u2019s company\nin this dilemma; she being awa, three days before, on the top of Tammy\nTrundle the carrier\u2019s cart, to Lauder, on a visit to her folks there;\nher mother (my gudemother, like) having been for some time ill, with an\nincome in her leg, which threatened to make a lameter of her in her old\nage; the twa doctors there, no speaking of the blacksmith, and sundry\nskeely old women, being able to mak naething of the business; so nane\nhappened to be wi\u2019 me in the room, saving wee Benjie, who was lying\nasleep at the back of the bed, with his little Kilmarnock on his head,\nas sound as a top. Nevertheless, I lookit for my claes; and opening\none-half of the window-shutter, I saw four young birkies well dressed;\nindeed three of them customers of my ain, all belanging to the toun; twa\nof them young doctors; ane of them a writer\u2019s clerk; and the ither a\ngrocer; the hale looking very fierce and fearsome, like turkey cocks;\nswaggering about with their hands and arms as if they had been the\nking\u2019s dragoons; and priming a pair of pistols, which ane of the\nsurgeons, a speerity, out-spoken lad, Maister Blister, was haddin\u2019 in\nhis grip.\n\nI jaloused at ance what they were after, being now a wee up to firearms;\nso I saw that skaith was to come o\u2019t, and that I wad be wanting in my\nduty on four heads\u2014first, as a Christian; second, as a man; third, as a\nsubject; and fourth, as a father, if I withheld mysel frae the scene,\nnor lifted up my voice, however fruitlessly, against such crying\niniquity as the wanton letting out of human blood; sae furth I\nhastened\u2014half-dressed, with my gray stockings rolled up my thighs, over\nmy corduroys, and my auld hat aboon my cowl\u2014to the kail-yard of\ncontention.\n\nI was just in the nick of time, and my presence checked the effusion of\nblood for a little;\u2014but wait a wee. So high and furious were at least\nthree of the party, that I saw it was catching water in a sieve to waste\nwords on them, knowing, as clearly as the sun serves the world, that\ninterceding would be of no avail. Howsomever, I made a feint, and\nthreatened to bowl awa for a magistrait, if they wadna desist, and stop\nfrom their barbarous and bluidy purpose; but, i\u2019fegs, I had better have\nkeepit my counsel till it was asked for.\n\n\u201cTailor Mansie,\u201d quoth Maister Thomas Blister, with a furious cock of\nhis eye (he was a queer Eirish birkie, come ower for his yedication),\n\u201csince ye have ventured to thrust your nose,\u201d said he, \u201cwhere nobody\ninvited ye, you must just stay,\u201d said he, \u201cand abide by the\nconsequences. This is an affair of honour,\u201d quoth he; \u201cand if ye venture\nto stir one foot from the spot, och then,\u201d said he, \u201cby the poker of St\nPatrick, but whisk through ye goes one of these leaden playthings, as\nsure as ye ever spoiled a coat, or cabbaged broadcloth. Ye have now come\nout, ye observe, hark ye,\u201d said ye, \u201cand are art and part in the\nbusiness;\u2014and, if one, or both, of the principals be killed, poor\ndevils,\u201d said he, \u201cwe are all alike liable to take our trial before the\nJusticiary Court, hark ye; and, by the powers,\u201d said he, \u201cI doubt not\nbut that, on proper consideration, they will allow us to get off\nmercifully, on this side of hanging, by a verdict of manslaughter.\u201d\n\n\u2019Od, I fund mysel immediately in a scrape; but how to get out of it\nbaffled my gumption. It set me all a shivering; yet I thought that, come\nthe warst when it wad, they surely wad not hang the faither of a\nhelpless sma family, that had naething but his needle for their support,\nif I made a proper affidavy, about having tried to make peace between\nthe youths. So, conscience being a brave supporter, I abode in silence,\nthough not without many queer and qualmish thochts, and a pit-patting of\nthe heart, no unco pleasant in the tholing.\n\n\u201cBlood and wounds!\u201d bawled Maister Thomas Blister, \u201cit would be a\ndisgrace for ever on the honourable profession of physic,\u201d egging on\npuir Maister Willie Magneezhy, whose face was as white as\ndouble-bleached linen, \u201cto make any apology for such an insult. You not\nfit to doctor a cat,\u2014you not fit to bleed a calf,\u2014you not fit to\npoultice a pig,\u2014after three years apprenticeship,\u201d said he, \u201cand a\nwinter with Doctor Monro? By the cupping-glasses of \u2019Pocrates,\u201d said he,\n\u201cand by the pistol of Gallon, but I would have caned him on the spot, if\nhe had just let out half as much to me. Look ye, man,\u201d said he, \u201clook\nye, man, he is all shaking\u201d (this was the truth); \u201che\u2019ll turn tail. At\nhim like fire, Willie.\u201d\n\nMagneezhy, though sadly frightened, looked a thocht brighter, and made a\nkind o\u2019 half stap forrit. \u201cSay that ye\u2019ll ask my pardon once more,\u2014and\nif no,\u201d said the puir lad, with a voice broken and trembling, \u201cthen we\nmust just shoot one another.\u201d\n\n\u201cDevil a bit,\u201d answered Mr Bloatsheet, \u201cdevil a bit. No, sir; you must\ndown on your bare knees, and beg ten thousand pardons for calling me out\nhere, in a raw morning; or I\u2019ll have a shot at you, whether you will or\nno.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you stand that?\u201d said Blister, with eyes like burning coals. \u201cBy\nthe living jingo and the holy poker, Magneezhy, if you stand that\u2014if you\nstand that, I say, I stand no longer your second, but leave you to\ndisgrace, and a caning. If he likes to shoot you like a dog, and not as\na gentleman, then let him do it and be done.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, sir,\u201d replied Magneezhy, with a quivering voice, which he tried in\nvain, puir fellow, to render warlike (he had never been in the\nvolunteers, like me). \u201cHand us the pistols, then, and let us do or die!\u201d\n\n\u201cSpoken like a hero, and brother of the lancet: as little afraid at the\nsight of your own blood, as at that of your patients,\u201d said Blister.\n\u201cHand over the pistols.\u201d\n\nIt was an awfu\u2019 business. Gude save us, such goings on in a Christian\nland! While Mr Bloatsheet, the young writer, was in the act of doing\nwhat he was bid, I again, but to no purpose, endeavoured to slip in a\nword edgeways. Magneezhy was in an awfu\u2019 case; if he had been already\nshot, he could not have looked mair clay and corpse-like; so I took a\nkind of whispering, while the stramash was drawing to a bloody\nconclusion, with Maister Harry Molasses, the fourth in the spree, who\nwas standing behind Bloatsheet, with a large mahogany box under his arm,\nsomething in shape like that of a licensed packman, ganging about from\nhouse to house through the country-side, selling toys and trinkets, or\nniffering plated ear-rings and sic like, wi\u2019 young lasses, for auld\nsilver coins or cracked tea-spoons.\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d answered he, very composedly, as if it had been a canister fu\u2019 of\nblack rappee, or blackguard, that he had just lifted down from his tap\nshelf, \u201cit\u2019s just Doctor Blister\u2019s saws, whittles, and big knives, in\ncase ony of their legs or arms be blawn away, that he may cut them off.\u201d\nLittle wad have prevented me sinking down through the ground, had I not\nremembered, at the preceese moment, that I myself was a soldier, and\nliable, when the hour of danger threatened, to be called out, in\nmarching order, to the field of battle. But by this time the pistols\nwere handed to the two infatuated young men\u2014Mr Bloatsheet, as fierce as\na hussar dragoon, and Magneezhy, as supple in the knees as if he was all\non oiled hinges; so the next consideration was to get weel out of the\nway, the lookers-on running nearly as great a chance of being shot as\nthe principals, they no being accustomed, like me, for instance, to the\nuse of arms; on which account, I scougged mysel behind a big pear-tree;\nbaith being to fire when Blister gied the word \u201cOff!\u201d\n\nI had hardly jouked into my hidy-hole, when \u201ccrack, crack\u201d played the\npistols like lightning, and as soon as I got my cowl ta\u2019en from my een,\nand looked about, wae\u2019s me, I saw Magneezhy clap his hand to his brow,\nwheel round like a peerie, or a sheep seized wi\u2019 the sturdie, and then\nplay flap down on his braidside, breaking the necks of half a dozen\ncabbage-stocks, three of which were afterwards clean lost, as we couldna\npit them all into the pat at ae time. The hale o\u2019 us ran forrit, but\nforemost was Bloatsheet, who, seizing Magneezhy by the hand, said wi\u2019 a\nmournful face, \u201cI hope you forgive me?\u2014Only say this as long as you have\nbreath, for I am off to Leith harbour in half a minute.\u201d\n\nThe blude was rinning ower puir Magneezhy\u2019s een, and drib-dribbling frae\nthe neb o\u2019 his nose; so he was truly in a pitiful state; but he said\nwith more strength than I thocht he could have mustered,\u2014\u201cYes, yes, fly\nfor your life, I am dying without much pain\u2014fly for your life, for I am\na gone man!\u201d\n\nBloatsheet bounced through the bit kail-yard like a maukin, clamb ower\nthe bit wa\u2019, and aff like mad; while Blister was feeling Magneezhy\u2019s\npulse with ane hand, and looking at his doctor\u2019s watch, which he had in\nthe ither.\n\n\u201cDo ye think that the puir lad will live, doctor?\u201d said I till him.\n\nHe gave his head a wise shake, and only observed, \u201cI dare say, it will\nbe a hanging business amang us. In what direction do you think, Mansie,\nwe should all take flight?\u201d\n\nBut I answered bravely, \u201cFlee them that will, I\u2019se flee nane. If am\nta\u2019en prisoner, the town-officers maun haul me frae my ain house; but\nnevertheless I trust the visibility of my innocence will be as plain as\na pikestaff to the een of the fifteen.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat then, Mansie, will we do with poor Magneezhy? Give us your advice\nin need.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us carry him down to my ain bed,\u201d answered I; \u201cI wad not desert a\nfellow-creature in his dying hour! Help me down wi\u2019 him, and then flee\nthe country as fast as you are able!\u201d\n\nWe immediately proceeded, and lifted the poor lad, wha had now dwaumed\naway, upon our wife\u2019s hand-barrow, Blister taking the feet, and me the\noxters, whereby I got my waistcoat a\u2019 japanned with blude; so, when we\ngot him laid right, we proceeded to carry him between us down the close,\njust as if he had been a stickit sheep, and in at the back door, which\ncost us some trouble, being narrow, and the barrow getting jammed in;\nbut, at lang and last, we got him streeked out aboon the blankets,\nhaving previously shooken Benjie, and waukened him out of his morning\u2019s\nnap.\n\nA\u2019 this being accomplished, and got ower, Blister decamped, leaving me\nmy leeful lane, excepting Benjie, wha was next to naebody, in the house\nwith the deein\u2019 man. What a frightfu\u2019 face he had, all smeared ower with\nblude and pouther! And I really jaloused, that if he deed in that room,\nit wad be haunted for ever mair, he being in a manner a murdered man, so\nthat, even should I be acquitted of art and part, his ghaist might still\ncome to bother us, making our house a hell upon yirth, and frightening\nus out of our seven senses. But, in the midst of my dreadful surmeeses,\nwhen all was still, so that you might hae heard a pin fall, a\nknock-knock-knock cam to the door, on which, recovering my senses, I\ndreaded first that it was the death-chap, and syne that the affair had\ngotten wind, and that it was the beagles come in search of me; so I\nkissed little Benjie, wha was sitting on his creepie, blubbering and\ngreeting for his parritch, while a tear stood in my ain ee, as I gaed\nforrit to lift the sneck, to let the officers, as I thocht, harry our\nhouse, by carrying aff me, its master; but it was\u2014thank Heaven!\u2014only\nTammy Bodkin coming in whistling to his wark with some measuring-papers\nhinging round his neck.\n\n\u201cAh, Tammy,\u201d said I to him, my heart warming at a kent face, and making\nthe laddie, although my bounden servant by a regular indenture of five\nyears, a friend in my need, \u201ccome in, my man. I fear ye\u2019ll hae to tak\ncharge of the business for some time to come. Mind what I tell\u2019d ye\nabout the shaping and the cutting, and no making the goose ower warm, as\nI doubt I am about to be harled awa to the Tolbooth.\u201d\n\nTammy\u2019s heart louped to his mouth.\n\n\u201cAy, maister,\u201d he said, \u201cye\u2019re joking. What should ye have done that ye\nshould be ta\u2019en to sic an ill place?\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, Tammy, lad,\u201d answered I, \u201cit is but ower true.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d quo\u2019 Tammy\u2014I really thought it a great deal of the\nladdie\u2014\u201cweel, weel, they canna prevent me coming to sew beside ye; and,\nif I can tak the measure of customers without, ye can cut the claith\nwithin. But what is\u2019t for, maister?\u201d\n\n\u201cCome in here,\u201d said I to him, \u201cand believe your ain een, Tammy, my\nman.\u201d\n\n\u201cLosh me!\u201d cried the puir laddie, glowering at the bluidy face of the\nman in the bed. \u201cAy\u2014ay\u2014ay! maister; save us, maister; ay\u2014ay\u2014ay\u2014you have\nna cloured his harnpan wi\u2019 the goose? Ay, maister, maister! what an\nunyirthly sight!! I doubt they\u2019ll hang us a\u2019;\u2014you for doing\u2019t, and me on\nsuspicion, and Benjie as art and part, puir thing. But I\u2019ll rin for a\ndoctor. Will I, maister?\u201d\n\nThe thocht had never struck me before, being in a sort of a manner dung\nstupid; but catching up the word, I said wi\u2019 all my pith and birr, \u201cRin,\nrin, Tammy, rin for life and death!\u201d\n\nTammy bolted like a nine-year-auld, never looking ahint his tail: so, in\nless than ten minutes, he returned, hauling alang auld Doctor Gripes,\nwhom he had wakened out o\u2019 his bed by the lug and horn, at the very time\nI was trying to quiet young Benjie, wha was following me up and doun the\nhouse, as I was pacing to and fro in distraction, girning and whinging\nfor his breakfast.\n\n\u201cBad business, bad business; bless us, what is this?\u201d said the auld\ndoctor, staring at Magneezhy\u2019s bluidy face through his silver\nspectacles\u2014\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d\n\nThe puir patient knew at once his maister\u2019s tongue, and, lifting up ane\nof his eyes\u2014the other being stiff and barkened down\u2014said in a melancholy\nvoice, \u201cAh, master, do ye think I\u2019ll get better?\u201d\n\nDoctor Gripes, auld man as he was, started back, as if he had been a\nFrench dancing-master, or had strampit on a het bar of iron. \u201cTom, Tom,\nis this you? What, in the name of wonder, has done this?\u201d Then feeling\nhis wrist\u2014\u201cBut your pulse is quite good. Have you fallen, boy? Where is\nthe blood coming from?\u201d\n\n\u201cSomewhere about the hairy scaup,\u201d answered Magneezhy, in his own sort\nof lingo. \u201cI doubt some artery\u2019s cut through!\u201d\n\nThe doctor immediately bade him lie quiet, and hush, as he was getting a\nneedle and silken thread ready to sew it up; ordering me to get a basin\nand water ready, to wash the puir lad\u2019s physog. I did so as hard as I\nwas able, though I wasna sure about the blude just; auld Doctor Gripes\nwatching ower my shouther, wi\u2019 a lighted penny candle in ae hand, and\nthe needle and thread in the ither, to see where the bluid spouted frae.\nBut we were as daft as wise; so he bade me tak my big shears, and cut\nout a\u2019 the hair on the fore part of the head as bare as my loof; and\nsyne we washed, and better washed; so Magneezhy got the ither ee up,\nwhen the barkened blude was loosed, looking, though as pale as a clean\nshirt, mair frighted than hurt; until it became plain to us all, first\nto the doctor, syne to me, and syne to Tammy Bodkin, and last of a\u2019 to\nMagneezhy himsel, that his skin was na sae much as peeled; so we helped\nhim out of the bed, and blithe was I to see the lad standing on the\nfloor, without a haud, on his ain feet.\n\nI did my best to clean his neckcloth and sark-neck of the blude, making\nhim look as decentish as possible, considering circumstances; and\nlending him, as the Scripture commands, my tartan mantle to hide the\ninfirmity of his bluidy breeks and waistcoat. Hame gaed he and his\nmaister thegither, me standing at our close mouth, wishing them a gude\nmorning, and blithe to see their backs. Indeed, a condemned thief with\nthe rope about his neck, and the white cowl tied ower his een, to say\nnaething of his hands yerked thegither behind his back, and on the nick\nof being thrown ower, couldna been mair thankfu\u2019 for a reprieve than I\nwas, at the same blessed moment. It was like Adam seeing the deil\u2019s rear\nmarching out o\u2019 Paradise, if ane may be allowed to think sic a thing.\n\nThe hale business\u2014tag, rag, and bobtail\u2014soon, however, spunkit out, and\nwas the town talk for mair than ae day. But ye\u2019ll hear.\n\nAt the first I pitied the puir lads, that I thocht had fled for ever and\naye from their native country to Bengal, Seringapatam, Copenhagen,\nBotany Bay, or Jamaica; leaving behint them all their friends and auld\nScotland, as they might never hear o\u2019 the gudeness of Providence in\ntheir behalf. But\u2014wait a wee.\n\nWad ye believe it? As sure\u2019s death, the hale was but a wicked trick\nplayed by that mischievous loon Blister and his cronies, upon ane that\nwas a simple and saft-headed callant. Deil a haet was in the ae pistol\nbut a pluff o\u2019 pouther; and, in the ither, a cartridge paper, fu\u2019 o\u2019\nbull\u2019s blood, was rammed down upon the charge, the which, hiting\nMagneezhy on the ee-bree, had caused a business that seemed to have put\nhim out o\u2019 life, and nearly put me (though ane of the volunteers) out of\nmy seven senses.\u2014_Mansie Wauch._\n\n\n\n\n THE VACANT CHAIR.\n\n BY JOHN MACKAY WILSON.\n\n\nYou have all heard of the Cheviot mountains. They are a rough, rugged,\nmajestic chain of hills, which a poet might term the Roman wall of\nnature; crowned with snow, belted with storms, surrounded by pastures\nand fruitful fields, and still dividing the northern portion of Great\nBritain from the southern. With their proud summits piercing the clouds,\nand their dark, rocky declivities frowning upon the glens below, thay\nappear symbolical of the wild and untamable spirits of the Borderers who\nonce inhabited their sides. We say, you have all heard of the Cheviots,\nand know them to be very high hills, like a huge clasp riveting England\nand Scotland together; but we are not aware that you may have heard of\nMarchlaw, an old, gray-looking farm-house, substantial as a modern\nfortress, recently, and, for aught we know to the contrary, still\ninhabited by Peter Elliot, the proprietor of some five hundred\nsurrounding acres. The boundaries of Peter\u2019s farm, indeed, were defined\nneither by fields, hedges, nor stone walls. A wooden stake here, and a\nstone there, at considerable distances from each other, were the general\nlandmarks; but neither Peter nor his neighbours considered a few acres\nworth quarrelling about; and their sheep frequently visited each other\u2019s\npastures in a friendly way, harmoniously sharing a family dinner, in the\nsame spirit as their masters made themselves free at each other\u2019s\ntables.\n\nPeter was placed in very unpleasant circumstances, owing to the\nsituation of Marchlaw House, which, unfortunately, was built immediately\nacross the \u201cideal line,\u201d dividing the two kingdoms; and his misfortune\nwas, that, being born within it, he knew not whether he was an\nEnglishman or a Scotchman. He could trace his ancestral line no farther\nback than his great-grandfather, who, it appeared from the family Bible,\nhad, together with his grandfather and father, claimed Marchlaw as their\nbirthplace. They, however, were not involved in the same perplexities as\ntheir descendant. The parlour was distinctly acknowledged to be in\nScotland, and two-thirds of the kitchen were as certainly allowed to be\nin England;\u2014his three ancestors were born in the room over the parlour,\nand, therefore, were Scotchmen beyond question; but Peter, unluckily,\nbeing brought into the world before the death of his grandfather, his\nparents occupied a room immediately over the debatable boundary line\nwhich crossed the kitchen. The room, though scarcely eight feet square,\nwas evidently situated between the two countries; but, no one being able\nto ascertain what portion belonged to each, Peter, after many arguments\nand altercations upon the subject, was driven to the disagreeable\nalternative of confessing he knew not what countryman he was. What\nrendered the confession the more painful was, that it was Peter\u2019s\nhighest ambition to be thought a Scotsman. All his arable land lay on\nthe Scottish side; his mother was collaterally related to the Stuarts;\nand few families were more ancient or respectable than the Elliots.\nPeter\u2019s speech, indeed, bewrayed him to be a walking partition between\nthe two kingdoms\u2014a living representation of the Union; for in one word\nhe pronounced the letter _r_ with the broad, masculine sound of the\nNorth Briton, and in the next with the liquid _burr_ of the\nNorthumbrians.\n\nPeter, or, if you prefer it, Peter Elliot, Esquire of Marchlaw, in the\ncounties of Northumberland and Roxburgh, was, for many years, the best\nrunner, leaper, and wrestler between Wooler and Jedburgh. Whirled from\nhis hand, the ponderous bullet whizzed through the air like a pigeon on\nthe wing; and the best \u201cputter\u201d on the Borders quailed from competition.\nAs a feather in his grasp, he seized the unwieldy hammer, swept it round\nand round his head, accompanying with agile limb its evolutions, swiftly\nas swallows play around a circle, and hurled it from his hands like a\nshot from a rifle, till antagonists shrunk back, and the spectators\nburst into a shout. \u201cWell done, squire! the squire for ever!\u201d once\nexclaimed a servile observer of titles. \u201cSquire! wha are ye squiring\nat?\u201d returned Peter. \u201cConfound ye! where was ye when I was christened\nsquire? My name\u2019s Peter Elliot\u2014your man, or onybody\u2019s man, at whatever\nthey like!\u201d\n\nPeter\u2019s soul was free, bounding, and buoyant as the wind that carolled\nin a zephyr, or shouted in a hurricane, upon his native hills; and his\nbody was thirteen stone of healthy substantial flesh, steeped in the\nspirits of life. He had been long married, but marriage had wrought no\nchange upon him. They who suppose that wedlock transforms the lark into\nan owl, offer an insult to the lovely beings who, brightening our\ndarkest hours with the smiles of affection, teach us that that only is\nunbecoming in the husband which is disgraceful in the man. Nearly twenty\nyears had passed over them; but Janet was still as kind, and, in his\neyes, as beautiful as when, bestowing on him her hand, she blushed her\nvows at the altar; and he was still as happy, as generous, and as free.\nNine fair children sat around their domestic hearth, and one, the\nyoungling of the flock, smiled upon its mother\u2019s knee. Peter had never\nknown sorrow; he was blest in his wife, in his children, in his flocks.\nHe had become richer than his fathers. He was beloved by his neighbours,\nthe tillers of his ground, and his herdsmen: yea, no man envied his\nprosperity. But a blight passed over the harvest of his joys, and gall\nwas rained into the cup of his felicity.\n\nIt was Christmas-day, and a more melancholy-looking sun never rose on\nthe 25th of December. One vast, sable cloud, like a universal pall,\noverspread the heavens. For weeks the ground had been covered with\nclear, dazzling snow; and as throughout the day the rain continued its\nunwearied and monotonous drizzle, the earth assumed a character and\nappearance melancholy and troubled as the heavens. Like a mastiff that\nhas lost its owner, the wind howled dolefully down the glens, and was\nre-echoed from the caves of the mountains, as the lamentations of a\nlegion of invisible spirits. The frowning, snow-clad precipices were\ninstinct with motion, as avalanche upon avalanche, the larger burying\nthe less, crowded downward in their tremendous journey to the plain. The\nsimple mountain rills had assumed the majesty of rivers; the broader\nstreams were swollen into the wild torrent, and, gushing forth as\ncataracts, in fury and in foam, enveloped the valleys in an angry flood.\nBut at Marchlaw the fire blazed blithely; the kitchen groaned beneath\nthe load of preparations for a joyful feast; and glad faces glided from\nroom to room.\n\nPeter Elliot kept Christmas, not so much because it was Christmas, as in\nhonour of its being the birthday of Thomas, his first-born, who that day\nentered his nineteenth year. With a father\u2019s love, his heart yearned for\nall his children; but Thomas was the pride of his eyes. Cards of apology\nhad not then found their way among our Border hills; and as all knew\nthat, although Peter admitted no spirits within his threshold, nor a\ndrunkard at his table, he was, nevertheless, no niggard in his\nhospitality, his invitations were accepted without ceremony. The guests\nwere assembled; and the kitchen being the only apartment in the building\nlarge enough to contain them, the cloth was spread upon a long, clean,\noaken table, stretching from England into Scotland. On the English end\nof the board were placed a ponderous plum-pudding, studded with\ntemptation, and a smoking sirloin; on Scotland, a savoury and\nwell-seasoned haggis, with a sheep\u2019shead and trotters; while the\nintermediate space was filled with the good things of this life, common\nto both kingdoms and to the season.\n\nThe guests from the north and from the south were arranged\npromiscuously. Every seat was filled\u2014save one. The chair by Peter\u2019s\nright hand remained unoccupied. He had raised his hands before his eyes,\nand besought a blessing on what was placed before them, and was\npreparing to carve for his visitors, when his eyes fell upon the vacant\nchair. The knife dropped upon the table. Anxiety flashed across his\ncountenance, like an arrow from an unseen hand.\n\n\u201cJanet, where is Thomas?\u201d he inquired; \u201chae nane o\u2019 ye seen him?\u201d and,\nwithout waiting an answer, he continued\u2014\u201cHow is it possible he can be\nabsent at a time like this? And on such a day, too? Excuse me a minute,\nfriends, till I just step out and see if I can find him. Since ever I\nkept this day, as mony o\u2019 ye ken, he has always been at my right hand,\nin that very chair; I canna think o\u2019 beginning our dinner while I see it\nempty.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf the filling of the chair be all,\u201d said a pert young sheep-farmer,\nnamed Johnson, \u201cI will step into it till Master Thomas arrive.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re not a father, young man,\u201d said Peter, and walked out of the room.\n\nMinute succeeded minute, but Peter returned not. The guests became\nhungry, peevish, and gloomy, while an excellent dinner continued\nspoiling before them. Mrs Elliot, whose goodnature was the most\nprominent feature in her character, strove, by every possible effort, to\nbeguile the unpleasant impressions she perceived gathering upon their\ncountenances.\n\n\u201cPeter is just as bad as him,\u201d she remarked, \u201cto hae gane to seek him\nwhen he kenned the dinner wouldna keep. And I\u2019m sure Thomas kenned it\nwould be ready at one o\u2019clock to a minute. It\u2019s sae unthinking and\nunfriendly like to keep folk waiting.\u201d And, endeavouring to smile upon a\nbeautiful black-haired girl of seventeen, who sat by her elbow, she\ncontinued in an anxious whisper\u2014\u201cDid ye see naething o\u2019 him, Elizabeth,\nhinny?\u201d\n\nThe maiden blushed deeply; the question evidently gave freedom to a\ntear, which had, for some time, been an unwilling prisoner in the\nbrightest eyes in the room; and the monosyllable, \u201cNo,\u201d that trembled\nfrom her lips, was audible only to the ear of the inquirer. In vain Mrs\nElliot despatched one of her children after another, in quest of their\nfather and brother; they came and went, but brought no tidings more\ncheering than the moaning of the hollow wind. Minutes rolled into hours,\nyet neither came. She perceived the prouder of her guests preparing to\nwithdraw, and, observing that \u201cThomas\u2019s absence was so singular and\nunaccountable, and so unlike either him or his father, she didna ken\nwhat apology to make to her friends for such treatment; but it was\nneedless waiting, and begged they would use no ceremony, but just\nbegin.\u201d\n\nNo second invitation was necessary. Good humour appeared to be restored,\nand sirloins, pies, pasties, and moorfowl began to disappear like the\nlost son. For a moment, Mrs Elliot apparently partook in the restoration\nof cheerfulness; but a low sigh at her elbow again drove the colour from\nher rosy cheeks. Her eye wandered to the farther end of the table, and\nrested on the unoccupied seat of her husband, and the vacant chair of\nher first-born. Her heart fell heavily within her; all the mother gushed\ninto her bosom; and, rising from the table, \u201cWhat in the world can be\nthe meaning o\u2019 this?\u201d said she, as she hurried, with a troubled\ncountenance, towards the door. Her husband met her on the threshold.\n\n\u201cWhere hae ye been, Peter?\u201d said she, eagerly. \u201cHae ye seen naething o\u2019\nhim?\u201d\n\n\u201cNaething, naething,\u201d replied he; \u201cis he no cast up yet?\u201d And, with a\nmelancholy glance, his eyes sought an answer in the deserted chair. His\nlips quivered, his tongue faltered.\n\n\u201cGude forgie me,\u201d said he, \u201cand such a day for even an enemy to be out\nin! I\u2019ve been up and doun every way that I can think on, but not a\nliving creature has seen or heard tell o\u2019 him. Ye\u2019ll excuse me,\nneebors,\u201d he added, leaving the house; \u201cI must awa again, for I canna\nrest.\u201d\n\n\u201cI ken by mysel, friends,\u201d said Adam Bell, a decent-looking\nNorthumbrian, \u201cthat a faither\u2019s heart is as sensitive as the apple o\u2019\nhis e\u2019e; and I think we would show a want o\u2019 natural sympathy and\nrespect for our worthy neighbour, if we didna every one get his foot\ninto the stirrup without loss o\u2019 time, and assist him in his search.\nFor, in my rough, country way o\u2019 thinking, it must be something\nparticularly out o\u2019 the common that would tempt Thomas to be amissing.\nIndeed, I needna say tempt, for there could be no inclination in the\nway. And our hills,\u201d he concluded, in a lower tone, \u201care not ower chancy\nin other respects, besides the breaking up o\u2019 the storm.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d said Mrs Elliot, wringing her hands, \u201cI have had the coming o\u2019\nthis about me for days and days. My head was growing dizzy with\nhappiness, but thoughts came stealing upon me like ghosts, and I felt a\nlonely soughing about my heart, without being able to tell the cause;\nbut the cause is come at last! And my dear Thomas\u2014the very pride and\nstaff o\u2019 my life\u2014is lost\u2014lost to me for ever!\u201d\n\n\u201cI ken, Mrs Elliot,\u201d replied the Northumbrian, \u201cit is an easy matter to\nsay compose yourself, for them that dinna ken what it is to feel. But,\nat the same time, in our plain, country way o\u2019 thinking, we are always\nready to believe the worst. I\u2019ve often heard my father say, and I\u2019ve as\noften remarked it myself, that, before anything happens to a body, there\nis a something comes ower them, like a cloud before the face o\u2019 the sun;\na sort o\u2019 dumb whispering about the breast from the other world. And\nthough I trust there is naething o\u2019 the kind in your case, yet as you\nobserve, when I find myself growing dizzy, as it were, with happiness,\nit makes good a saying o\u2019 my mother\u2019s, poor body. \u2018Bairns, bairns,\u2019 she\nused to say, \u2018there is ower muckle singing in your heads to-night; we\nwill have a shower before bedtime.\u2019 And I never, in my born days, saw it\nfail.\u201d\n\nAt any other period, Mr Bell\u2019s dissertation on presentiments would have\nbeen found a fitting text on which to hang all the dreams, wraiths,\nwarnings, and marvellous circumstances, that had been handed down to the\ncompany from the days of their grandfathers; but, in the present\ninstance, they were too much occupied in consultation regarding the\ndifferent routes to be taken in their search.\n\nTwelve horsemen, and some half-dozen pedestrians, were seen hurrying in\ndivers directions from Marchlaw, as the last faint lights of a\nmelancholy day were yielding to the heavy darkness which appeared\npressing in solid masses down the sides of the mountains. The wives and\ndaughters of the party were alone left with the disconsolate mother, who\nalternately pressed her weeping children to her heart, and told them to\nweep not, for their brother would soon return; while the tears stole\ndown her own cheeks, and the infant in her arms wept because its mother\nwept. Her friends strove with each other to inspire hope, and poured\nupon her ear their mingled and loquacious consolation. But one remained\nsilent. The daughter of Adam Bell, who sat by Mrs Elliot\u2019s elbow at\ntable, had shrunk into an obscure corner of the room. Before her face\nshe held a handkerchief wet with tears. Her bosom throbbed convulsively;\nand, as occasionally her broken sighs burst from their prison house, a\nsignificant whisper passed among the younger part of the company.\n\nMrs Elliot approached her, and taking her hand tenderly within both of\nhers\u2014\u201cOh, hinny! hinny!\u201d said she, \u201cyer sighs gae through my heart like\na knife! An\u2019 what can I do to comfort ye? Come, Elizabeth, my bonny\nlove, let us hope for the best. Ye see before ye a sorrowin\u2019 mother\u2014a\nmother that fondly hoped to see you an\u2019\u2014I canna say it\u2014an\u2019 I am ill\nqualified to gie comfort, when my own heart is like a furnace! But, oh!\nlet us try and remember the blessed portion, \u2018Whom the Lord loveth He\nchasteneth,\u2019 an\u2019 inwardly pray for strength to say \u2018His will be done!\u2019\u201d\n\nTime stole on towards midnight, and one by one the unsuccessful party\nreturned. As foot after foot approached, every breath was held to\nlisten.\n\n\u201cNo, no, no,\u201d cried the mother, again and again, with increasing\nanguish, \u201cit\u2019s no the foot o\u2019 my ain bairn;\u201d while her keen gaze still\nremained riveted upon the door, and was not withdrawn, nor the hope of\ndespair relinquished, till the individual entered, and with a silent and\nominous shake of his head, betokened his fruitless efforts. The clock\nhad struck twelve; all were returned, save the father. The wind howled\nmore wildly; the rain poured upon the windows in ceaseless torrents; and\nthe roaring of the mountain rivers gave a character of deeper\nghostliness to their sepulchral silence; for they sat, each wrapt in\nforebodings, listening to the storm; and no sounds were heard, save the\ngroans of the mother, the weeping of her children, and the bitter and\nbroken sobs of the bereaved maiden, who leaned her head upon her\nfather\u2019s bosom, refusing to be comforted.\n\nAt length the barking of the farm dog announced footsteps at a distance.\nEvery ear was raised to listen, every eye turned to the door; but,\nbefore the tread was yet audible to the listeners\u2014\u201cOh! it is only\nPeter\u2019s foot!\u201d said the miserable mother, and, weeping, rose to meet\nhim.\n\n\u201cJanet, Janet!\u201d he exclaimed, as he entered, and threw his arms around\nher neck, \u201cwhat\u2019s this come upon us at last?\u201d\n\nHe cast an inquisitive glance around his dwelling, and a convulsive\nshiver passed over his manly frame, as his eye again fell on the vacant\nchair, which no one had ventured to occupy. Hour succeeded hour, but the\ncompany separated not; and low, sorrowful whispers mingled with the\nlamentations of the parents.\n\n\u201cNeighbours,\u201d said Adam Bell, \u201cthe morn is a new day, and we will wait\nto see what it may bring forth; but, in the meantime, let us read a\nportion o\u2019 the Divine Word, an\u2019 kneel together in prayer, that, whether\nor not the day-dawn cause light to shine upon this singular bereavement,\nthe Sun o\u2019 Righteousness may arise wi\u2019 healing on His wings, upon the\nhearts o\u2019 this afflicted family, an\u2019 upon the hearts o\u2019 all present.\u201d\n\n\u201cAmen!\u201d responded Peter, wringing his hands; and his friend, taking down\nthe \u201cHa\u2019 Bible,\u201d read the chapter wherein it is written\u2014\u201cIt is better to\nbe in the house of mourning than in the house of feasting;\u201d and again\nthe portion which saith\u2014\u201cIt is well for me that I have been afflicted,\nfor before I was afflicted I went astray.\u201d\n\nThe morning came, but brought no tidings of the lost son. After a solemn\nfarewell, all the visitants, save Adam Bell and his daughter, returned\nevery one to their own house; and the disconsolate father, with his\nservants, again renewed the search among the hills and surrounding\nvillages.\n\nDays, weeks, months, and years rolled on. Time had subdued the anguish\nof the parents into a holy calm; but their lost first-born was not\nforgotten, although no trace of his fate had been discovered. The\ngeneral belief was, that he had perished on the breaking up of the snow;\nand the few in whose remembrance he still lived, merely spoke of his\ndeath as a \u201cvery extraordinary circumstance,\u201d remarking that \u201che was a\nwild, venturesome sort o\u2019 lad.\u201d\n\nChristmas had succeeded Christmas, and Peter Elliot still kept it in\ncommemoration of the birthday of him who was not. For the first few\nyears after the loss of their son, sadness and silence characterized the\nparty who sat down to dinner at Marchlaw, and still at Peter\u2019s right\nhand was placed the vacant chair. But, as the younger branches of the\nfamily advanced in years, the remembrance of their brother became less\npoignant. Christmas was, with all around them, a day of rejoicing, and\nthey began to make merry with their friends; while their parents partook\nin their enjoyment, with a smile, half of approval and half of sorrow.\n\nTwelve years had passed away; Christmas had again come. It was the\ncounterpart of its fatal predecessor. The hills had not yet cast off\ntheir summer verdure; the sun, although shorn of its heat, had lost none\nof its brightness or glory, and looked down upon the earth as though\nparticipating in its gladness; and the clear blue sky was tranquil as\nthe sea sleeping beneath the moon. Many visitors had again assembled at\nMarchlaw. The sons of Mr Elliot, and the young men of the party, were\nassembled upon a level green near the house, amusing themselves with\nthrowing the hammer, and other Border games, while himself and the elder\nguests stood by as spectators, recounting the deeds of their youth.\nJohnson, the sheep-farmer, whom we have already mentioned, now a brawny\nand gigantic fellow of two-and-thirty, bore away in every game the palm\nfrom all competitors. More than once, as Peter beheld his sons defeated,\nhe felt the spirit of youth glowing in his veins, and, \u201cOh!\u201d muttered\nhe, in bitterness, \u201chad my Thomas been spared to me, he would hae thrown\nhis heart\u2019s blude after the hammer, before he would hae been beat by\ne\u2019er a Johnson in the country!\u201d\n\nWhile he thus soliloquized, and with difficulty restrained an impulse to\ncompete with the victor himself, a dark, foreign-looking, strong-built\nseaman, unceremoniously approached, and, with his arms folded, cast a\nlook of contempt upon the boasting conqueror. Every eye was turned with\na scrutinizing glance upon the stranger. In height he could not exceed\nfive feet nine, but his whole frame was the model of muscular strength;\nhis features open and manly, but deeply sunburnt and weather-beaten; his\nlong, glossy, black hair, curled into ringlets by the breeze and the\nbillow, fell thickly over his temples and forehead; and whiskers of a\nsimilar hue, more conspicuous for size than elegance, gave a character\nof fierceness to a countenance otherwise possessing a striking impress\nof manly beauty. Without asking permission, he stepped forward, lifted\nthe hammer, and, swinging it around his head, hurled it upwards of five\nyards beyond Johnson\u2019s most successful throw. \u201cWell done!\u201d shouted the\nastonished spectators. The heart of Peter Elliott warmed within him, and\nhe was hurrying forward to grasp the stranger by the hand, when the\nwords groaned in his throat, \u201cIt was just such a throw as my Thomas\nwould have made!\u2014my own lost Thomas!\u201d The tears burst into his eyes,\nand, without speaking, he turned back, and hurried towards the house to\nconceal his emotion.\n\nSuccessively, at every game, the stranger had defeated all who ventured\nto oppose him, when a messenger announced that dinner waited their\narrival. Some of the guests were already seated, others entering; and,\nas heretofore, placed beside Mrs Elliot was Elizabeth Bell, still in the\nnoontide of her beauty; but sorrow had passed over her features, like a\nveil before the countenance of an angel. Johnson, crest-fallen and out\nof humour at his defeat, seated himself by her side. In early life he\nhad regarded Thomas Elliot as a rival for her affections; and,\nstimulated by the knowledge that Adam Bell would be able to bestow\nseveral thousands upon his daughter for a dowry, he yet prosecuted his\nattentions with unabated assiduity, in despite of the daughter\u2019s\naversion and the coldness of her father. Peter had taken his place at\nthe table; and still by his side, unoccupied and sacred, appeared the\nvacant chair, the chair of his first-born, whereon none had sat since\nhis mysterious death or disappearance.\n\n\u201cBairns,\u201d said he, \u201cdid nane o\u2019ye ask the sailor to come up and tak a\nbit o\u2019 dinner wi\u2019 us?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe were afraid it might lead to a quarrel with Mr Johnson,\u201d whispered\none of the sons.\n\n\u201cHe is come without asking,\u201d replied the stranger, entering; \u201cand the\nwind shall blow from a new point if I destroy the mirth or happiness of\nthe company.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re a stranger, young man,\u201d said Peter, \u201cor ye would ken this is no a\nmeeting o\u2019 mirth-makers. But, I assure ye, ye are welcome, heartily\nwelcome. Haste ye, lasses,\u201d he added to the servants; \u201csome o\u2019 ye get a\nchair for the gentleman.\u201d\n\n\u201cGentleman, indeed!\u201d muttered Johnson between his teeth.\n\n\u201cNever mind about a chair, my hearties,\u201d said the seaman; \u201cthis will\ndo!\u201d And, before Peter could speak to withhold him, he had thrown\nhimself carelessly into the hallowed, the venerated, the twelve years\nunoccupied chair! The spirit of sacrilege uttering blasphemies from a\npulpit could not have smitten a congregation of pious worshippers with\ndeeper horror and consternation, than did this filling of the vacant\nchair the inhabitants of Marchlaw.\n\n\u201cExcuse me, sir! excuse me, sir!\u201d said Peter, the words trembling upon\nhis tongue; \u201cbut ye cannot\u2014ye cannot sit there!\u201d\n\n\u201cO man! man!\u201d cried Mrs Elliot, \u201cget out o\u2019 that! get out o\u2019 that!\u2014take\nmy chair!\u2014take ony chair i\u2019 the house!\u2014but dinna, dinna sit there! It\nhas never been sat in by mortal being since the death o\u2019 my dear\nbairn!\u2014and to see it filled by another is a thing I canna endure!\u201d\n\n\u201cSir! sir!\u201d continued the father, \u201cye have done it through ignorance,\nand we excuse ye. But that was my Thomas\u2019s seat! Twelve years this very\nday\u2014his birthday\u2014he perished, Heaven kens how! He went out from our\nsight, like the cloud that passes over the hills\u2014never, never to return.\nAnd, O sir, spare a father\u2019s feelings! for to see it filled wrings the\nblood from my heart!\u201d\n\n\u201cGive me your hand, my worthy soul!\u201d exclaimed the seaman; \u201cI\nrevere\u2014nay, hang it! I would die for your feelings! But Tom Elliot was\nmy friend, and I cast anchor in this chair by special commission. I know\nthat a sudden broadside of joy is a bad thing; but as I don\u2019t know how\nto preach a sermon before telling you, all I have to say is\u2014that Tom\naint dead.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot dead!\u201d said Peter, grasping the hand of the stranger, and speaking\nwith an eagerness that almost choked his utterance. \u201cO sir! sir! tell me\nhow!\u2014how!\u2014Did ye say living?\u2014Is my ain Thomas living?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot dead, do ye say?\u201d cried Mrs Elliot, hurrying towards him and\ngrasping his other hand\u2014\u201cnot dead! And shall I see my bairn again? Oh!\nmay the blessing o\u2019 Heaven, and the blessing o\u2019 a broken-hearted mother\nbe upon the bearer o\u2019 the gracious tidings! But tell me\u2014tell me, how is\nit possible? As ye would expect happiness here or hereafter, dinna,\ndinna deceive me!\u201d\n\n\u201cDeceive you!\u201d returned the stranger, grasping, with impassioned\nearnestness, their hands in his\u2014\u201cNever!\u2014never! and all I can say is\u2014Tom\nElliot is alive and hearty.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no!\u201d said Elizabeth, rising from her seat, \u201che does not deceive us;\nthere is that in his countenance which bespeaks a falsehood impossible.\u201d\nAnd she also endeavoured to move towards him, when Johnson threw his arm\naround her to withhold her.\n\n\u201cHands off, you land-lubber!\u201d exclaimed the seaman, springing towards\nthem, \u201cor, shiver me! I\u2019ll show daylight through your timbers in the\nturning of a handspike.\u201d And, clasping the lovely girl in his arms,\n\u201cBetty! Betty, my love!\u201d he cried, \u201cdon\u2019t you know your own Tom? Father,\nmother, don\u2019t you know me? Have you really forgot your own son? If\ntwelve years have made some change on his face, his heart is as sound as\never.\u201d\n\nHis father, his mother, and his brothers clung around him, weeping,\nsmiling, and mingling a hundred questions together. He threw his arms\naround the neck of each, and in answer to their enquiries,\nreplied\u2014\u201cWell! well! there is time enough to answer questions, but not\nto-day\u2014not to-day!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, my bairn,\u201d said his mother, \u201cwe\u2019ll ask you no questions\u2014nobody\nshall ask you any! But how\u2014how were you torn away from us, my love? And,\nO hinny! where\u2014where hae you been?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a long story, mother,\u201d said he, \u201cand would take a week to tell it.\nBut, howsoever, to make a long story short, you remember when the\nsmugglers were pursued, and wished to conceal their brandy in our house,\nmy father prevented them; they left muttering revenge\u2014and they have been\nrevenged. This day twelve years, I went out with the intention of\nmeeting Elizabeth and her father, when I came upon a party of the gang\nconcealed in Hell\u2019s Hole. In a moment half-a-dozen pistols were held to\nmy breast, and, tying my hands to my sides, they dragged me into the\ncavern. Here I had not been long their prisoner, when the snow, rolling\ndown the mountains, almost totally blocked up its mouth. On the second\nnight they cut through the snow, and, hurrying me along with them, I was\nbound to a horse between two, and, before daylight, found myself stowed,\nlike a piece of old junk, in the hold of a smuggling lugger. Within a\nweek I was shipped on board a Dutch man-of-war, and for six years was\nkept dodging about on different stations, till our old yawning hulk\nreceived orders to join the fleet, which was to fight against the\ngallant Duncan at Camperdown. To think of fighting against my own\ncountrymen\u2014my own flesh and blood\u2014was worse than to be cut to pieces by\na cat-o\u2019-nine tails; and, under cover of the smoke of the first\nbroadside, I sprang upon the gunwale, plunged into the sea, and swam for\nthe English fleet. Never, never shall I forget the moment that my feet\nfirst trod upon the deck of a British frigate! My nerves felt as firm as\nher oak, and my heart free as the pennant that waved defiance from her\nmasthead! I was as active as any one during the battle; and when it was\nover, and I found myself again among my own countrymen, and all speaking\nmy own language, I fancied\u2014nay, hang it! I almost believed\u2014I should meet\nmy father, my mother, or my dear Bess, on board of the British frigate.\nI expected to see you all again in a few weeks at farthest; but, instead\nof returning to old England, before I was aware, I found it was helm\nabout with us. As to writing, I never had an opportunity but once. We\nwere anchored before a French fort; a packet was lying alongside ready\nto sail; I had half a side written, and was scratching my head to think\nhow I should come over writing about you, Bess, my love, when, as bad\nluck would have it, our lieutenant comes to me, and says he, \u2018Elliot,\u2019\nsays he, \u2018I know you like a little smart service; come, my lad, take the\nhead oar, while we board some of those French bum-boats under the\nbatteries.\u2019 I couldn\u2019t say no. We pulled ashore, made a bonfire of one\nof their craft, and were setting fire to a second, when a deadly shower\nof small shot from the garrison scuttled our boat, killed our commanding\nofficer with half of the crew, and the few who were left of us were made\nprisoners. It is of no use bothering you by telling how we escaped from\na French prison. We did escape, and Tom once more fills his vacant\nchair.\u201d\n\nShould any of our readers wish farther acquaintance with our friends,\nall we can say is, the new year was still young when Adam Bell bestowed\nhis daughter\u2019s hand upon the heir of Marchlaw, and Peter beheld the once\nvacant chair again occupied, and a namesake of the third generation\nprattling on his knee.\n\n\n\n\n COLKITTOCH.\n\n\nThe name of Colkittoch often occurs in the history of the great\nrebellion in the reign of Charles I. By some he is denominated Macdonald\nof Colkittoch, by others Colkittoch, and by many he is confounded with\nhis son. His name was Coll, or Colle, Macdonald: he was a native of\nIreland. His father was Archibald Macdonell, who was an illegitimate son\nof the Earl of Antrim. With the aid of his partisans, Coll took violent\npossession of the island of Colonsay, one of the Hebrides, having driven\naway the Macfees, who had held it for many centuries. Coll was\ndenominated Kittoch, or, more correctly, Ciotach, from his being\nleft-handed. Coll had distinguished himself in the unhappy disturbances\nin Ireland, and when Lord Antrim sent troops to Scotland as auxiliaries\nin the royal cause, he served as an officer under his own son, Allister,\nor Alexander, who had the chief command of the corps. The father and son\nwere well qualified for this service, both of them being well known in\nthe Highlands, and connected by blood or marriage with some of the best\nfamilies in that country.\n\nColl was noted for his strength and prowess, though tainted with the\ncruelty too familiar to his countrymen at that time. He fought in all\nthe battles in which the Irish auxiliaries were engaged under Montrose;\nhe was also concerned in their plundering expeditions in Argyleshire,\nwhere private revenge was unfortunately added to the horrors of war.\nMany of the lyric compositions of those days extol his bravery and his\nbloody vengeance on his antagonists, the Campbells, though it seems he\nwas on very friendly terms with some of that name.\n\nColl had possession of the Castle of Duntroon, and having placed a\ngarrison in it, he went to another quarter; but in his absence it was\ntaken by stratagem. He was ignorant of this misfortune, and on his\nreturn he steered his boat direct for the castle. His own piper was then\na prisoner there; and knowing his master\u2019s boat, to warn him of his\ndanger, he played a tune which he composed for the purpose; and so\naccurately did the sound correspond with the meaning, that Coll\nunderstood the intention, and avoided the castle.\n\nAfter the defeat of Montrose at Philiphaugh, and the retreat of his son\nAlexander to Ireland, Coll was left in command of the castle of\nDunaovaig, the ancient seat of the Macdonalds of Islay. The garrison\nconsisted of 150 men; but the pipes which conveyed the water being cut\nby the enemy, on the assurance of Sir David Leslie, who commanded the\nparliamentary forces, Coll was induced to go out of the castle to hold\nparley with his old friend Campbell of Dunstaffnage. Leslie basely broke\nhis word, and made Coll prisoner. The Marquis of Argyle was present on\nthe occasion, and was blamed for this. After the Restoration, when\nArgyle was brought to trial, he was accused of the heinous crime of\nhaving ordered this garrison to be put on a rock, surrounded by the sea,\nto perish without food or water. He denied all knowledge of any such\nthing; and the proof on this point does not appear satisfactory, nor\ncould we find any tradition in that country of such an atrocious action.\n\nColl was committed to the custody of the captain of Dunstaffnage, in\nwhose castle he was confined, and the tower where he lay is still named\nafter him. That gentleman being no doubt sensible of the dishonourable\ntreatment his prisoner had received, gave him every possible indulgence.\nHe permitted Coll to walk about the place, but he had cause to repent\nhis lenity. The Marquis of Argyle charged him with misconduct; and\ndreading the well-known severity of his chief, Dunstaffnage denied it.\nArgyle swore that if Coll should be found at large, the captain would be\nseverely punished, and a messenger was despatched to ascertain the fact.\nDunstaffnage being at Inveraray at the time, ordered his foster-brother\nto set off with all speed, and outrun the other, which he did; and on\ncoming in sight of the castle, he cried out, \u201cColl in irons! Coll in\nirons!\u201d Coll was occupied in superintending the shearing of corn at the\ntime, and was the first who heard the cries. Conjecturing what the cause\nmight be, he instantly retired to his dungeon, and with his own hands\nput on the irons. He was soon after this brought to trial before the\nsheriff of Argyle, in the castle where he was confined. Maclean of\nArdgour, who originally had been on the royal side, was one of the jury;\nand wishing to display his zeal for the republican cause, which, with\nmany others, he then espoused, asked Coll if he had been present at the\nbattle of Inverlochy; the prisoner boldly replied, \u201cBy my baptism! I was\nso, carle, and did more service there than thyself.\u201d He was condemned to\ndie, and was executed, by hanging from the mast of his own boat, laid\nacross the cleft of a rock.[11] He suffered death without dismay,\nrequesting that his body might be laid so near that of his friend, the\ncaptain of Dunstaffnage, that they might exchange snuff-boxes in their\ngraves; and this request was complied with. The fate of Collkittoch was\namply avenged: at the Restoration, his death and sufferings formed some\nof the most serious and fatal charges against the Marquis of\nArgyle.\u2014_\u201cTraditions of the Western Highlands,\u201d in the London Literary\nGazette._\n\nFootnote 11:\n\n Coll\u2019s execution took place in 1647.\n\n\n\n\n THE COVENANTERS:\n _A TRADITIONARY TALE OF LANARKSHIRE_.\n\n BY ROBERT MACNISH, LL.D.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nDuring the persecutions in Scotland, consequent upon the fruitless\nattempt to root out Presbyterianism and establish Episcopacy by force,\nthere lived one Allan Hamilton, a farmer, at the foot of the Lowther\nmountains in Lanarkshire. His house was situated in a remote valley,\nwhich, though of small extent, was beautiful and romantic, being\nembosomed on all sides by hills covered to their summits with rich\nverdure. Around the house was a considerable piece of arable ground, and\nbehind it a well-stocked orchard and garden. A few tall trees grew in\nfront, waving their ample foliage over the roof, while at each side of\nthe door was a little plot planted with honeysuckle, wallflower, and\nvarious odoriferous shrubs. The owner of this neat mansion was a\nfortunate man; for the world had hitherto gone well with him, and if he\nhad lost his wife\u2014an affliction which sixteen years had mellowed over\u2014he\nwas blessed with an affectionate and virtuous daughter. He had two male\nand as many female servants to assist him in his farming operations; and\nso well had his industry been rewarded, that he might be considered as\none of the most prosperous husbandmen in that part of the country.\n\nMary Hamilton, his only child, was, at the time we speak of, nineteen\nyears of age. She was an extremely handsome girl, and, though living in\nso remote a quarter, the whole district of the Lowthers rung with the\nfame of her beauty. But this was the least of her qualifications, for\nher mind was even fairer than her person; and on her pure spirit the\nimpress of virtue and affection was stamped in legible characters.\n\nAllan, though a religious man, was not an enthusiast; and, from certain\nprudent considerations, had forborne to show any of that ardent zeal for\nthe faith which distinguished many of his countrymen. He approved\nsecretly in his heart of the measures adopted by the Covenanters, and\ninwardly prayed for their success; but these matters he kept to his own\nmind, reading his Bible with his daughter at home, and not exposing\nhimself or her to the machinations of the persecuting party.\n\nIt was on an August evening that he and his daughter were seated\ntogether in their little parlour. He had performed all his daily\nlabours, and had permitted his servants to go to some rural meeting\nseveral miles off. Being thus left undisturbed, he enjoyed with her that\nquiet rest so grateful after a day spent in toil. The day had been\nremarkably beautiful; but towards nightfall, the heavens were overcast\nwith dark clouds, and the sun had that sultry glare which is so often\nthe forerunner of a tempest. When this luminary disappeared beneath the\nmountains, he left a red and glowing twilight behind him; and over the\nfirmament a tissue of crimson clouds was extended, mingled here and\nthere with black vapours. The atmosphere was hot, sickening, and\noppressive, and seemed to teem with some approaching convulsion.\n\n\u201cWe shall have a storm to-night,\u201d Allan remarked to his daughter. \u201cI\nwish that I had not let the servants out; they will be overtaken in it\nto a certainty as they cross the moors.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is no fear of them, father,\u201d replied Mary; \u201cthey know the road\nwell; at any rate, the tempest will be over before they think of\nstirring from where they are.\u201d\n\nAllan did not make any answer, but continued looking through the window\nopposite to which he was placed. He could see from it the mountain of\nLowther, the highest in Lanarkshire; its huge shoulders and top were\ndistinctly visible, standing forth in grand relief from the red clouds\nabove and behind it. The last rays of the sun, bursting from the rim of\nthe horizon, still lingered upon the hill, and, casting over its western\nside a broad and luminous glare, gave to it the appearance of a\nburnished pyramid towering from the earth. This gorgeous vision,\nhowever, did not continue long. In a few minutes the mountain lost its\nruddy tint, and the sky around it became obscurer. Shortly afterwards a\nhuge sable cloud was observed hovering over its summit. \u201cLook, Mary,\u201d\ncried Allan to his daughter, \u201cdid you ever see anything grander than\nthis? Look at yon black cloud that hangs over Lowther.\u201d Mary did so, and\nsaw the same thing as was remarked by her father. The cloud came down\nslowly and majestically, enveloped the summit of the mountain, and\ndescended for some way upon its sides. At last, when it had fairly\nsettled, confirming, as it were, its dismal empire, a flash of fire was\nseen suddenly to issue from the midst of it. It revealed, for an\ninstant, the summit of Lowther; then vanishing with meteor-like\nrapidity, left everything in the former state of gloom. Mary clung with\nalarm to her father. \u201cHush, my dear,\u201d said Allan, pressing her closely\nto him, \u201cand you will hear the thunder.\u201d He had scarcely pronounced the\nword when a clap was heard, so loud that the summit of the mountain\nappeared to be rent in twain. The terrific sound continued some time,\nfor the neighbouring hills caught it up and re-echoed it to each other,\ntill it died away in the distance. A succession of flashes and peals\nfrom different quarters succeeded, and, in a short time, a deluge of\nrain poured down with the utmost violence.\n\nThe two inmates did not hear this noise without alarm. The rain beat\nloudly upon the windows, while, every now and then, fearful peals of\nthunder burst overhead. Without, no object was visible: darkness alone\nprevailed, varied at intervals with fierce glares of lightning.\nThereafter gusts of wind began to sweep with tumult through the glen;\nand the stream which flowed past the house was evidently swollen, from\nthe increased noise of its current rushing impetuously on.\n\nThe tempest continued to rage with unabated violence, when a knock was\nheard at the door. Allan opened it, expecting to find his domestics; but\nto his astonishment and dismay he beheld the Rev. Thomas Hervey, one of\nthe most famous preachers of the Covenant. He was a venerable old man,\nand seemed overcome with fatigue and want, for he was pale and drooping,\nwhile his thin garments were drenched with rain. Now, though Allan\nHamilton would yield to no man in benevolence, he never, on any\noccasion, felt so disposed, as at present, to outrage his own feelings,\nand cast aside the godlike virtue of charity. Mr Hervey, like many other\ngood men, was proscribed by the ruling powers; and persecution then ran\nso high, that to grant him a night\u2019s lodging amounted to a capital\ncrime. Many persons had already been shot for affording this slight\ncharity to the outlawed Covenanters: Allan himself had been an unwilling\nwitness of this dreadful fact. It was not, therefore, with his usual\nalacrity that he welcomed in the way-worn stranger. On the contrary, he\nheld the door half-shut, and in a tone of embarrassment asked him what\nhe wanted.\n\n\u201cI see, Mr Hamilton,\u201d said the minister, calmly, \u201cthat you do not wish I\nshould cross your threshold. You ask me what I want. Is that Christian?\nWhat can any one want in a night like this, but lodgment and protection?\nIf you grant it to me, I shall pray for you and yours; if you refuse it,\nI can only shake the dust off my feet and depart, albeit it be to\ndeath.\u201d\n\n\u201cMr Hervey,\u201d said Allan, \u201cyou know your situation, and you know mine. I\nwould be loth to treat the meanest thing that breathes as I have now\ntreated you; but you are an outlawed man, and a lodging for one night\nunder my roof is as much as my life is worth. Was it not last month I\nsaw one of my nearest neighbours cruelly slain for doing a less\nthing,\u2014even for giving a morsel of bread to one of your brethren? Mr\nHervey, I repeat it, and with sorrow, that you know my situation, and\nthat for the sake of my poor daughter and myself I have no alternative.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I know your situation,\u201d answered the preacher, drawing himself up\nindignantly. \u201cYou are one of those faint-hearted believers who, for the\nsake of ease and temporal gain, have deserted that glorious cause for\nwhich your fathers have struggled. You are one of those who can stand by\ncoolly and see others fight the good fight; and when they have overcome,\nyou will doubtless enjoy the blessed fruits of their combating. You held\nback in the time of need: you have abetted prelacy and persecution, in\nso far as you have not set your shoulder to the wheel of the Covenant.\nNow, when a humble forwarder of that holy cause craves from you an hour\nof shelter, you stand with your door well-nigh closed, and refuse him\nadmittance. I leave God to judge of your iniquity, and I quit your\ninhospitable and unchristian mansion.\u201d\n\nHe was moving off when Mary Hamilton, who had listened with a beating\nheart to this colloquy, rushed forward and caught him by the arm. Her\nbeautiful eyes were wet with tears, and she looked at her parent with an\nexpression in which entreaty and upbraiding were mingled together. \u201cYou\nwill not turn out this poor old man, father? Indeed you will not. You\nwere only jesting. Come in, Mr Hervey; my father did not mean what he\nsaid;\u201d\u2014and she led him in by the hand, pushing gently back Allan, who\nstill stood by the door. \u201cNow, Mr Hervey, sit down there and dry\nyourself; and, father, shut the door.\u201d\n\n\u201cThank you, my fair maiden,\u201d said the minister. \u201cThe Lord, for this good\ndeed, will aid you in your distresses. You have shown that the old may\nbe taught by the young; and I pray that this lesson of charity, which\nyou have given to your father, may not turn out to your scaith or his.\u201d\n\nAllan said nothing; he felt that the part he had acted was hardly a\ngenerous one, although perhaps justified by the stern necessity of the\ntimes. His heart was naturally benevolent, and in the consciousness of\nself-reproach every dread of danger was obliterated.\n\nThe first attention of him and Mary was directed to their guest. His\ngarments having been thoroughly dried, food was placed before him, of\nwhich he partook, after returning thanks to God in a lengthened grace,\nfor so disposing towards him the hearts of His creatures. When he had\nfinished the repast, he raised his face slightly towards heaven, closed\nhis eyes, and clasping his hands together, fervently implored the\nblessings of Providence on the father of that mansion and his child.\nWhen he had done this, he took a small Bible from his pocket, and read\nsome of the most affecting passages of the Old Testament, descanting\nupon them as he went along: how God fed Elijah in the wilderness; how he\nconducted the Israelites through their forty years of sojourn; how\nDaniel, by faith, remained unhurt in the lion\u2019s den; and how Shadrach,\nMeshach, and Abednego, walked through the fiery furnace, and not even\ntheir garments were touched by the flames. Allan and Mary listened with\nthe most intense interest to the old man, whose voice became stronger,\nwhose form seemed to dilate, and whose eyes were lit up with a sort of\nprophetic rapture, as he threw his spirit into those mysteries of Holy\nWrit.\n\nAfter having concluded this part of his devotions, and before retiring\nto rest, he proposed that evening prayer should be offered up. Each\naccordingly knelt down, and he commenced in a strain of ardent and\nimpassioned language. He deplored the afflicted state of God\u2019s kirk;\nprayed that the hearts of those who still clung to it might be confirmed\nand made steadfast; that confidence might be given to the wavering; that\nthose who from fear or worldly considerations had held off from the good\ncause, might be taught to see the error of their ways; and that all\nbacksliders might be reclaimed, and become goodly members of the broken\nand distressed Covenant. \u201cO Lord!\u201d continued he, \u201cThou who hast watched\nover us in all time\u2014who from Thy throne in the highest heaven hast\nvouchsafed to hearken to the prayer of Thy servants, Thou will not now\nabandon us in our need. We have worshipped Thee from the depths of the\nvalley, and the rocks and hills of the desert have heard our voices\ncalling upon Thy name. \u2018Where is your temple, ye outcast remnant?\u2019 cry\nthe scorners. We answer, O Lord, that we have no temple, but such as\nThou hast created; and yet from that tabernacle of the wilderness hast\nthou heard us, though storms walked around. We have trod the valley of\nthe shadow of death, and yet Thou hast been a light in our path; we have\nbeen chased like wild beasts through the land, yet Thy spirit hath not\ndeserted us; armed men have encompassed us on all sides, threatening to\ndestroy, yet our hearts have not failed; neither has the prison nor the\ntorture had power to make us abjure Thy most holy laws.\u201d\n\nDuring the whole of his supplication, which he had poured forth with\nsingular enthusiasm, the storm continued without, and distant peals of\nthunder were occasionally heard. This convulsion of the elements did\nnot, however, distract his thoughts; on the contrary, it rendered them\nmore ardent; and in apostrophising the tempest he frequently rose to a\npitch of wild sublimity. Mary listened with deep awe. Her feelings,\nconstitutionally warm and religious, were aroused, and she sobbed with\nemotion. Allan Hamilton, though not by nature a man of imagination, was\nalso strongly affected; he breathed hard, and occasionally a\nhalf-suppressed groan came from his breast. He could not help feeling\ndeep remorse for the lukewarmness he had shown to the great cause then\nat stake.\n\nThe night, though fearfully tempestuous, did not prevent slumber from\nfalling on the eyes of all. Each slept soundly, and the old minister,\nperhaps, more so than any. Many months had elapsed since he had\nstretched himself on such a couch as that which Mary Hamilton had\nprepared for him; for he was a dweller in the desert, and had often lain\nupon the heath, with no other shelter than his plaid afforded. His\nslumbers, therefore, were delicious; but they were not long, for no\nsooner had the morning light begun to peep through the window of his\nchamber than he was up and at his devotions. Allan, though an early\nriser, was still in bed, and not a little astonished when he heard his\ndoor open, and saw the old man walk softly up to his side.\n\n\u201cHush! Allan Hamilton, do not awaken the dear maiden, your daughter, in\nthe next room. I have come to thank you and to bid you farewell. The\nmorning sun is up, and I may not tarry longer here, consistent with my\nown safety or yours. There are spies through all the country; but\nperadventure I have escaped their observation. I am going a few miles\noff near the Clyde, to meet sundry of my flock who are to assemble\nthere. May God bless you, and send better times to this afflicted land!\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nWhen Allan and his daughter sat down to their homely breakfast, the\nmorning presented a pleasing contrast to the previous night. The sky was\nperfectly clear and serene. Every mountain sparkled, and the earth had a\npeculiar freshness diffused over its surface. The few clouds visible\nwere at a great elevation, and were hurrying away, as if not to leave a\nstain on the transparent concave of heaven. There was little wind on the\nlower regions, scarcely sufficient to ruffle the surface of a slumbering\nlake. The dampness of the grass, the clay washed from the pebbles, and\nthe rivulet swollen and turbid, were the only relics of the tempest. The\nweather continued beautifully serene, and when the sun was at its\nheight, one of the finest days was presented that ever graced this most\ngorgeous month of the year.\n\nIt was about the middle of the day when Mary, who happened to look out,\nperceived six armed troopers approaching. They were on foot, their\nbroadswords hanging at their sides, and carbines swung over their\nshoulders. In addition to this, each had a couple of pistols stuck in\nhis belt. As soon as she saw them she ran in to her father with manifest\nlooks of alarm, and informed him of their approach. Allan could not help\nfeeling uneasy at this intelligence; for the military were then\nuniversally dreaded, and whenever a number were seen together, it was\nalmost always on some errand of destruction. He went to the door; but\njust as he reached it the soldiers were on the point of entering. The\nleader of this body he recognised to be the ferocious Captain\nClobberton, who had rendered himself universally infamous by his\ncruelties; and who, it was reported, had in his career of persecution\ncaused no less than seventeen persons to be put to death, in cold blood,\nwithout even the formality of a trial. He was one of the chief\nfavourites of Dalzell, who used to call him his \u201clamb.\u201d The man\u2019s aspect\ndid not belie his heart, for it was fierce, lowering, and cruel. His\ncompanions, with a single exception, seemed well suited to their leader,\nand fit instruments to carry his bloody mandates into execution. Allan,\nwhen he confronted this worthy agent of tyranny, turned back, followed\nby him and his crew into the house.\n\n\u201cShut the door, my dear chucks,\u201d said Clobberton; \u201cwe must have some\nconversation with this godly man. So, Mr Hamilton, you have taken up\nwith that pious remnant: you have turned a psalm-singer, eh? Come, don\u2019t\nstare at me as if you saw an owl; answer my question\u2014yes or no.\u201d Allan\nlooked at him with a steady eye. \u201cCaptain Clobberton, you have asked me\nno question. I shall not scruple to answer anything which may be justly\ncommanded of me.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnswer me, then, sir,\u201d continued the captain. \u201cWere you not present at\nthe field-preaching near Lanark, when one of the king\u2019s soldiers was\nslain, in attempting with several others to disperse it?\u201d\n\n\u201cI was not,\u201d answered Allan; \u201cI never in my life attended a\nfield-preaching.\u201d\n\n\u201cOr a conventicle?\u201d\n\n\u201cNor a conventicle either.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you mean to deny that you are one of that hypocritical set, who\npreach their absurd and treasonable jargon in defiance of the law? In a\nword, do you deny that you are one of the sworn members of the\nCovenant?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do deny it, stoutly.\u201d\n\n\u201cAcknowledge it, and save your wretched life. Acknowledge it, or I will\nconfront you with a proof which will perhaps astonish you, and cost you\nmore than you are aware of.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will tell no untruth, even to save my life.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen on your own stupid head rest the consequences. Do you know one\nHervey, a preacher?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do,\u201d said Allan, firmly.\n\n\u201cHa, here it comes! You have then spoken to that man, most godly Allan?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have spoken to him.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe has been in your house?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do not mean to deny that he has.\u201d\n\n\u201cHas he not sung psalms in your house, and prayed in your house, and\nlodged in your house? Eh? And was it not last night that these doings\nwere going on?\u201d\n\n\u201cI will gainsay nothing of what you have said.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen Allan Hamilton,\u201d said the other, \u201cI tell you plainly that you have\nharboured a traitor; and that unless you deliver him up, or tell where\nhe may be found, I shall hold you guilty of treason, and punish you\naccordingly.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe Lord\u2019s will be done,\u201d answered Hamilton, with a deep sigh. \u201cWhat I\ndid was an act of common charity. The old man applied to me in his\ndistress; and it would have been cruel to have closed my door against\nhim. Wreak your will upon me as it pleases you. Where he has gone I know\nnot; and though I did know, I should hardly consider myself justified in\ntelling you.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen we shall make short work with you,\u201d rejoined Clobberton with an\noath. \u201cRoss, give him ten minutes to say his prayers, and then bind up\nhis eyes. It is needless to palaver with him. We have other jobs of a\nlike kind to manage to-day.\u201d\n\nHere Mary, who stood in a corner listening with terrified heart, uttered\na loud scream when she heard her father\u2019s doom pronounced. She rushed\nforth into the middle of the room, and fell upon her knees before\nClobberton.\n\n\u201cOh, captain, do not slay my father! Take _my_ life. It was _my_ fault\nalone that the old man was let into the house. My father refused to\nadmit him. Take my life and save his. I shall be his murderess if he\ndie\u2014for I brought him into this trouble.\u201d\n\nShe continued some moments in this attitude, gazing up at him with looks\nof fear and entreaty, and clasping his knees. He had, however, been too\nlong accustomed to scenes of this afflicting nature to be much moved;\nand he extricated himself from the unhappy girl with brutal rudeness.\nShe fell speechless at his feet.\n\n\u201cConfound the wench! Was there ever seen the like of it? She takes me\nfor one of your chicken-hearted milksops,\u2014out of the way with the\nninny.\u201d\n\nHe was about to lay rough hands upon her, when a trooper, stepping\nforward, raised her gently up and placed her on a seat. This was the\nonly one of Clobberton\u2019s followers whose appearance was at all\nindicative of humanity. He was a handsome and strongly-built young man\nof six feet. His countenance was well formed; but its expression was\nrather dissolute, and rendered stern, apparently by the prevalence of\nsome fierce internal passion. The marks of a generous heart were,\nnotwithstanding, imprinted upon its bold outlines; and whoever looked\nupon him could not help thinking that his natural disposition had been\nperverted by the wicked characters and scenes among which he was placed.\n\n\u201cCaptain,\u201d said he, \u201cI do not see the use of shooting this old fool. I\nbegin to feel that we have had a surfeit of this work. Besides, if what\nthe girl declares is correct, there is no great matter of treason in the\ncase. At all events, I would vote to leave the business to the\nJusticiary.\u201d\n\n\u201cGraham,\u201d said Clobberton, eyeing him sternly, \u201cgive me none of your\ncursed whining palaver. What is your liver made of? When there is\nanything in the way of justice to be done, you are as mealy and\ncream-faced as if you saw the devil. A fine fellow to wear the king\u2019s\nuniform! If you say another word,\u201d added he, with a frightful oath,\n\u201cI\u2019ll have you reported to the general!\u201d\n\n\u201cCaptain,\u201d said Graham, stepping modestly but firmly forward, \u201cyou may\nspeak of me as you please\u2014you are my officer\u2014(though neither you nor any\nman of the regiment need be told that when my service was needed in real\ndanger, I was never behind); but I cannot stand by unmoved and see\ndownright butchery. If you have anything to urge against this man, let\nhim be brought to Edinburgh, and there tried by the commission, which\nwill punish him severely enough, in all conscience, if he be really\nguilty. I have assisted in some of these murders; but my conscience\ntells me that I have done wrong; and whatever the consequences be, I\nshall assist at them no more.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy,\u201d said Clobberton, \u201cyou are a pretty dainty fellow\u2014fitter to strut\nabout in regimentals before wenches than behave like a man; but, Mr John\nGraham, let me tell you that your eloquence, instead of retarding, has\nhastened the fate of this rascally traitor. And, let me tell you\nfarther, that on my arrival at head-quarters, I shall have you arraigned\nfor mutiny and disobedience of orders. Ross, blindfold Hamilton and lead\nhim out.\u201d\n\nHis command was instantly executed; while Mary, in a fit of distraction,\nflew up to her father, cast her arms round his neck, and kissed him with\nthe most heart-rending affliction.\n\n\u201cMy father, my father, I am your murderess! I will die with you! Ye\ncruel-hearted men, will none of you save him from this bloody death?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear Mary, may God protect you, and send you a happier lot than\nmine,\u201d was all that the unhappy parent could articulate. He was then\ntorn from her with violence, and hurried out to the green before the\nhouse. Mary, on this separation, fell into a short swoon; on awakening\nfrom which she found herself in the chamber with no one except Graham.\nHis face was flushed with anger, and he walked impatiently up and down.\nBy a sudden impulse she ran to the window, and the first sight which\ncaught her eye was her father kneeling down, and opposite to him the\nfour troopers, seemingly waiting for the signal of Clobberton, who\nlooked intently at his watch. At this terrifying spectacle, and in an\nagony of desperation, she threw herself on her knees before the soldier.\n\n\u201cYoung man\u2014young man, save my father\u2019s life! Oh, try at least to save\nhim. I will love you, and work for you, and be your slave for ever.\nBlessings on your kind heart, you will do it\u2014yes, you will do it.\u201d And\nshe rose up and threw her arms round his neck, and kissed him on the\ncheek. A tear rolled from Graham\u2019s manly eye, and his soul was moved\nwith compassion for the lovely being who clung to him and implored him\nso feelingly. He turned an instant to the window.\n\n\u201cLet me go, my dear\u2014the accursed miscreant is putting up his watch and\nhas told them to present; there is not a second to lose.\u201d\n\nWithout saying another word, he unslung his carbine, rushed to the open\nair\u2014and shot Clobberton dead on the spot.\n\nThe troopers were confounded at this sudden action. They lowered the\nweapons which they had that instant raised to their shoulders, and stood\nfor some time gazing confusedly at each other\u2014then at Graham\u2014then at the\nbody of their captain. When they recovered their self-possession, they\nraised up the latter to see if any spark of life remained. He was\nperfectly dead. The following colloquy then ensued between them.\n\n_Russell._\u2014Why, I thinks as how he be dead.\n\n_Smith._\u2014Dead! ay, as dead as Julius C\u00e6sar. I wonder what old Dalzell\nwill say when he hears of his dear \u201clamb\u201d being butchered thus?\n\n_Russell._\u2014Now hang it, Smith, don\u2019t speak ill of the captain. He was a\nworthy man\u2014that is to say, after his own fashion; and no one ever sarved\nhis country better in the way of ridding it of crop-eared preachers: he\nwas worth a score of hangmen.\n\n_Ross._\u2014Gentlemen, there is no occasion to stand jesting and talking\nnonsense. Here is as pretty a piece of murder as ever was committed; and\nit remains for us to decide what we will do, first with the traitor,\nHamilton, and secondly with the murderer, Graham.\n\n_Graham._\u2014Whatever you do with me, I hope you will not harm that poor\nman. Let him go; and thus do a charitable action for once in your lives.\n\n_Russell._\u2014I always, do you see, gentlemen, goes with the majority. Hang\nit, shoot or not is all one to Dick Russell. If you make up your minds\nto let him go scot-free, why, I\u2019se not oppose it.\n\n_Jones._\u2014Well, well, let him go and sing psalms in his own canting\nfashion.\n\nThe fact is, these men were getting sick of shedding innocent blood, and\nalthough ready to spill more on being ordered, rather shunned it than\notherwise\u2014especially when their victims were unresisting.\n\n\u201cI see, comrades, you are agreed to let the old fool go unharmed,\u201d said\nRoss. Then walking up to Allan, who still knelt\u2014his daughter with her\narms around him, awaiting in terrible suspense the result of their\ndeliberation, \u201cGet up,\u201d said he, \u201cand bless your stars; but take care in\nfuture of your treasonable Covenanting tricks under the cloak of\ncharity. It is not every day you will get a young fellow to shoot your\nexecutioner and save your life. As for you, Graham,\u201d turning to his\ncompanion, \u201cI hold you prisoner. You must accompany us to head-quarters,\nand there take your trial for this business. You have committed a black\nmurder on the body of your officer; and if we failed to bring you up,\nold Dalzell would have us shot like so many pyets the minute after.\u201d\n\nGraham\u2019s carbine and pistols were immediately taken from him, and his\nhands tied behind his back by the remaining troopers.\n\n\u201cFarewell, young woman,\u201d said he to Mary, who looked at him with tears\nof gratitude, \u201cfarewell! I have saved your father\u2019s life and forfeited\nmy own: don\u2019t forget Jack Graham.\u201d\n\nThe unfortunate girl was distracted at this heartrending sight; and she\nrushed forward to entreat his guards to give him liberty. One of them\npresented his carbine at her\u2014\n\n\u201cOff, mistress; blast my heart, if it were not for your pretty face, I\nwould send an ounce of cold lead through you. What the devil\u2014haven\u2019t we\nspared your father\u2019s life, and you would have us connive at the escape\nof a murderer, to the risk of our own necks!\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not distress yourself about me, my sweet girl,\u201d cried\nGraham\u2014\u201cfarewell once more!\u201d\n\nAnd she turned back weeping, while the troopers held their way towards\nthe western outlet of the valley.\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\nMary was too generous to be happy in the safety of her father, when that\nwas bought with the life of his brave deliverer. When Graham was taken\naway, she felt a pang as if he had been led to execution. Instead,\ntherefore, of indulging in selfish congratulation, her whole soul was\ntaken up in the romantic and apparently hopeless scheme of extricating\nhim from his danger. There was not a moment to lose; and she asked her\nfather if he could think of any way in which a rescue might be\nattempted.\n\n\u201cMary, my dear, I know of none,\u201d was his answer. \u201cWe live far from any\nhouse, and before assistance could be procured, they would be miles\nbeyond our reach.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, father, there is a chance,\u201d said she, with impatience. \u201cGallop\nover to Allister Wilson\u2019s on the other side of the hills. He is a strong\nand determined man, and, as well as some of his near neighbours, is\naccustomed to contest. You know he fought desperately at Drumclog; and\nthough he blamed you for not joining the cause, he will not be loth to\nassist in this bitter extremity.\u201d\n\nAllan, at these words, started up as if awakened from a reverie. \u201cThat\nwill do, my dear bairn. I never thought of it; but your understanding is\nquicker than mine. I shall get out the horse; follow me on foot, as hard\nas you can.\u201d\n\nThis was the work of a minute. The horse was brought from the stable,\nand Allan lashed him to his full speed across the moor. Most fortunately\nhe arrived at Allister\u2019s house as the latter was on the point of leaving\nit. He carried a musket over his shoulder, and a huge claymore hung down\nfrom a belt girded round his loins.\n\n\u201cYou have just come in time,\u201d said this stern son of the Covenant, after\nAllan had briefly related to him what had happened. \u201cI am on my way to\nhear that precious saint, Mr Hervey, hold forth. You see I am armed to\ndefend myself against temporal foes, and so are many others of my\nfriends and brethren in God, who will be present on that blessed\noccasion. Come away, Allan Hamilton, you are one of the timid and\nfaint-hearted flock of Jacob, but we will aid you as you wish, and\nperadventure save the young man who has done you such a good turn.\u201d\n\nThey went on swiftly to a retired spot at the distance of half a mile;\nit was a small glen nearly surrounded with rocks. There they beheld the\nReverend Mr Hervey standing upon a mound of earth, and preaching to a\ncongregation, the greater part of the males of which were armed with\nmuskets, swords, or pikes; they formed, as it were, the outworks of the\nassembly,\u2014the women, old men, and children being placed in the centre.\nThese were a few of the devoted Christians who, from the rocks and caves\nof their native land, sent up their fearless voices to heaven\u2014who,\ndisowning the spiritual authority of a tyrannic government, thought it\nnowise unbecoming or treasonable to oppose the strong arm of lawless\npower with its own weapons; and who finally triumphed in the glorious\ncontest, establishing that pure religion, for which posterity has\nproved, alas, too ungrateful!\n\nIn the pressing urgency of the case, Allister did not scruple to go up\nto the minister, in the midst of his discourse. Such interruptions\nindeed were common in these distracted times, when it was necessary to\nskulk from place to place, and perform divine worship as if it was an\nact of treason against the state. Mr Hervey made known to his flock in a\nfew words what had been communicated to him, taking care to applaud\nhighly the scheme proposed by Wilson. There was no time to be lost, and\nunder the guidance of Allister the whole of the assemblage hurried to a\ngorge of the mountains through which the troopers must necessarily pass.\nAs the route of the latter was circuitous, time was allowed to this\nsagacious leader to arrange his forces. This he did by placing all the\narmed men\u2014about twenty-five in number\u2014in two lines across the pass.\nThose who were not armed, together with the women and children, were\nsent to the rear. When, therefore, the soldiers came up, they found to\ntheir surprise a formidable body ready to dispute the passage.\n\n\u201cWhat means this interruption?\u201d said Ross, who acted the part of\nspokesman to the rest. Whereupon Mr Hervey advanced in front\u2014\u201cRelease,\u201d\nsaid he, \u201cthat young man whom ye have in bonds.\u201d\n\n\u201cRelease him!\u201d replied Ross. \u201cWould you have us release a murderer? Are\nyou aware that he has shot his officer?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am aware of it,\u201d Mr Hervey answered, \u201cand I blame him not for the\ndeed. Stand forth, Allan Hamilton, and say if that is the soldier who\nsaved your life; and you, Mary Hamilton, stand forth likewise.\u201d\n\nBoth, to the astonishment of the soldiers, came in front of the crowd.\n\u201cThat,\u201d said Allan, \u201cis the man, and may God bless him for his\nhumanity.\u201d\u2014\u201cIt is the same,\u201d cried his daughter; \u201cI saw him with these\neyes shoot the cruel Clobberton. On my knees I begged him to sue for\nmercy, and his kind heart had pity upon me, and saved my father.\u201d\n\n\u201cSoldiers,\u201d said Mr Hervey, \u201cI have nothing more to say to you. That\nyoung man has slain your captain, but he has done no murder. His deed\nwas justifiable: yea, it was praiseworthy, in so far as it saved an\nupright man, and rid the earth of a cruel persecutor. Deliver him up,\nand go away in peace, or peradventure ye may fare ill among these armed\nmen who stand before you.\u201d\n\nThe troopers consulted together for a short time, till, seeing that\nresistance would be utter madness against such odds, they reluctantly\nlet go their prisoner. The first person who came up to him was Mary\nHamilton. She loosened the cords that tied him, and presented him with\nconscious pride to those of her own sex who were assembled round.\n\n\u201cGood bye, Graham,\u201d cried Ross, with a sneer;\u2014\u201cyou have bit us once, but\nit will puzzle you to do so again. We shall soon \u2018harry\u2019 you and your\npuritanical friends from your strongholds. An ell of strong hemp is in\nreadiness for you at the Grassmarket of Edinburgh. Take my defiance for\na knave, as you are,\u201d added he, with an imprecation.\n\nHe had scarcely pronounced the last sentence when Graham unsheathed the\nweapon which hung at his side, sprang from the middle of the crowd, and\nstood before his defier. \u201cRoss, you have challenged me, and you shall\nabide it\u2014draw!\u201d Here there was an instantaneous movement among the\nCovenanters, who rushed in between the two fierce soldiers, who stood\nwith their naked weapons, their eyes glancing fire at each other. Mary\nHamilton screamed aloud with terror, and cries of \u201cseparate them!\u201d were\nheard from all the women. Mr Hervey came forward and entreated them to\nput up their swords, and he was seconded by most of the old men; but all\nentreaties were in vain. They stood fronting each other, and only\nwaiting for free ground to commence their desperate game.\n\n\u201cLet me alone,\u201d said Graham, furiously, to some who were attempting to\ndraw him back; \u201cam I to be bearded to my teeth by that swaggering\nruffian?\u201d\n\n\u201cCome on, my sweet cock of the Covenant,\u201d cries Ross, with the most\ninsulting derision, \u201cyou or any one of your canting crew\u2014or a dozen of\nyou, one after the other.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet Graham go,\u201d was heard from the deep stern voice of Allister Wilson;\n\u201clet him go, or I will meet that man with my own weapon. Mr Hervey, your\nadvice is dear to us all, and well do we know that the blood of God\u2019s\ncreatures must not be shed in vain; but has not that man of blood openly\ndefied us, and shall we hinder our champion from going forward to meet\nhim? No; let them join in combat and try which is the better cause. If\nthe challenger overcomes, we shall do him no harm, but let him depart in\npeace: if he be overcome, let him rue the consequences of his\ninsolence.\u201d\n\nThis proposition, though violently opposed by the women and the aged\npart of the crowd, met the entire approbation of the young men. Each\nfelt himself personally insulted, and allowed, for a time, the turbulent\npassions of his nature to get the better of every milder feeling. A\nspace of ground was immediately cleared for the combat, the friends of\nRoss being allowed to arrange matters as they thought fit. They went\nabout it with a coolness and precision which showed that to them this\nsort of pastime was nothing new. \u201cAll is right\u2014fall on,\u201d was their cry,\nand in a moment the combatants met in the area. The three troopers\nlooked on with characteristic _sang froid_, but it was otherwise with\nthe rest of the bystanders, who gazed upon the scene with the most\nintense interest. Some of the females turned away their eyes from it,\nand among them Mary Hamilton, who almost sank to the earth, and was with\ndifficulty supported by her father.\n\nThe combat was desperate, for the men were of powerful strength, and of\ntried courage and skill in their weapons. The blows were parried for\nsome time on both sides with consummate address, and neither could be\nsaid to have the advantage. At length, after contending fiercely, Ross\nexhibited signs of exhaustion\u2014neither guarding himself nor assaulting\nhis opponent so vigorously as at first. Graham, on noticing this,\nredoubled his efforts. He acted now wholly on the offensive, sending\nblow upon blow with the rapidity of lightning. His last and most\ndesperate stroke was made at the head of his enemy. The sword of the\nlatter, which was held up in a masterly manner to receive it, was beat\ndown by Graham\u2019s weapon, which descended forcibly upon his helmet. The\nblow proved decisive, and Ross fell senseless upon the ground. His\nconqueror immediately wrested the weapon from him, while a shout was set\nup by the crowd in token of victory. The troopers looked mortified at\nthis result of the duel, which was by them evidently unexpected. Their\nfirst care was to raise up their fellow comrade. On examination, no\nwound was perceived upon his head. His helmet had been penetrated by the\nsword, which, however, did not go further. His own weapon had\ncontributed to deaden the blow, by partially arresting that of Graham in\nits furious descent. It was this only which saved his life. In a few\nminutes he so far recovered as to get up and look around him. The first\nobject which struck him was his opponent standing in the ring wiping his\nforehead.\n\n\u201cWell, Ross,\u201d said one of his companions, \u201cI always took you to be the\nbest swordsman in the regiment; but I think you have met your match.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy match? confound me!\u201d returned the vanquished man, \u201cI thought I would\nhave made minced meat of him. There, for three years, have I had the\ncharacter of being one of the best men in the army at my weapon, and\nhere is all this good name taken out of me in a trice. How\nmortifying\u2014and to lose my good sword too!\u201d\n\n\u201cHere is your sword, Ross, and keep it,\u201d said Graham. \u201cYou have behaved\nlike a brave man; and I honour such a fellow, whether he be my friend or\nfoe. Only don\u2019t go on with your insolent bragging\u2014that is all the advice\nI have to give you; nor call any man a knave till you have good proof\nthat he is so.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, well, Graham,\u201d answered the other, \u201cI retract what I said; I have\na better opinion of you than I had ten minutes ago. Take care of old\nDalzell\u2014his \u201clambs\u201d will be after you, and you had better keep out of\nthe way. Take this advice in return for my weapon which you have given\nme back. It would, after all, be a pity to tuck up such a pretty fellow\nas you are; although I would care very little to see your long-faced\nacquaintances there dangling by their necks. Give us your hand for old\nfellowship, and shift your quarters as soon as you choose. Good bye.\u201d So\nsaying, he and his three comrades departed.\n\nAfter these doings, it was considered imprudent for the principal actors\nto remain longer in this quarter. Mr Hervey retired about twenty miles\nto the northward, in company with Allan Hamilton and his daughter, and\nAllister Wilson. Graham went by a circuitous route to Argyleshire, where\nhe secreted himself so judiciously, that though the agents of government\ngot information of his being in that country, they could never manage to\nlay hand upon him. These steps were prudent in all parties; for the very\nday after the rescue, a strong body of dragoons was sent to the\nLowthers, to apprehend the above named persons. They behaved with great\ncruelty, burning the cottages of numbers of the inhabitants, and\ndestroying their cattle. They searched Allan Hamilton\u2019s house, took from\nit everything that could be easily carried away, and such of his cattle\nas were found on the premises. Among other things, they carried off the\nbody of the sanguinary Clobberton, which they found on the spot where it\nhad been left, and interred it in Lanark churchyard, with military\nhonours. None of the individuals, however, whom they sought for were\nfound.\n\nFor a short time after this, the persecution raged with great violence\nin the south of Lanarkshire; but happier days were beginning to dawn;\nand the arrival of King William, and the dethronement of the bigoted\nJames, put an end to such scenes of cruelty. When these events occurred,\nthe persecuted came forth from their hiding-places. Mr Hervey, among\nothers, returned to the Lowthers, and enjoyed many happy days in this\nseat of his ministry and trials. Allan and his daughter were among the\nfirst to make their appearance. Their house soon recovered its former\ncomfort; and in the course of time every worldly concern went well with\nthem. Mary, however, for a month or more after their return, did not\nfeel entirely satisfied. She was duller than was her wont, and neither\nshe nor her father could give any explanation why it should be so. At\nthis time a tall young man paid them a visit, and, strange to say, she\nbecame perfectly happy. This visitor was no other than the wild fighting\nfellow Graham,\u2014now perfectly reformed from his former evil courses, by\nseparation from his profligate companions, and by the better company and\nprinciples with which his late troubles had brought him acquainted.\n\nA few words more will end our story. This bold trooper and the beautiful\ndaughter of Allan Hamilton were seen five weeks thereafter going to\nchurch as man and wife. It was allowed that they were the handsomest\ncouple ever seen in the Lowthers. Graham proved a kind husband; and it\nis hardly necessary to say that Mary was a most affectionate and\nexemplary wife. Allan Hamilton attained a happy old age, and saw his\ngrandchildren ripening into fair promise around him. His daughter, many\nyears after his death, used to repeat to them the story of his danger\nand escape, which we have here imperfectly related. The tale is not\nfictitious. It is handed down in tradition over the upper and middle\nwards of Lanarkshire, and with a consistency which leaves no doubt of\nits truth.\n\n\n\n\n THE POOR SCHOLAR.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nThe vernal weather, that had come so early in the year as to induce a\nfear that it would not be lasting, seemed, contrary to that foreboding\nof change, to become every day more mild and genial, and the spirit of\nbeauty, that had at first ventured out over the bosom of the earth with\ntimid footsteps, was now blending itself more boldly with the deep\nverdure of the ground, and the life of the budding trees. Something in\nthe air, and in the great wide blue bending arch of the unclouded sky,\ncalled upon the heart to come forth from the seclusion of parlour or\nstudy, and partake of the cheerfulness of nature.\n\nWe had made some short excursions together up the lonely glens, and over\nthe moors, and also through the more thickly inhabited field-farms of\nhis parish, and now the old minister proposed that we should pay a visit\nto a solitary hut near the head of a dell, which, although not very\nremote from the manse, we had not yet seen; and I was anxious that we\nshould do so, as, from his conversation, I understood that we should see\nthere a family\u2014if so a widow and her one son could be called\u2014that would\nrepay us by the interest we could not fail to feel in their character,\nfor the time and toil spent on reaching their secluded and guarded\ndwelling.\n\n\u201cThe poor widow woman,\u201d said the minister, \u201cwho lives in the hut called\nBraehead, has as noble a soul as ever tenanted a human bosom. One\nearthly hope alone has she now\u2014but I fear it never will be fulfilled.\nShe is the widow of a common cottar, who lived and died in the hut which\nshe and her son now inhabit. Her husband was a man of little education,\nbut intelligent, even ingenious, simple, laborious, and pious. His\nduties lay all within a narrow circle, and his temptations, it may be\nsaid, were few. Such as they were, he discharged the one and withstood\nthe other. Nor is there any reason to think that, had they both been\ngreater, he would have been found wanting. He was contented with meal\nand water all his days, and so fond of work that he seemed to love the\nsummer chiefly for the length of its labouring days. He had a slight\ngenius for mechanics; and during the long winter evenings he made many\narticles of curious workmanship, the sale of which added a little to the\nearnings of his severer toil. The same love of industry excited him from\nmorning to night; but he had also stronger, tenderer, and dearer\nmotives; for if his wife and their one pretty boy should outlive him, he\nhoped that, though left poor, they would not be left in penury, but\nenabled to lead, without any additional hardships, the usual life, at\nleast, of the widow and the orphans of honest hardworking men. Few\nthought much about Abraham Blane while he lived, except that he was an\nindustrious and blameless man; but, on his death, it was felt that there\nhad been something far more valuable in his character; and now, I\nmyself, who knew him well, was pleasingly surprised to know that he had\nleft his widow and boy a small independence. Then the memory of his long\nsummer days, and long winter nights, all ceaselessly employed in some\nkind of manual labour, dignified the lowly and steadfast virtue of the\nunpretending and conscientious man.\n\n\u201cThe widow of this humble-hearted and simple-minded man, whom we shall\nthis forenoon visit, you will remember, perhaps,\u2014although then neither\nshe nor her husband were much known in the parish,\u2014as the wife of the\nbasket-maker. Her father had been a clergyman\u2014but his stipend was one of\nthe smallest in Scotland, and he died in extreme poverty. This, his only\ndaughter, who had many fine feelings and deep thoughts in her young\ninnocent and simple heart, was forced to become a menial servant in a\nfarmhouse. There, subduing her heart to her situation, she married that\ninoffensive and good man; and all her life has been\u2014maid, wife, and\nwidow\u2014the humblest among the humble. But you shall soon have an\nopportunity of seeing, what sense, what feeling, what knowledge, and\nwhat piety, may all live together, without their owner suspecting them,\nin the soul of the lonely widow of a Scottish cottar; for except that\nshe is pious, she thinks not that she possesses any other treasure; and\neven her piety she regards, like a true Christian, as a gift bestowed.\n\n\u201cBut well worthy of esteem, and, to speak in the language of this\nworld\u2019s fancies, of admiration, as you will think this poor solitary\nwidow, perhaps you will think such feelings bestowed even more\ndeservedly on her only son. He is now a boy only of sixteen years of\nage, but in my limited experience of life, never knew I such another.\nFrom his veriest infancy he showed a singular capacity for learning; at\nseven years of age he could read, write, and was even an arithmetician.\nHe seized upon books with the same avidity with which children in\ngeneral seize upon playthings. He soon caught glimmerings of the meaning\neven of other languages; and, before he was ten years old, there were in\nhis mind clear dawnings of the scholar, and indications not to be\ndoubted of genius and intellectual power. His father was dead\u2014but his\nmother, who was no common woman, however common her lot, saw with pure\ndelight, and with strong maternal pride, that God had given her an\nextraordinary child to bless her solitary hut. She vowed to dedicate him\nto the ministry, and that all her husband had left should be spent upon\nhim, to the last farthing, to qualify him to be a preacher of God\u2019s\nWord. Such ambition, if sometimes misplaced, is almost always\nnecessarily honourable. Here it was justified by the excelling talents\nof the boy\u2014by his zeal for knowledge, which was like a fever in his\nblood\u2014and by a childish piety, of which the simple, and eloquent, and\nbeautiful expression has more than once made me shed tears. But let us\nleave the manse, and walk to Braehead. The sunshine is precious at this\nearly season; let us enjoy it while it smiles!\u201d\n\nWe crossed a few fields\u2014a few coppice woods\u2014an extensive sheep-pasture,\nand then found ourselves on the edge of a moorland. Keeping the shelving\nheather ridge of hills above us, we gently descended into a narrow rushy\nglen, without anything that could be called a stream, but here and there\ncrossed and intersected by various runlets. Soon all cultivation ceased,\nand no houses were to be seen. Had the glen been a long one, it would\nhave seemed desolate, but on turning round a little green mount that ran\nalmost across it, we saw at once an end to our walk, and one hut, with a\npeatstack close to it, and one or two elder, or, as we call them in\nScotland, bourtrie bushes, at the low gable-end. A little smoke seemed\nto tinge the air over the roof uncertainly\u2014but except in that, there was\nnothing to tell that the hut was inhabited. A few sheep lying near it,\nand a single cow of the small hill-breed, seemed to appertain to the\nhut, and a circular wall behind it apparently enclosed the garden. We\nsat down together on one of those large mossy stones that often lie\namong the smooth green pastoral hills, like the relics of some building\nutterly decayed\u2014and my venerable friend, whose solemn voice was indeed\npleasant in this quiet solitude, continued the simple history of the\npoor scholar.\n\n\u201cAt school he soon outstripped all the other boys, but no desire of\nsuperiority over his companions seemed to actuate him\u2014it was the pure\nnative love of knowledge. Gentle as a lamb, but happy as a lark, the\nvery wildest of them all loved Isaac Blane. He procured a Hebrew Bible\nand a Greek Testament, both of which he taught himself to read. It was\nmore than affecting\u2014it was sublime and awful to see the solitary boy\nsitting by himself on the braes shedding tears over the mysteries of the\nChristian faith. His mother\u2019s heart burned within her towards her son;\nand if it was pride, you will allow that it was pride of a divine\norigin. She appeared with him in the kirk every Sabbath, dressed not\nostentatiously, but still in a way that showed she intended him not for\na life of manual labour. Perhaps, at first, some half thought that she\nwas too proud of him; but that was a suggestion not to be cherished, for\nall acknowledged that he was sure to prove an honour to the parish in\nwhich he was born. She often brought him to the manse, and earth did not\ncontain a happier creature than she, when her boy answered all my\nquestions, and modestly made his own simple, yet wise remarks on the\nsacred subjects gradually unfolding before his understanding and his\nheart.\n\n\u201cBefore he was twelve years of age he went to college; and his mother\naccompanied him to pass the winter in the city. Two small rooms she took\nnear the cathedral; and while he was at the classes, or reading alone,\nshe was not idle, but strove to make a small sum to help to defray their\nwinter\u2019s expenses. To her that retired cell was a heaven when she looked\nupon her pious and studious boy. His genius was soon conspicuous; for\nfour winters he pursued his studies in the university, returning always\nin summer to this hut, the door of which during their absence was\nclosed. He made many friends, and frequently during the three last\nsummers, visitors came to pass a day at Braehead, in a rank of life far\nabove his own. But in Scotland, thank God, talent and learning, and\ngenius and virtue, when found in the poorest hut, go not without their\nadmiration and their reward. Young as he is, he has had pupils of his\nown\u2014his mother\u2019s little property has not been lessened at this hour by\nhis education; and besides contributing to the support of her and\nhimself, he has brought neater furniture into that lonely hut, and there\nhas he a library, limited in the number, but rich in the choice of\nbooks, such as contain food for years of silent thought to the poor\nscholar\u2014if years indeed are to be his on earth.\u201d\n\nWe rose to proceed onwards to the hut, across one smooth level of\ngreenest herbage, and up one intervening knowe, a little lower than the\nmount on which it stood. Why, thought I, has the old man always spoken\nof the poor scholar as if he had been speaking of one now dead? Can it\nbe, from the hints he has dropped, that this youth, so richly endowed,\nis under the doom of death, and the fountain of all those clear and\nfresh-gushing thoughts about to be sealed? I asked, as we walked along,\nif Isaac Blane seemed marked out to be one of those sweet flowers \u201cno\nsooner blown than blasted,\u201d and who perish away like the creatures of a\ndream? The old man made answer that it was even so, that he had been\nunable to attend college last winter, and that it was to be feared he\nwas now far advanced in a hopeless decline. \u201cSimple is he still as a\nvery child; but with a sublime sense of duty to God and man\u2014of profound\naffection and humanity never to be appeased towards all the brethren of\nour race. Each month\u2014each week\u2014each day, has seemed visibly to bring him\nnew stores of silent feeling and thought\u2014and even now, boy as he is, he\nis fit for the ministry. But he has no hopes of living to that day\u2014nor\nhave I. The deep spirit of his piety is now blended with a sure\nprescience of an early death. Expect, therefore, to see him pale,\nemaciated, and sitting in the hut like a beautiful and blessed ghost.\u201d\n\nWe entered the hut, but no one was in the room. The clock ticked\nsolitarily, and on a table, beside a nearly extinguished peat fire, lay\nthe open Bible, and a small volume, which, on lifting it up, I found to\nbe a Greek Testament.\n\n\u201cThey have gone out to walk, or to sit down for an hour in the warm\nsunshine,\u201d said the old man. \u201cLet us sit down and wait their return. It\nwill not be long.\u201d A long, low sigh was heard in the silence,\nproceeding, as it seemed, from a small room adjoining that in which we\nwere sitting, and of which the door was left half open. The minister\nlooked into that room, and, after a long earnest gaze, stepped softly\nback to me again, with a solemn face, and taking me by the hand,\nwhispered to me to come with him to that door, which he gently moved. On\na low bed lay the poor scholar, dressed as he had been for the day,\nstretched out in a stillness too motionless and profound for sleep, and\nwith his fixed face up to heaven. We saw that he was dead. His mother\nwas kneeling, with her face on the bed, and covered with both her hands.\nThen she lifted up her eyes and said, \u201cO merciful Redeemer, who wrought\nthat miracle on the child of the widow of Nain, comfort me\u2014comfort me,\nin this my sore distress. I know that my son is never to rise again\nuntil the great judgment day. But not the less do I bless Thy holy name,\nfor Thou didst die to save us sinners.\u201d\n\nShe arose from her knees, and, still blind to every other object, went\nup to his breast. \u201cI thought thee lovelier, when alive, than any of the\nsons of the children of men, but that smile is beyond the power of a\nmother\u2019s heart to sustain.\u201d And, stooping down, she kissed his lips, and\ncheeks, and eyes, and forehead, with a hundred soft, streaming, and\nmurmuring kisses, and then stood up in her solitary hut, alone and\nchildless, with a long mortal sigh, in which all earthly feelings seemed\nbreathed out, and all earthly ties broken. Her eyes wandered towards the\ndoor, and fixed themselves with a ghastly and unconscious gaze for a few\nmoments on the gray locks and withered countenance of the holy old man,\nbent towards her with a pitying and benignant air, and stooped, too, in\nthe posture of devotion. She soon recognised the best friend of her son,\nand leaving the bed on which his body lay, she came out into the room,\nand said, \u201cYou have come to me at a time when your presence was sorely\nneeded. Had you been here but a few minutes sooner you would have seen\nmy Isaac die!\u201d\n\nUnconsciously we were all seated; and the widow, turning fervently to\nher venerated friend, said, \u201cHe was reading the Bible\u2014he felt faint\u2014and\nsaid feebly, \u2018Mother, attend me to my bed, and when I lie down, put your\narm over my breast and kiss me.\u2019 I did just as he told me; and, on\nwiping away a tear or two vainly shed by me on my dear boy\u2019s face, I saw\nthat his eyes, though open, moved not, and that the lids were fixed. He\nhad gone to another world. See\u2014sir! there is the Bible lying open at the\nplace he was reading\u2014God preserve my soul from repining!\u2014only a few, few\nminutes ago.\u201d\n\nThe minister took the Bible on his knees, and laying his right hand,\nwithout selection, on part of one of the pages that lay open, he read\naloud the following verses:\u2014\n\n\u201cBlessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.\n\n\u201cBlessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.\u201d\n\nThe mother\u2019s heart seemed to be deeply blest for a while by these words.\nShe gave a grateful smile to the old man, and sat silent, moving her\nlips. At length she again broke forth:\u2014\n\n\u201cOh! death, whatever may have been our thoughts or fears, ever comes\nunexpectedly at last. My son often\u2014often told me, that he was dying, and\nI saw that it was so ever since Christmas. But how could I prevent hope\nfrom entering my heart? His sweet happy voice\u2014the calmness of his\nprayers\u2014his smiles that never left his face whenever he looked or spoke\nto me\u2014his studies, still pursued as anxiously as ever\u2014the interest he\ntook in any little incident of our retired life\u2014all forced me to believe\nat times that he was not destined to die. But why think on all these\nthings now? Yes! I will always think of them, till I join him and my\nhusband in heaven!\u201d\n\nIt seemed now as if the widow had only noticed me for the first time.\nHer soul had been so engrossed with its passion of grief, and with the\nfelt sympathy and compassion of my venerable friend. She asked me if I\nhad known her son; and I answered, that if I had, I could not have sat\nthere so composedly; but that I was no stranger to his incomparable\nexcellence, and felt indeed for her grievous loss. She listened to my\nwords, but did not seem to hear them, and once more addressed the old\nman.\n\n\u201cHe suffered much sickness, my poor boy. For although it was a\nconsumption, that is not always an easy death. But as soon as the\nsickness and the racking pain gave way to our united prayers, God and\nour Saviour made us happy; and sure he spake then as never mortal spake,\nkindling into a happiness that was beautiful to see, when I beheld his\nface marked by dissolution, and knew, even in those inspired moments\n(for I can call them nothing else), that ere long the dust was to lie on\nthose lips now flowing over with heavenly music!\u201d\n\nWe sat for some hours in the widow\u2019s hut, and the minister several times\nprayed with her, at her own request. On rising to depart, he said that\nhe would send up one of her dearest friends to pass the night with her,\nand help her to do the last offices to her son. But she replied that she\nwished to be left alone for that day and night, and would expect her\nfriend in the morning. We went towards the outer door, and she, in a\nsort of sudden stupor, let us depart without any farewell words, and\nretired into the room where her son was lying. Casting back our eyes\nbefore our departure, we saw her steal into the bed beside the dead\nbody, and drawing the head gently into her bosom, she lay down with him\nin her arms, and as if they had in that manner fallen asleep.\n\n\n\n\n THE CRUSHED BONNET.\n\n\nTowards the close of a beautiful autumnal day in 18\u2014, when pacing slowly\non my way, and in a contemplative mood admiring the delightful scenery\nbetween Blair Athole and Dunkeld, on my return from a survey of the\ncelebrated pass of Killiecrankie, and other places rendered famous in\nScottish story, I was accosted by a female, little past the prime of\nlife, but with two children of unequal age walking by her side, and a\nyounger slung upon her back. The salutation was of the supplicatory\nkind, and while the tones were almost perfectly English, the\npronunciation of the words was often highly Scottish. The words, a\n\u201csodger\u2019s widow\u201d\u2014\u201cthree helpless bairns\u201d\u2014and \u201cWaterloo,\u201d broke my\nmeditations with the force of an enchantment, excited my sympathy, and\nmade me draw my purse. While in the act of tendering a piece of money\u2014a\ncheap and easy mode of procuring the luxury of doing good\u2014I thought the\ncountenance, though browned and weather-beaten, one which I before had\nseen, without exactly recollecting when or where. My curiosity thus\nraised, many interrogatives and answers speedily followed, when at last\nI discovered that there stood before me Jeanie Strathavon, once the\nbeauty and the pride of my own native village. Ten long and troublous\nyears had passed away since Jeanie left the neighbourhood in which she\nwas born to follow the spirit-stirring drum; and where she had gone, or\nhow she had afterwards fared, many enquired, though but few could tell.\nThe incident which led to all her subsequent toil and suffering seemed\nbut trivial at the time, yet, like many other trivial occurrences,\nbecame to her one fraught with mighty consequences.\n\nShe was an only daughter, her father was an honest labourer, and though\nnot nursed in the bosom of affluence, she hardly knew what it was to\nhave a wish ungratified. She possessed mental vivacity, and personal\nattractions, rarely exhibited, especially at the present day, by persons\nin her humble sphere of life. Though she never could boast what might\nproperly be called education, yet great care had been taken to render\nher modest, affectionate, and pious. Her parents, now in the decline of\nlife, looked upon her as their only solace. She had been from her very\nbirth the idol of their hearts; and as there was no sunshine in their\ndays but when she was healthy and happy, so their prospects were never\nclouded but when she was the reverse. Always the favourite of one sex,\nand the envy of another, when not yet out of her teens, she was\nimportuned by the addresses of many both of her own rank and of a rank\nabove her own, to change her mode of life. The attentions of the latter,\nin obedience to the suggestions of her affectionate but simple hearted\nparents, she always discouraged, for they never would allow themselves\nto think that \u201cfolk wi\u2019 siller would be looking after their bairn for\nony gude end.\u201d Among those of her own station, she could hardly be said\nto have yet shown a decided preference to any one, though the glances\nwhich she cast at Henry Williams, when passing through the kirkyard on\nSundays, seemed to every one to say where, if she had her own unbiassed\nwill, her choice would light. Still she had never thought seriously upon\nthe time when, nor the person for whom, she would leave her fond and\ndoting parents. Chance or accident, however, in these matters, often\noutruns the speed of deliberate choice; at least such was the case with\npoor Jeanie.\n\nDecked out one Sabbath morning in her best, to go to what Burns calls a\n\u201cHoly Fair,\u201d in the neighbouring parish, though viewed in a far\ndifferent light by her, Jeanie had on her brawest and her best; and\namong other things, a fine new bonnet, which excited the gossip and the\ngaze of all the lasses in the village. Having sat for an hour or two at\nthe tent, listening earnestly and devoutly to a discourse which formed a\ncomplete body of divinity, she, with many others, was at length obliged\nto take refuge in the church, to shun a heavy summer shower, which\nunexpectedly arrested the out-door devotions. Here, whether wearied with\nthe long walk she had in the morning, or overpowered with the heat and\nsuffocation consequent upon such a crowd, she began to feel a serious\noppression of sickness, and before she could effect her escape she\nentirely fainted away, requiring to be carried out in a state of\ncomplete insensibility.\n\nIt was long before she came to herself; and when she did, she found that\nthe rough hands of those who had caught her when falling, and borne her\nthrough the crowd to the open air, had, amidst the anxiety for her\nrecovery, treated her finery with but very little ceremony. Among other\ninstances of this kind, she found that her bonnet had been hastily torn\nfrom her head, thrown carelessly aside, and, being accidentally trod\nupon, had been so crushed, as to render it perfectly useless. The grief\nwhich this caused made her forget the occasion which produced such\ndisaster; and adjusting herself as well as she could, she did not wait\nthe conclusion of the solemn service, but sought her father\u2019s cottage\namidst much sorrow and confusion.\n\nWhen she reached home, she found her parents engaged in devotional\nreading, their usual mode of spending the Sabbath evenings. As it was\nnot altogether with their consent that she had not accompanied them that\nday to their usual place of being instructed in divine things, the\nplight in which she returned to them excited, especially on the mother\u2019s\npart, a hasty burst of displeasure, if not of anger; and the calm\nimproving peace of the evening was entirely broken. Sacred as to them\nthe day appeared, they could not restrain inquiry as to the cause of her\naltered appearance, and maternal anxiety gave birth to suspicions which\npoor Jeanie\u2019s known veracity and simple unaffected narrative could not\naltogether repress. Thus, for the first time in her life, had Jeanie\nexcited the frown of her parents, and every reproving look and word was\nas a dagger to her heart.\n\nNight came, and she retired to rest, but her innocent breast was too\nmuch agitated to allow her eyes to close in sleep; and the return of\nmorning only brought with it an additional burden to her heart, by a\nrenewed discussion of the events of the previous day. This was more than\nshe was able to stand, and she took the first opportunity to escape from\nthat roof where, till now, she had never known aught but delight, to go\nto pour her complaint into the ear of one who seemed to love her almost\nto distraction,\u2014her youthful admirer, Henry Williams. Their interview,\nthough not long, terminated in the proposal on his part to relieve her\nfrom her embarrassed situation by forthwith making her his own. Whether\nthis was what she desired, in having recourse to such an adviser, cannot\nbe known, but, at all events, she acceded with blamable facility to his\nwishes. She could not endure the thought of being without a friend, and\nshe knew not that the friendship and affection of her parents had\nsuffered no abatement, though their great concern for her innocence and\nwelfare had pushed their reproofs further than they intended, or than\nprudence under such circumstances would warrant.\n\nHenry was little more than her own age, of but moderate capacity,\nhandsome in person, and ill provided with the means of making matrimony\na state of enjoyment; and too much addicted to the frivolities of his\nyears to be fitted for the serious business of being the head of a\nfamily. Youth and inexperience seldom consider consequences, and the\ndesire of the one to receive, and of the other to afford relief, under\nexisting circumstances, made them resolve neither to ask parental\nconsent to their purpose, nor wait the ordinary steps prescribed by the\nChurch. The connection was therefore no less irregular than it was\nprecipitate, and Jeanie never so much as sought to see her father\u2019s\nhouse till the solemn knot was tied.\n\nIn her absence many inquiries were made respecting her by the villagers,\nwho had witnessed or heard of what had happened to her on the previous\nday. Her truth and innocence being thus put beyond the shadow of a\ndoubt, consternation at the long absence of their child, and compunction\nfor the severity of their reproofs, drove the unhappy parents almost\nfrantic. When the news of the re-appearance of their daughter dispelled\ntheir direful apprehensions as to her safety, though they felt a\nmomentary gleam of joy, yet they experienced nothing like heartfelt\nsatisfaction.\n\nJeanie made as sweet and loving a wife as she had been a daughter; but\nthe cares of providing for more than himself soon made Henry regret his\nrashness, and the prospect of these cares speedily increasing made him\nmore and more dissatisfied with his new state of life. All Jeanie\u2019s care\nand anxiety to soothe and please him were unavailing. It is not in the\npower of beauty, youth, and innocence, to check and control the sallies\nof ignorance and caprice. Chagrined because his youthful wife had not\nprepared his morning meal to his liking, on a day when he was to visit a\nneighbouring city for some trifling purpose, he determined to free\nhimself from the yoke into which he had so heedlessly run, and returned\nhome on the evening of the following day somewhat altered in dress and\nappearance, and with the king\u2019s money in his pocket. The grief and agony\nof Jeanie, and of her affectionate parents, were past all description;\nand the consideration of her rashness and imprudence having been the\noccasion of so much distress to herself and others, rendered her almost\ndesperate.\n\nHenry was not long in the hands of the drill sergeant till he became\nnearly as penitent and full of regrets as his lovely young wife, and he\nwillingly would, had he been permitted, have returned to a faithful\ndischarge of the duties of a husband; but the country was at that time\nin too great need of men such as Henry, to part with him either for\nmoney or interest. When he began to reap the bitter fruits of his own\nfolly, his affection for Jeanie, if it ever deserved so sacred a name,\nreturned with redoubled intensity; and that object, for the abandonment\nof which he had plunged himself into the hardships of which he\ncomplained, he thought he could not now live without. He was shortly to\nbe marched off to his regiment, and poor Jeanie, whose attachment\nremained unshaken amidst the severe treatment she had suffered,\ndetermined to follow him through all the casualties of the military\nlife; and at any rate preferred hardship to the disgrace which she\nthought she had brought upon herself by her own imprudence. She had at\nthis time been a mother for little more than two months; but even this\ncould not change her resolution to follow the father of her child,\nexposed as she must be to all the privations and hardships of the\nsoldier\u2019s wife. She saw her father and mother on the morning of her\ndeparture, but neither she nor they were able to exchange words, so full\nwere their hearts; save that the old man said, \u201cGod help and bless you,\nJeanie!\u201d Scarcely a dry eye was to be seen in the village that morning,\nand a crowd of youths, amidst silent dejection, saw her far on her way,\ncarrying her baby and her bundle by turns. The toils through which she\npassed in following her husband were too many and too severe to be here\nrelated. He was ultimately one of those who assisted to decide the\ndreadful conflict at Waterloo, and received a severe wound when the day\nwas just about won. In a foreign hospital, though he suffered much, he\nat length recovered; but upon returning home, his wounds broke forth\nafresh, and at last carried him off. Jeanie was now left quite\nunfriended. She had seen her two eldest children laid in the dust, the\none in a distant clime, and the other, though on British soil, yet far\nfrom the tomb of her fathers. She still had three surviving, and her\nparents being gone to their long home, her only resource at the time I\nmet her was dependence on public charity.\u2014\u201c_The Athen\u00e6um_,\u201d\u2014_Glasgow\nUniversity Annual_, 1830.\n\n\n\n\n THE VILLAGERS OF AUCHINCRAIG.\n\n BY DANIEL GORRIE.\n\n\nIn one of the eastern counties of Scotland, there is a pleasant secluded\nvalley, known by the name of Strathkirtle. It is well cultivated,\ngrowing good grain crops, abounding in rich pasture-land, and beautified\nby the water of Kirtle, which winds smoothly along between its fertile\nbanks, and loses itself at last in the German Ocean. Strips and roundels\nof woodland, snug farm steadings, and the sheltering hills on either\nside, impart an air of peace and an aspect of comfort to this secluded\nScottish strath, such as may rarely be witnessed in other countries.\nSpring nurses there her sweetest wild-flowers, on the meadows, in the\nwoods, and by the water-courses; summer comes early with choirs of\nsinging-birds, and the voice of the cuckoo; autumn adorns the fields\nwith the mellowest beauty, and touches the green leaves into gold; and\nwinter ever spares some gladsome relics of the sister seasons, to cheer\nthe hearts of the inhabitants at Strathkirtle.\n\nIn the centre of the valley, and close beside the stream, there formerly\nstood the ancient village of Auchincraig; but the progress of\nimprovement has, I am told, almost swept its last vestiges away. It was,\nwithout exception, the oddest, old-fashioned place in which I ever\nresided for any length of time. The dwelling-houses were of all shapes\nand sizes, and they had been built, whether solitary, in rows, or in\nbatches, in utter contempt of all order and regularity. One might almost\nhave imagined that they had fallen down in dire confusion from the\nclouds, and been allowed to stand peaceably where they fell. Some had\ntheir gables to the street, some were planted back to back, some frowned\nfront to front. The roofs of not a few rose in ridges like the back of a\ndromedary, while the appearance of others betokened a perilous collapse\nand sudden downfall. Auchincraig could boast of styles of architecture\nunknown to Grecian and Roman fame. The primitive builders had not been\nparticular regarding the situation of the doors, and evidently\nconsidered windows as useless breaks in the walls. Houses two storeys\nhigh, with weather-worn and weather-stained slate roofs, stood beside\nhumbler dwellings, low and long, and covered with thatch. The parish\nchurch was situated in the burial ground at the east end of the village.\nIt was an old edifice, with ivy-mantled spire, which seemed ready to\nsink down and mingle with the dust of the many generations who slept\naround. Jackdaws congregated on its summit, and swallows, unmolested,\nbuilt their nests in all the windows of the hoary pile. The parish\nmanse, which appeared scarcely less ancient than the church, stood about\na stone\u2019s cast from the place of graves. Primeval trees hung their\nfoliage over it in summer, shading its roof and windows from the\nsunrays, and groaned mournfully throughout all their bare bulk when the\nbitter blast of winter swept over the exposed churchyard. A beechen\nhedge encircled the manse and the garden attached. The residence of the\nminister was by far the pleasantest abode in Auchincraig.\n\nQueer and old-fashioned as the village was, it was far surpassed in\nthese respects by the villagers. I could scarcely have believed that it\nwas possible to find so many odd characters and strange mortals\ncollected together in one locality. Nothing astonished me more than the\nnumber of old people, male and female, who, \u201cdaunered\u201d about the village\nstreets, or sat dozing on three-legged stools at the doors of their\ndwellings. It seemed as if the promise, \u201cThou shalt live long upon the\nland,\u201d had been specially vouchsafed to them. The old men wore\nknee-breeches, home-made stockings, blue coats with metal buttons, and\nred Kilmarnocks; while the old women looked the very picture of sedate,\nsagacious, and decent eld, with their white coifs and black ribbons, and\nbone spectacles bestriding their attenuated noses. The village children\nhad an \u201cauld-farrant\u201d appearance; and the young men and women, whose\nprincipal employment was weaving and spinning, partook somewhat of the\ngravity of their elders with whom they associated so much. It was only\nat such festive seasons as Hallowe\u2019en, Hansel Monday, and the annual\nsummer Fair, that the natural hilarity of youth displayed itself in any\nremarkable degree.\n\nOne of the odd characters of this venerable village was the minister\nhimself. He belonged to that quaint, homely class of Scottish rural\npastors, the last remnants of which have now altogether vanished. A\nstrange, eccentric old man was the Rev. Thomas Watson\u2014more generally and\nfamiliarly known by the name of \u201cTammy\u201d\u2014parish minister of Auchincraig.\nHe was a grayhaired man, but stout of body and ruddy of countenance,\nhale and hearty as an old farmer, and fond of his own creature comfort,\nwhile he imparted to others spiritual consolation. He was generally\nattired, at home and abroad, in a broad-brimmed hat, knee breeches, and\na loose coat, cut in the shape of a jockey\u2019s jacket. He had a habit of\nscrewing his face and shrugging his shoulders, both in the pulpit and\nout of it, when anything unpleasant occurred. It was amusing to see him\nengaged in conversation with one of his aged parishioners on the streets\nof the village. He applied vigorously to his snuff-box, and a hearty\nslap on the shoulder of his auditor was the invariable prelude to a\nhumorous remark. One day, while he was thus enjoying a \u201ctwa-handed\ncrack\u201d with an aged member of his congregation, he administered a\nheavier slap than was desirable, upon which the parishioner exclaimed,\nwith more familiarity than reverence, \u201cTammy, Tammy! my banes are no\nmade o\u2019 brass\u2014dinna hit sae sair!\u201d Tammy, notwithstanding his slapping\npropensities, was a great favourite amongst the people, and I have heard\nthe villagers repeating with great glee some of his witty remarks, and\ntelling anecdotes regarding his eccentricities. He always addressed the\npeople in broad Scotch from the pulpit. Indeed it is more than probable\nthat they would have accused him of preaching heresy if he had ever\nattempted English. He felt himself as much at home, and said as homely\nthings, in the church and before the congregation, as when sitting in\nsocial converse beside the manse hearth. Several instances of this I\ndistinctly remember. One Sabbath forenoon, his own servant-girl entered\nthe church rather late\u2014in fact, the first psalm had been sung, and the\nRev. Thomas was in the midst of his lengthy opening prayer. Janet,\nflurried no doubt by disturbing the devotions of the congregation,\nomitted to shut the door behind her, and a breeze blew up the passage\nand waved the gray locks of the minister. This was more than the\nreverend gentleman could endure. He opened his eyes, saw the culprit,\nand said with his own broad peculiar accent, \u201cJanet, woman, Janet! can\nye no steek the door ahint ye, an\u2019 keep the wund oot!\u201d Ludicrous as this\nremark might have appeared in the circumstances to a stranger, it was\nlistened to by his hearers as devoutly as if it had been an ordinary\npart of the service.\n\nOn another occasion \u201cTammy\u201d was holding an evening diet of worship in\nthe church. This, it must be confessed, was with him a rare event\nindeed. It was the winter season, and, at the close of the first\ndevotional exercise, the candles were emitting a light faint, and feeble\nas that of the waning crescent-moon. \u201cTammy\u201d took up the psalmbook and\nadjusted his spectacles, but it was of no avail. The solitary \u201cdips\u201d at\neach side of the pulpit showed long wicks but little flame. The minister\nfumbled about for a time, but could not find the object of his search.\nAt last, screwing his face, and shrugging his shoulders, he exclaimed,\naddressing the beadle (who was also the grave-digger), \u201cPate, I say,\nPate! what\u2019s come ower ye?\u2014whaur\u2019s the snuffers, man?\u201d\n\nNumerous anecdotes of a similar kind are recorded of the eccentric\ndivine of Auchincraig. Once, however, on a baptismal occasion in the\nchurch, he committed what was regarded as a sacrilegious act by many of\nhis parishioners. It set the tongues of all the mothers and grandmothers\na-wagging for a month, and \u201cTammy\u201d narrowly escaped a presbyterial\ninvestigation. The affair was innocent enough, allowing a margin for\noddity of character, and he would, in all probability, have come off\ntriumphant from a trial, unless the members of the presbytery had been\nrigid disciplinarians. The circumstances of the case may briefly be\ntold. At the conclusion of the forenoon\u2019s discourse, a child was brought\nup for baptism. The father received the customary exhortations and took\nhis vows, and \u201cTammy\u201d had just folded up his sleeve preparatory to\nsprinkling the baptismal water on the infant\u2019s face, when he found to\nhis surprise that Peter, otherwise Pate, the beadle, had stinted\nsomewhat the necessary supply of liquid, perhaps in deference to the\nwishes of the child\u2019s mother. The eccentric minister had conscientious\nobjections at performing the sacred rite in a perfunctory manner, and he\naccordingly lifted the large pewter basin from its place, much to the\namazement of the congregation, and sprinkled the whole contents to the\nlast drop over the face and white attire of the squalling babe! He then\ncoolly continued the service, in his own peculiar style, as if nothing\nextraordinary had occurred.\n\nThe Reverend Thomas Watson made himself at home wherever he was. When\nbreakfasting with any of his parishioners, or in the neighbouring manses\nof brother clergymen, he invariably took possession of the largest egg,\ngiving as his excuse and speaking from his experience, that \u201cthe biggest\nwere aye the maist caller!\u201d He was very fond of porter, and could drink\nas much toddy as any laird in all Strathkirtle, without showing the\nslightest symptoms that he had imbibed more than was good for the health\nof his body and brain. \u201cTammy,\u201d it must be confessed, with all his good\nqualities, was rather lazy and self indulgent. To have spent more than\nan hour or two in the preparation of a discourse he would have regarded\nas a culpable waste of precious time. A clergyman in the neighbourhood\nonce narrated to me a ludicrous instance of the manner in which the\nAuchincraig minister rolled the burden of duty upon the shoulders of\nothers, and managed to escape himself.\n\n\u201cTammy,\u201d on a certain occasion, was assisting at the dispensation of the\nsacrament in another part of the county. The good cheer provided for\nclergymen in the manses at communion seasons he relished with infinite\nzest, and he generally contrived to coax the younger \u201chands\u201d into\nundertaking a large share of his allotted spiritual work. When he could\nnot succeed by coaxing, he adopted more effective means. On the special\noccasion referred to, he had taken as little part as he possibly could\nin the Saturday and Sunday services. It was his duty on Monday to preach\none of two sermons; but that was with him the great day of the feast; a\ngood winding-up dinner was expected in the afternoon, and he felt little\ninclination for ministerial work. Accordingly, as soon as breakfast was\nfinished, and an hour before the commencement of public worship, he\nmysteriously disappeared. When the bell began to toll, the Rev. Thomas\nwas searched for through every room of the house, and in every nook of\nthe manse garden, but he could not be discovered, and another clergyman\npresent was compelled, at a moment\u2019s notice, to undertake the duty of\nthe renegade. Meanwhile, \u201cTammy\u201d was stretched at full length in an\nadjoining corn-field, quietly sunning himself, with much self-complacent\ncomposure, and listening to the voice of psalms floating upwards to the\nsummer heavens from the lips of the assembled worshippers. He did not\nleave his lair until the guests were assembled for dinner, and then he\nreturned to the manse, and heartily thanked the \u201cdear brother\u201d who had\nofficiated in his stead. His ready wit, his contagious laugh, his fund\nof racy anecdotes, would doubtless be regarded by the company as some\ncompensation for the sin he had committed in failing to discharge his\nministerial duty. Many years have elapsed since old Tammy Watson was\ngathered to his fathers; and of the ancient kirk of Auchincraig in which\nhe preached not one stone now stands upon another. _Requiescat in pace!_\n\nThe parish dominie was another of the eccentric characters in the\nvillage. He inhabited a house that had once seen better days, and he\nappeared also to have seen them himself. He was a tall, thin, silent,\nswarthy man, past middle age, abstemious and even miserly in his habits.\nDominie Dawson was a bachelor, and few people ever crossed his\nthreshold. He disliked old \u201cTammy,\u201d who took a malicious pleasure in\nplaguing and bantering him upon the spareness of his body. Never were\ntwo men, occupying the highest posts in a parish, more utterly opposed\nto each other in appearance, tastes, and habits. \u201cTammy\u201d was always\nready with his joke; dominie Dawson had never even perpetrated a pun all\nhis life. \u201cTammy\u201d laughed immoderately when anything tickled his fancy;\ndominie Dawson was seldom seen to relax his grim countenance by a smile.\nSome men seem to have all things in common, but these two had absolutely\nnothing. The dominie never dined at the manse, and the minister never\nsupped with the dominie. Still there was room in the parish for them\nboth, and each held on the tenor of his way, independent of the other.\nThe dominie, it could not be denied, was by far a more learned man than\nthe minister. He was a capital linguist, as had been proved on more than\none occasion, although his knowledge of languages was of little\npractical avail in the village of Auchincraig. He was also an\nenthusiastic naturalist. He returned from solitary rambles among the\nwoods, and along the banks of the Kirtle, with his hat full of wild\nflowers and \u201cweeds of glorious feature.\u201d The old wives of the village\nused to say, \u201cthe man mun be crazed, for he\u2019s aye houkin\u2019 among divots!\u201d\nOn Saturday afternoons he sent bands of the school children away in\nsearch of beetles, moths, butterflies, and all varieties of insects; and\nthese, after much study and careful examination, he pinned carefully on\nsquares of pasteboard. Dominie Dawson was, in fact, an unrecognised\ngenius. He seemed quite out of place in that secluded village, and yet\nit was almost impossible that he could have existed anywhere else. He\nwas neither very much beloved, nor particularly disliked by his\nscholars. He flourished the birch pretty vigorously at times, and it was\nuniversally allowed that he made an excellent teacher. He opened his\nschool each day with a prayer, which he had repeated so often that he\ncould think on other matters during the time of its delivery. He always\nkept his eyes wide open when engaged in the act of devotion, watching\nintently the behaviour of his scholars, and no sooner was the prayer\nfinished than he proceeded to apply the birchen rod as a corrective to\nmisconduct, and an incitement to devotional feeling. \u201cTammy,\u201d alluding\nto this circumstance, said to him one day\u2014\u201cSkelpin\u2019 may mak gude\nscholars, dominie, but it\u2019s sure to mak bad Christians.\u201d After\nschool-hours, the dominie either kept within doors, or walked forth\nalone. He had not a single companion in the whole village, nor did he\ncultivate any one\u2019s society. He returned a salutation with civility, but\nappeared to have no desire for further intercourse. He was still parish\nteacher when I left the village; but it is more than probable that the\nloneliness of his life has now merged into the solitude of the grave.\n\nAfter the minister and dominie, the village crier must not be forgotten.\nHe used a large hand-bell instead of the kettle-drum which is employed\nin most country places to herald important public announcements. \u201cPob\nJamie\u201d was the name by which the bellman, as he was called, was\ngenerally known throughout the district. A squalid, ragged, cadaverous,\nmiserable-looking object he was. He wore a hat \u201cwhich was not all a\nhat,\u201d part of the rim being gone, and the rain and sunshine finding a\nfree passage through its rents of ruin. A long gaberlunzie\u2019s gaberdine,\nformed, like Joseph\u2019s coat, of many colours, and adorned with many\nstreamers, descended from his neck to his heels. His feet were strapped\nover the soles of old shoes that served the purpose of sandals. Thus\narrayed, he shuffled with his bell through the streets of Auchincraig,\nlike the presiding genius of the place. It was no use attempting to\nclothe him in better attire. If he had been presented over night with a\nroyal mantle, he would have appeared at his vocation next day in his\nmany-coloured and tattered gaberdine. \u201cPob Jamie\u201d was \u201ccracked,\u201d and\npublic pity alone kept him in his responsible office. It was one of the\nmost ludicrous sights in the world to see him actively engaged in the\ndischarge of his duty, for which he seemed to think he had special\ncalling. After tingling his bell for a time, he planted his staff behind\nhim, and leant upon it in a half-sitting posture, and then drawing a\nlong breath, commenced thus, in drawling tones, to give the world the\nbenefit of his announcement:\u2014\u201cGo-od faa-aat bee-eef to be so-old at\nMustruss Ma-act-avushes sho-op at sa-axpence the pund.\u201d Poor Pob made a\nsad mess of long roup-bills and documents of a similar kind. The\nvillagers, accustomed to his voice and manner, could make some meaning\nout of his words; but to strangers it sounded like a language never\nspoken before on earth since the dispersion at the Tower of Babel. The\nvillage boys annoyed the bellman greatly by mimicking his attitude and\nvoice when he was in the act of \u201ccrying\u201d through the streets. It\ninvariably excited his somewhat irascible temper, and he prolonged and\nintensified his tones to an amusing extent. Jamie had a withered,\nill-natured, half-crazed old woman for a wife, and a wretched\ncat-and-dog life they led together in their tottering hovel. The union\nof these two miserable beings was a melancholy caricature of the\nmatrimonial alliance. They were never known to exchange a single word of\naffection. In fact, they were apparently bound to each other by mutual\nhatred. It was strange to think for what purpose they had been created,\nor why they should exist in the world so long. One winter day, after\ngoing his customary round, Pob fell sick, and rapidly declined. In the\ncourse of a day or two it was apparent that he was on the very verge of\ndeath. His old wife contemplated with evident pleasure the prospect of\nhis speedy dissolution, and within five minutes of his death the\nhalf-crazed hag hissed these words into his ear, \u201cDee, ye deevil, dee!\u201d\n\nSpace would fail me to describe minutely all the oddities of\nAuchincraig. There was the keeper of the post-office\u2014a dwarfish man,\nwith elfin locks, and a notorious squint, who knew all the secrets of\nthe village, and seemed to possess the power of reading the contents of\nletters without breaking the seals. There was \u201cburnewin,\u201d\u2014a man of huge\nstature and gigantic strength,\u2014whose \u201csmiddy\u201d after nightfall, when the\nfurnace blazed, was the favourite resort of all the cockfighters,\npoachers, and blackguards throughout Strathkirtle. There were the\n\u201csouter\u201d and the tailor, politicians both, and hard drinkers to boot.\nNor did the village want its due complement of \u201cinnocents.\u201d It had\ngreatly more than the average number; and throughout all my wanderings,\nand during all my residences in towns and remote villages, I have never\nmet so many odd characters gathered together as in old Auchincraig. It\nseemed to me strange that in a valley so beautiful,\u2014where nature is\nprodigal of her richest gifts, where flowers bloom, birds sing, and\ncorn-fields rustle in the summer breeze,\u2014humanity should have appeared\nin such strange shapes and eccentric manifestations. But the old village\nis gone, and the old villagers have departed, and the sun now shines\nupon new homes and fresher hearts.\n\n\n\n\n PERLING JOAN.\n\n BY JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART, LL.D.\n\n\nOur Laird was a very young man when his father died, and he gaed awa to\nFrance, and Italy, and Flanders, and Germany, immediately, and we saw\nnaething o\u2019 him for three years; and my brother, John Baird, went wi\u2019\nhim as his own body-servant. When that time was gane by, our Johnny cam\nhame and tauld us that Sir Claud wad be here the next day, an\u2019 that he\nwas bringing hame a foreign lady wi\u2019 him\u2014but they were not married. This\nnews was a sair heart, as ye may suppose, to a\u2019 that were about the\nhouse; and we were just glad that the auld lady was dead and buried, not\nto hear of sic doings. But what could we do? To be sure, the rooms were\na\u2019 put in order, and the best chamber in the hale house was got ready\nfor Sir Claud and her. John tauld me, when we were alane together that\nnight, that I wad be surprised wi\u2019 her beauty when she came.\n\nBut I never could have believed, till I saw her, that she was sae very\nyoung\u2014such a mere bairn, I may say; I\u2019m sure she was not more than\nfifteen. Such a dancing, gleesome bit bird of a lassie was never seen;\nand ane could not but pity her mair than blame her for what she had\ndone, she was sae visibly in the daftness and light-headedness of youth.\nOh, how she sang, and played, and galloped about on the wildest horses\nin the stable, as fearlessly as if she had been a man! The house was\nfull of fun and glee; and Sir Claud and she were both so young and so\ncomely, that it was enough to break ane\u2019s very heart to behold their\nthoughtlessness. She was aye sitting on his knee, wi\u2019 her arm about his\nneck; and for weeks and months this love and merriment lasted. The poor\nbody had no airs wi\u2019 her; she was just as humble in her speech to the\nlike of us, as if she had been a cottar\u2019s lassie. I believe there was\nnot one of us that could help liking her, for a\u2019 her faults. She was a\nglaiket creature; but gentle and tender-hearted as a perfect lamb, and\nsae bonny! I never sat eyes upon her match. She had never any colour but\nblack for her gown, and it was commonly satin, and aye made in the same\nfashion; and a\u2019 the perling about her bosom, and a great gowden chain\nstuck full of precious rubies and diamonds. She never put powder on her\nhead neither; oh proud, proud was she of her hair! I\u2019ve often known her\ncomb and comb at it for an hour on end; and when it was out of the\nbuckle, the bonny black curls fell as low as her knee. You never saw\nsuch a head of hair since ye were born. She was the daughter of a rich\nauld Jew in Flanders, and ran awa frae the house wi\u2019 Sir Claud, ae night\nwhen there was a great feast gaun on,\u2014the Passover supper, as John\nthought,\u2014and out she came by the back-door to Sir Claud, dressed for\nsupper wi\u2019 a\u2019 her braws.\n\nWeel, this lasted for the maist feck of a year; and Perling Joan (for\nthat was what the servants used to ca\u2019 her, frae the laces about her\nbosom), Mrs Joan lay in and had a lassie.\n\nSir Claud\u2019s auld uncle, the colonel, was come hame from America about\nthis time, and he wrote for the laird to gang in to Edinburgh to see\nhim, and he behoved to do this; and away he went ere the bairn was mair\nthan a fortnight auld, leaving the lady wi\u2019 us.\n\nI was the maist experienced body about the house, and it was me that got\nchief charge of being with her in her recovery. The poor young thing was\nquite changed now. Often and often did she greet herself blind,\nlamenting to me about Sir Claud\u2019s no marrying her; for she said she did\nnot take muckle thought about thae things afore; but that now she had a\nbairn to Sir Claud, and she could not bear to look the wee thing in the\nface, and think a\u2019 body would ca\u2019 it a bastard. And then she said she\nwas come of as decent folk as any lady in Scotland, and moaned and\nsobbit about her auld father and her sisters.\n\nBut the colonel, ye see, had gotten Sir Claud into the town; and we soon\nbegan to hear reports that the colonel had been terribly angry about\nPerling Joan, and threatened Sir Claud to leave every penny he had past\nhim, if he did not put Joan away, and marry a lady like himself. And\nwhat wi\u2019 fleeching, and what wi\u2019 flyting, sae it was that Sir Claud went\naway to the north wi\u2019 the colonel, and the marriage between him and lady\nJuliana was agreed upon, and everything settled.\n\nEverybody about the house had heard mair or less about a\u2019 this, or ever\na word of it came her length. But at last, Sir Claud himself writes a\nlong letter, telling her what a\u2019 was to be; and offering to gie her a\nheap o\u2019 siller, and send our John ower the sea wi\u2019 her, to see her safe\nback to her friends\u2014her and her baby, if she liked best to take it with\nher; but if not, the colonel was to take the bairn hame, and bring her\nup a lady, away from the house here, not to breed any dispeace.\n\nThis was what our Johnny said was to be proposed; for as to the letter\nitself, I saw her get it, and she read it twice ower, and flung it into\nthe fire before my face. She read it, whatever it was, with a wonderful\ncomposure; but the moment after it was in the fire she gaed clean aff\ninto a fit, and she was out of one and into anither for maist part of\nthe forenoon. Oh, what a sight she was! It would have melted the heart\nof stone to see her.\n\nThe first thing that brought her to herself was the sight of her bairn.\nI brought it, and laid it on her knee, thinking it would do her good if\nshe could give it a suck; and the poor trembling thing did as I bade\nher; and the moment the bairn\u2019s mouth was at the breast, she turned as\ncalm as the baby itsel\u2014the tears rapping ower her cheeks, to be sure,\nbut not one word more. I never heard her either greet or sob again a\u2019\nthat day.\n\nI put her and the bairn to bed that night\u2014but nae combing and curling o\u2019\nthe bonnie black hair did I see then. However, she seemed very calm and\ncomposed, and I left them, and gaed to my ain bed, which was in a little\nroom within hers.\n\nNext morning, the bed was found cauld and empty, and the front door of\nthe house standing wide open. We dragged the waters, and sent man and\nhorse every gate, but ne\u2019er a trace of her could we ever light on, till\na letter came twa or three weeks after, addressed to me, frae hersel. It\nwas just a line or twa, to say that she was well, and thanking me, poor\nthing, for having been attentive about her in her down-lying. It was\ndated frae London. And she charged me to say nothing to anybody of\nhaving received it. But this was what I could not do; for everybody had\nset it down for a certain thing, that the poor lassie had made away\nbaith wi\u2019 hersel and the bairn.\n\nI dinna weel ken whether it was owing to this or not, but Sir Claud\u2019s\nmarriage was put aff for twa or three years, and he never cam near us a\u2019\nthat while. At length word came that the wedding was to be put over\ndirectly; and painters, and upholsterers, and I know not what all, came\nand turned the hale house upside down, to prepare for my lady\u2019s\nhame-coming. The only room that they never meddled wi\u2019 was that that had\nbeen Mrs Joan\u2019s: and no doubt they had been ordered what to do.\n\nWeel, the day came, and a braw sunny spring day it was, that Sir Claud\nand the bride were to come hame to the Mains. The grass was a\u2019 new mawn\nabout the policy, and the walks sweepit, and the cloth laid for dinner,\nand everybody in their best to give them their welcoming. John Baird\ncame galloping up the avenue like mad, to tell us that the coach was\namaist within sight, and gar us put oursels in order afore the ha\u2019\nsteps. We were a\u2019 standing there in our ranks, and up came the coach\nrattling and driving, wi\u2019 I dinna ken how mony servants riding behind\nit; and Sir Claud lookit out at the window, and was waving his\nhandkerchief to us, when, just as fast as fire ever flew frae flint, a\nwoman in a red cloak rushed out from among the auld shrubbery at the\nwest end of the house, and flung herself in among the horses\u2019 feet, and\nthe wheels gaed clean out ower her breast, and crushed her dead in a\nsingle moment. She never stirred. Poor thing! she was nae Perling Joan\nthen. She was in rags\u2014perfect rags all below the bit cloak; and we found\nthe bairn, rowed in a checked apron, lying just behind the hedge. A braw\nheartsome welcoming for a pair of young married folk!\u2014_The History of\nMatthew Wald._\n\n\n\n\n JANET SMITH.\n\n BY PROFESSOR THOMAS GILLESPIE.\n\n\nOld Janet Smith lived in a cottage overshadowed by an ash-tree, and\nflanked by a hawthorn, called Lasscairn,\u2014so named, in all probability,\nfrom a cairn of stones, almost in the centre of which this simple\nhabitation was placed, in which, even within the period of my\nremembrance, three maiden veterans kept \u201crock and reel, bleezing hearth\nand reeking lum.\u201d They were uniformly mentioned in the neighbourhood as\n\u201cthe lasses o\u2019 Lasscairn,\u201d though their united ages might have amounted\nto something considerably above three-score thrice told. Janet, however,\nof whom I am now speaking, had been married in her teens, and her\nhusband having lost his life in a lime-quarry, she had been left with an\nonly child, a daughter, whom, by the help of God\u2019s blessing, and her wee\nwheel, she had reared and educated as far as the Proofs and Willison\u2019s.\nThis daughter having attained to a suitable age, had been induced one\nfine summer evening, whilst her mother was engaged in her evening\ndevotion under the shadow of the ash-tree, to take a pleasure walk with\nRob Paton, a neighbouring ploughman, but then recently enlisted, and to\nshare his name and his fortunes for twenty-four months to come. At the\nend of this period, she found her mother nearly in the same position in\nwhich she had left her, praying earnestly to her God to protect, direct,\nand return her \u201cbairn.\u201d There were, however, two bairns for the good old\nwoman to bless, instead of one, and the young Jessie Paton was said to\nbe the very picture of her mother. Be that as it may, old Janet, now a\ngrannie, loved the bairn, forgave the mother, and by the help of an\nadditional wheel, which, in contradistinction to her own, was designated\n\u201cmuckle,\u201d she, and her \u201cbroken-hearted, deserted\u201d daughter, contrived\nfor years to earn such a subsistence as their very moderate wants\nrequired. At last a severe fever cut off the mother, and left a somewhat\nsickly child at about nine years of age, under the sole protection of an\naged and enfeebled grandmother. It was at this stage of old Janet\u2019s\nearthly travail that, in the character of a schoolboy, I became\nacquainted with her and her daughter,\u2014for ever after the mother\u2019s death,\nthe child knew her grandmother by no other name, and under no other\nrelation.\n\nJanet had a particular way\u2014still the practice in Dumfriesshire\u2014of\ndressing or preparing her meal of potatoes. They were scraped,\nwell-dried, salted, beetled, buttered, milked, and ultimately rumbled\ninto the most beautiful and palatable consistency. In short, they became\nthat first, and\u2014beyond the limits of the south country\u2014least known of\nall delicacies, \u201cchampit potatoes.\u201d As I returned often hungry and weary\nfrom school, Janet\u2019s pot presented itself to me, hanging in the reek,\nand at a considerable elevation above the fire, as the most tempting of\nall objects. In fact, Janet, knowing that my hour of return from school\nwas full two hours later than hers of repast, took this method of\nreserving for me a full heaped spoonful of the residue of her and her\nJessie\u2019s meal. Never whilst I live, and live by food, shall I forget the\nexquisite feelings of eager delight with which that single overloaded\nspoonful of beat or \u201cchampit\u201d potatoes was devoured. There are pleasures\nof sentiment and imagination of which I have occasionally partaken, and\nothers connected with what is called the heart and affections; all these\nare beautiful and engrossing in their way and in their season, but to a\nhungry schoolboy, who has devoured his dinner \u201cpiece\u201d ere ten o\u2019clock\na.m., and is returning to his home at a quarter before five, the\npresentiment, the sight, and, above all, the taste and reflection\nconnected with the swallowing of a spoonful\u2014and such a spoonful!\u2014of\nJanet Smith\u2019s potatoes, is, to say nothing flighty or extravagant, not\nless seasonable than exquisite. As my tongue walked slowly and\ncautiously round and round the lower and upper boundaries of the\ndelicious load, as if loath rapidly to diminish that bulk, which the\ncraving stomach would have wished to have been increased had it been\ntenfold, my whole soul was wrapped in Elysium; it tumbled about, and\nrioted in an excess of delight\u2014a kind of feather-bed of downy softness.\nDrinking is good enough in its season, particularly when one is thirsty;\nbut the pleasures attendant on the satisfying of _the appetite_ for\nme!\u2014this is assuredly the great, the master gratification.\n\nBut Janet did not only deal in potatoes; she had likewise a cheese, and,\non pressing occasions, a bottle of beer besides. The one stood in a kind\nof corner press or cupboard, whilst the other occupied a still less\ndignified position beneath old Janet\u2019s bed. To say the truth of Janet\u2019s\ncheese, it was not much beholden to the maker. It might have been\nadvantageously cut into bullets or marbles, such was its hardness and\nsolidity; but then, _in those days_, my teeth were good; and, with a\nkeen stomach and a willing mind, much may be effected even on a \u201cthree\ntimes skimmed sky-blue!\u201d The beer\u2014for which I have often adventured into\nthe terra incognita already mentioned, even at the price of a prostrate\nperson and a dusty jacket\u2014was excellent, brisk, frothy, and nippy;\u2014my\nbreath still goes when I think of it. And then Janet wore such long\nstrings of tape, blue and red, white and yellow, all striped and\nvariegated like a gardener\u2019s garter! I shall never be such a beau again,\nas when my stockings on Sabbath were ornamented with a new pair of\nJanet\u2019s well-known, much-prized, and admired garters.\n\nIt was, however, after all, on Sabbath that Janet appeared to move in\nher native element. It was on Sabbath that her face brightened, and her\nstep became accelerated\u2014that her spectacles were carefully wiped with\nthe corner of a clean neck-napkin, and her Bible was called into early\nand almost uninterrupted use. It was on Sabbath that her devotions were\npoured forth\u2014both in a family and private capacity\u2014with an earnestness\nand a fervency which I have never seen surpassed in manse or mansion, in\ndesk or pulpit. There is, indeed, nothing in nature so beautiful and\nelevating as sincere and heartfelt, heart-warming devotion. There is a\npoor, frail creature, verging on three-score and ten years, with an\nattendant lassie, white-faced, and every way \u201cshilpy\u201d in appearance.\nAround them are nothing more elevating or exciting than a few old sticks\nof furniture, sooty rafters, and a smoky atmosphere. Surely imbecility\nhas here clothed herself in the forbidding garb of dependence and\nsqualid poverty! The worm that crawls into light through the dried\nmole-hill, all powdered over with the dust from which it is escaping, is\na fit emblem of such an object and such a condition. But over all this\nlet us pour the warm and glowing radiance of genuine devotion! The roots\nof that consecrated ash can bear witness to those half-articulated\nbreathings, which connect the weakness of man with the power of God,\u2014the\nsqualidness of poverty with the radiant richness of divine grace. Do\nthose two hearts, which under one covering _now_ breathe forth their\nevening sacrifice in hope and reliance\u2014do they feel, do they acknowledge\nany alliance with the world\u2019s opinions, the world\u2019s artificial and cruel\ndistinctions? If there be one object more pleasing to God and to the\nholy ministers of His will than another, it is this\u2014age uniting with\nyouth, and youth with age, in the giving forth into audible, if not\narticulate expression, the fulness of the devout heart!\n\nLord W\u2014\u2014, whose splendid residence stands about fifteen miles distant\nfrom Lasscairn, happened to be engaged in a hunting expedition in the\nneighbourhood of this humble and solitary abode, and having separated\nfrom his attendants and companions, he bethought himself of resting for\na little under a roof, however humble, from which he saw smoke issuing.\nBut when he put his thumb to the latch it would not move; and after an\neffort or two, he applied first his eye, and lastly his ear, to the\nkeyhole, to ascertain the presence of the inhabitants. The solemn voice\nof fervent prayer met his ear, uttered by a person evidently not in a\nkneeling, but in an erect position; he could, in short, distinctly\ngather the nature and tendency of Janet\u2019s address to her Maker.\n\nShe was manifestly engaged in asking a blessing on her daily meal, and\nwas proceeding to enumerate, with the voice of thanksgiving, the many\nmercies with which, under God\u2019s good providence, she and hers had been\nvisited. After an extensive enumeration, she came at last to speak of\nthat _ample provision_ on which she was now imploring a blessing. In\nthis part of her address she dwelt with peculiar cheerfulness, as well\nas earnestness of tone, on that goodness which had provided so\nbountifully for her, whilst many better deserving than she were worse\ncircumstanced. The whole tenor of her prayer tended to impress the\nlistener with the belief that Janet\u2019s board, though spread in a humble\nhut, must be at least amply supplied with the necessaries of life. But\nwhat was Lord W\u2014\u2014\u2019s surprise, on entrance, to find that a round oaten\nbannock, toasting before a brick at a peat fire, with a basin of\nwhey,\u2014the gift of a kind neighbour,\u2014composed that _ample and bountiful\nprovision_ for which this humble, but contented and pious woman\nexpressed so much gratitude! Lord W\u2014\u2014 was struck with the contrast\nbetween his own condition and feelings and those of this humble pair;\nand, in settling upon Janet and her inmate \u00a36 a-year for life, he\nenabled her to accommodate herself with a new plaid and black silk hood,\nin which she appeared, with her granddaughter, every Sabbath, occupying\nher well-known and acknowledged position on the lowest step of the\npulpit stair, and paying the same respect to the minister in passing as\nif she had been entirely dependent on her own industry and the good will\nof her neighbours as formerly.\n\n\n\n\n THE UNLUCKY TOP BOOTS.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nTop Boots, as everybody must have remarked, are now [1833] nearly\naltogether out of fashion. Their race is all but extinct. An\noccasional pair may indeed still be seen encasing the brawny legs of a\nstout elderly country gentleman on a market day, or on the occasion of\na flying visit to the metropolis; but with this exception, and with\nprobably that of some hale obstinate bachelor octogenarian, who, in\nfull recollection of the impression which his top boots had made on\nthe public mind some fifty years since, still persists in thrusting\nhis shrivelled shanks into the boots of his youth;\u2014we say, with the\nfirst positive, and the last probable exception, this highly\nrespectable-looking, and somewhat flashy, article of dress has\nentirely disappeared.\n\nTime was, however, and we recollect it well, when matters stood far\notherwise with top boots. We have a distinct vision of numberless pairs\nflitting before our eyes, through the mazes of the various thoroughfares\nof the city; but, alas! they have vanished, one after another, like\nstars before the light of approaching day. Rest to their _soles_\u2014they\nare now gathered to their fathers\u2014their brightness is extinguished\u2014their\nglory is gone. The Conqueror of Waterloo hath conquered them also. The\ntop boots have fallen before the Wellingtons!\n\nWe have said that we recollect when it was otherwise with top boots, and\nso we do. We recollect when a pair of top boots was a great object of\nambition with the young, whose worldly prosperity was all yet to\ncome\u2014whose means of indulging in such little vanities of the flesh were\nyet to be acquired. To them a pair of top boots was a sort of land-mark\nin the voyage of life; a palpable, prominent, and desirable object to be\nattained; a sort of Cape Horn to be doubled. Nor were they less objects\nof ambition at the time we speak of\u2014say about 40 years since\u2014to the more\nadvanced, whose circumstances required a long previous hint to prepare\nfor such an event as the purchase of a pair of top boots. In short, top\nboots were the rage of the day. The apprentice, the moment he got \u201cout\u201d\nof his time, got \u201cinto\u201d his top boots. The first thing the young grocer\ndid was to get a pair of top boots. No lover then went to woo his\nmistress but in top boots, or at least if he did, the chance was, that\nhe would go to very little purpose. The buckishly-inclined mechanic,\ntoo, hoarded his superfluous earnings until they reached the height of a\npair of top boots, in which to entomb his lower limbs. Although their\nvisits now, as we have already hinted, are \u201cfew and far between,\u201d we\nhave seen the day when, instead of being but occasionally seen, like\nsolitary points of light as they are now, on the dusky street, they\nconverted it by their numbers into an absolute _via lactea_,\u2014a perfect\ngalaxy of white leather,\u2014or shot, frequent, pale, and flitting, like\nnorthern streamers, through the dark tide of humanity as it strolled\nalong.\n\nNo marvel is it, therefore, that, in the midst of the wide prevalence of\nthis top boot epidemic, poor Tommy Aikin should have fallen a victim to\nthe disease\u2014that his heart should have been set upon a pair of top\nboots; nor is it a marvel that Mr Aikin should have been able finally to\ngratify this longing of his, seeing that he was in tolerable\ncircumstances, or at least in such circumstances as enabled him, by\nretrenching a little somewhere else, to attain the great object of his\nambition\u2014a pair of top boots. No marvel, then, as we have said, are\nthese things which we have related of Mr Aikin; but great marvel is it\nthat a pair of top boots should have wrought any man such mischief, as\nwe shall presently show they did to that honest man. But let us not\nanticipate. Let us, as has been before wisely said, begin at the\nbeginning, and say who Mr Aikin was, and what were the evils in which\nhis top boots involved him.\n\nBe it known, then, to all whom it may concern, that Mr Thomas Aikin was\nan officer of Excise, and was, at the period to which our story relates,\nresiding in a certain small town not more than fifty miles distant from\nthe city of Glasgow. Mr Aikin was a stout-made middle-aged man,\nexceedingly good-natured, kind, civil, and obliging. In short, he was an\nexcellent fellow, honest and upright in all his dealings, and a faithful\nservant of the revenue. Everybody liked Mr Aikin, and Mr Aikin liked\neverybody; and sorely did everybody lament his misfortunes when they\nfell upon him. Mr Aikin had for many years led a happy life in the bosom\nof his family. He laughed and joked away, took his jug of toddy,\ncaressed his children, spoke always affectionately to and of his wife,\nand was so spoken to and of by her in return. In short, Mr Aikin was a\nhappy man up to that evil hour when he conceived the idea of possessing\nhimself of a pair of top boots.\n\n\u201cMary,\u201d said Mr Aikin, one luckless evening, to his loving wife, after\nhaving sat for about half an hour looking into the fire.\n\n\u201cAweel, Thomas?\u201d said his spouse, in token of her attention.\n\n\u201cI wad like to hae a pair o\u2019 tap boots,\u201d replied Mr Aikin, shortly, and\nwithout further preamble, although he had in reality bestowed a good\ndeal of thought on the subject previously; indeed, a dim undefined\nvision of top boots had been floating before his mind\u2019s eye for nearly a\nmonth before it took the distinct shape of such a determination as he\nwas now about to express.\n\n\u201cAweel, Thomas,\u201d replied his better half, with equal brevity, \u201cye had\nbetter get a pair.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re decent lookin\u2019 things,\u201d rejoined Mr Aikin.\n\n\u201cIndeed are they,\u201d said his indulgent spouse,\u2014\u201cvery decent and\nrespectable, Thomas.\u201d\n\n\u201cRather flashy though, I doubt, for the like o\u2019 me,\u201d quoth Mr Aikin.\n\n\u201cI dinna see that, Thomas, sae lang as ye\u2019re able to pay for them,\u201d\nremarked Mrs Aikin.\n\n\u201cNo so very able, my dear,\u201d responded her husband; \u201cbut I wad like to\nhae a pair for a\u2019 that, just to wear on Sundays and collection days.\u201d\n\n\u201cAweel, Thomas, get them; and what for no?\u201d replied Mrs Aikin, \u201csince\nyour mind\u2019s bent on them. We\u2019ll save the price o\u2019 them aff something\nelse.\u201d\n\nWe need not pursue further the amiable colloquy which took place on this\nfatal night between Mr Aikin and his wife. Suffice it to say, that that\nnight fixed Mr Aikin\u2019s resolution to order a pair of top boots. On the\nvery next day he was measured for the said boots; and late on the\nSaturday evening following, the boots, with their tops carefully\npapered, to protect them from injury, were regularly delivered by an\napprentice boy into the hands of Mrs Aikin herself, for her husband\u2019s\ninterest.\n\nAs Mr Aikin was not himself in the house when the boots were brought\nhome, they were placed in a corner of the parlour to await his pleasure;\nand certainly nothing could look more harmless or more inoffensive than\ndid these treacherous boots, as they now stood, with their muffled tops\nand shining feet, in the corner of Mr Aikin\u2019s parlour. But alas! alas!\nshortsighted mortals that we are, that could not foresee the slightest\nportion of the evils with which these rascally boots were fraught! To\nshorten our story as much as possible, we proceed to say that Mr Aikin\nat length came home, and being directed to where the boots lay, he\nraised them up in one hand, holding a candle in the other; and having\nturned them round and round several times, admiring their gloss and fair\nproportions, laid them down again with a calm quiet smile of\nsatisfaction, and retired to bed.\n\nSunday came, the church bells rang, and Mr Aikin sallied forth in all\nthe pomp and glory of a pair of spick and span new top boots. With all\nMr Aikin\u2019s good qualities, there was, however,\u2014and we forgot to mention\nit before,\u2014a \u201cleetle\u201d touch of personal vanity; the slightest imaginable\nit was, but still such an ingredient did enter into the composition of\nhis character, and it was this weakness, as philosophers call it, which\nmade him hold his head at an unwonted height, and throw out his legs\nwith a flourish, and plant his foot with a firmness and decision on this\nparticular Sunday, which was quite unusual with him, or, at least, which\nhad passed unnoticed before. With the exception, however, of a few\npassing remarks, in which there was neither much acrimony nor much\nnovelty, Mr Aikin\u2019s boots were allowed to go to and from the church in\npeace and quietness. \u201cHae ye seen Mr Aikin\u2019s tap boots?\u201d \u201cFaith, Mr\nAikin looks weel in his tap boots.\u201d \u201cMr Aikin was unco grand the day in\nhis tap boots.\u201d Such and such like were the only observations which Mr\nAikin\u2019s top boots elicited on the first Sunday of their appearance.\nSunday after Sunday came and departed, and with the Sundays came also\nand departed Mr Aikin\u2019s top boots, for he wore them only on that sacred\nday, and on collection days, as he himself originally proposed. Like\nevery other marvel, they at length sank quietly to rest, becoming so\nassociated and identified with the wearer, that no one ever thought of\ndiscussing them separately. Deceitful calm\u2014treacherous silence!\u2014it was\nbut the gathering of the storm.\n\nIt so happened that Mr Aikin, in the language of the Excise, surveyed,\nthat is, ascertained and levied the duties payable by a tanner, or\nleather dresser, who carried on his business in the town in which Mr\nAikin resided. Now, the Honourable Board of Excise were in those days\nextremely jealous of the fidelity of their officers, and in a spirit of\nsuspicion of the honour and faith of man peculiar to themselves, readily\nlistened to every report prejudicial to the character of their servants.\nHere, then, was an apparently intimate connection, and of the worst\nsort,\u2014a pair of top boots,\u2014between a revenue officer and a trader, a\ndresser of leather. Remote and obscure hints of connivance between the\nformer and the latter began to arise, and in despite of the general\nesteem in which Mr Aikin was held, and the high opinion which was\nentertained of his worth and integrity, these hints and suspicions\u2014such\nis the wickedness and perversity of human nature\u2014gradually gained\nground, until they at length reached the ears of the Board, with the\nmost absurd aggravations.\n\nTheir honours were told, but by whom was never ascertained, that the\nmost nefarious practices were going on in \u2014\u2014, and to an enormous extent.\nLarge speculations in contraband leather, on the joint account of the\nofficer and trader, were talked of; the one sinking his capital, the\nother sacrificing the king\u2019s duties. Whole hogsheads of manufactured\nboots and shoes were said to be exported to the West Indies, as the\ncommon adventure of the officer and trader. The entire family and\nfriends of the former, to the tenth degree of propinquity, were said to\nhave been supplied gratis with boots and shoes for the last ten years.\nIn short, the whole affair was laid before their honours, the\nCommissioners of Excise, decked out in the blackest colours, and so\nswollen, distorted, and exaggerated, that no man could have conceived\nfor a moment that so monstrous a tale of dishonesty and turpitude could\nhave been manufactured out of a thing so simple as a pair of top boots.\nIndeed, how could he? For the boots\u2014the real ground of the vile\nfabrication\u2014were never once mentioned, nor in the slightest degree\nalluded to; but, as it was, the thing bore a serious aspect, and so\nthought the Honourable Board of Excise.\n\nA long and grave consultation was held in the Board-room, and the result\nwas, an order to the then collector of Excise in Glasgow to make a\nstrict and immediate inquiry into the circumstances of the case, and to\nreport thereon; a measure which was followed up, in a day or two\nafterwards, by their honours dispatching two surveying-generals, as they\nare called, also to Glasgow, to assist at and superintend the\ninvestigation which the collector had been directed to set on foot. On\nthe arrival of these officers at Glasgow, they forthwith waited upon the\ncollector, to ascertain what he had learned regarding Mr Aikin\u2019s\nnefarious practices. The result of the consultation, which was here\nagain held, was a determination, on the part of the generals and the\ncollector, to proceed to the scene of Mr Aikin\u2019s ignominy, and to\nprosecute their inquiries on the spot, as the most likely way of\narriving at a due knowledge of the facts.\n\nAccordingly, two chaises were hired at the expense of the Crown, one for\nthe two generals, and another for the collector and his clerk\u2014all this,\ngood reader, be it remembered, arising from the simple circumstance of\nMr Aikin\u2019s having indulged himself in the luxury of a single solitary\npair of top boots,\u2014and, moreover, the first pair he ever had. The\ngentlemen, having seated themselves in the carriages, were joined, just\nbefore starting, by a friend of the collector\u2019s, on horseback, who,\nagreeably to an arrangement he had made with the latter on the preceding\nday, now came to ride out with them to the scene of their impending\nlabours; and thus, though of course he had nothing to do with the\nproceedings of the day, he added not a little to the imposing character\nof the procession, which was now about to move in the direction of Mr\nAikin\u2019s top boots.\n\nAn hour and a half\u2019s drive brought the whole cavalcade into the little\ntown in which the unfortunate owner of the said boots resided; and\nlittle did he think, honest man, as he eyed the procession passing the\nwindows, marvelling the while what it could mean\u2014little, we say, did he\nthink that the sole and only object, _pro tempore_ at least, of those\nwho composed it, was to inquire how, and by what means, and from whom,\nhe had gotten his top boots. Of this fact, however, he was soon made\naware. In less than half an hour he was sent for, and told, for the\nfirst time, of the heavy charges which lay against him. A long, tedious\ninvestigation took place; item after item of poor Aikin\u2019s indictment\nmelted away beneath the process of inquiry; until at length the whole\naffair resolved itself into the original cause of all the mischief,\u2014the\npair of top boots. Nothing which could in the slightest degree impugn Mr\nAikin\u2019s honesty remained but these unlucky top boots, and for them he\nimmediately produced his shoemaker\u2019s receipt:\u2014\n\n Mr AIKIN,\n _Bought of_ DAVID ANDERSON,\n\n One pair of Top Boots, \u00a32, 2s.\n Settled in full,\n\n DAVID ANDERSON.\n\nWith this finisher the investigation closed, and Mr Aikin stood fully\nand honourably acquitted of all the charges brought against him. The\nimpression, however, which the affair made at head-quarters, was far\nfrom being favourable to him. He was ever after considered there in the\nlight, not of an innocent man, but as one against whom nothing could be\nproven; and his motions were watched with the utmost vigilance. The\nconsequence was, that, in less than three months, he was dismissed from\nthe service of the revenue, ostensibly for some trifling omission of\nduty; but he himself thought, and so did everybody else, that the top\nboots were in reality the cause of his misfortune.\n\nOne would have thought that this was quite enough of mischief to arise\nfrom one pair of top boots, and so thought everybody but the top boots\nthemselves, we suppose. This, however, was but a beginning of the\ncalamities into which they walked with their unfortunate owner.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nAbout four miles distant from the town in which Mr Aikin lived, there\nresided an extensive coal-mine proprietor of the name of Davidson; and\nit so happened that he, too, had a predilection for that particular\narticle of dress, already so often named, viz., top boots; indeed, he\nwas never known to wear anything else in their place. Davidson was an\nelderly gentleman, harsh and haughty in his manner, and extremely mean\nin all his dealings\u2014a manner and disposition which made him greatly\ndisliked by the whole country, and especially by his workmen, the\nminers, of whom he employed upwards of a hundred and fifty. The\nabhorrence in which Mr Davidson was at all times held by his servants,\nwas at this particular moment greatly increased by an attempt which he\nwas making to reduce his workmen\u2019s wages; and to such a height had their\nresentment risen against their employer, that some of the more ferocious\nof them were heard to throw out dark hints of personal violence; and it\nwas much feared by Davidson\u2019s friends\u2014of whom he had, however, but a\nvery few, and these mostly connected with him by motives of\ninterest\u2014that such an occurrence would, in reality, happen one night or\nother, and that at no great distance of time. Nor was this fear\ngroundless.\n\nMr Davidson was invited to dine with a neighbouring gentleman. He\naccepted the invitation, very foolishly, as his family thought; but he\ndid accept it, and went accordingly. It was in the winter time, and the\nhouse of his host was about a mile distant from his own residence. Such\nan opportunity as this of giving their employer a sound drubbing had\nbeen long looked for by some half dozen of Mr Davidson\u2019s workmen, and\nearly and correct information on the subject of his dining out enabled\nthem to avail themselves of it. The conspirators, having held a\nconsultation, resolved to waylay Davidson on his return home. With this\nview they proceeded, after it became dark, in the direction of the house\nin which their employer was dining. Having gone about half way, they\nhalted, and held another consultation, whereat it was determined that\nthey should conceal themselves in a sunk fence which ran alongside of\nthe road, until the object of their resentment approached, when they\nshould all rush out upon him at once, and belabour him to their hearts\u2019\ncontent. This settled, they all cowered down into the ditch, to await\nthe arrival of their victim. \u201cBut how will we ken him i\u2019 the dark?\u201d said\nJock Tamson, one of the conspirators, in a low whisper, to his next\nneighbour; \u201cwe may fa\u2019 foul o\u2019 somebody else in a mistak.\u201d The question\nrather posed Jock\u2019s neighbour, who immediately put it to the person next\nhim, and he again to the next, and on went the important query, until\nall were in possession of it; but none could answer it. At length, one\nof more happy device than the rest suggested that Mr Davidson might be\nrecognised by his top boots. The idea pleased all, and was by all\nconsidered infallible, for the fame of Mr Aikin\u2019s boots had not yet\nreached this particular quarter of the country. Satisfied that they had\nhit upon an unerring mark by which to know their man, the ruffians\nwaited patiently for his approach.\n\nAt length, after fully two hours\u2019 watching, the fall of a footstep broke\nfaintly on their ears; it came nearer and nearer, and became every\nmoment more and more distinct. Breathless with the intensity of their\nfeelings, the conspirators, in dead silence, grasped their cudgels with\nincreased energy, and sunk themselves in the ditch until their eyes were\non a level with the ground, that they might at once place the\napproaching object full before them, and between them and the feeble\nlight which lingered in the western sky. In the meantime, the wayfarer\napproached; two dim whitey objects glimmered indistinctly in the\ndarkness. They were instantly recognized to be Mr Davidson\u2019s top boots;\na loud shout followed this feeling of conviction; the colliers rushed\nfrom their hiding-place, and in the next instant half a dozen bludgeons\nwhistled round the ears of the unfortunate wayfarer. The sufferer roared\nlustily for mercy, but he roared in vain. The blows fell thick and fast\nupon his luckless head and shoulders, for it was necessary that the work\nshould be done quickly; and a few seconds more saw him lying senseless\nand bleeding in the ditch in which his assailants had concealed\nthemselves. Having satisfied their vengeance, the ruffians now fled,\nleaving their victim behind them in the condition we have described.\nMorning came; a man was found in a ditch, speechless, and bleeding\nprofusely from many severe wounds on the head and face. He was dragged\nout, and, after cleansing his face from the blood and dirt with which it\nwas encrusted, the unfortunate man was recognised to be\u2014Mr Thomas Aikin!\n\nThe unlucky boots, and they alone, were the cause of poor Aikin\u2019s\nmischance. He had, indeed, been mauled by mistake, as the reader will\nhave already anticipated. There was no intention whatever on the part of\nthe colliers to do Mr Aikin any injury, for Mr Aikin, in the whole\ncourse of his harmless life, had never done them any; indeed, he was\nwholly unknown to them, and they to him. It was the top boots, and\nnothing but the top boots, that did all the mischief. But to go on with\nour story. Aikin was carried home, and, through the strength of a\nnaturally good constitution and skilful surgical assistance, recovered\nso far in six weeks as to be able to go about as usual, although he bore\nto his grave with him on his face the marks of the violence which he had\nreceived, besides being disfigured by the loss of some half dozen of his\nfront teeth.\n\nThe top boots, which poor Aikin had worn before as articles of dress,\nand, of course, as a matter of choice, he was now obliged to wear daily\nfrom necessity, being, as we have already related, dismissed from his\nsituation in the Excise. One would think that Aikin had now suffered\nenough for his predilection for top boots, seeing\u2014at least so far as we\ncan see\u2014that there was no great harm in such an apparently inoffensive\nindulgence; but Mr Aikin\u2019s evil stars, or his top boots themselves, we\ndo not know which, were of a totally different opinion, and on this\nopinion they forthwith proceeded to act.\n\nSome weeks after the occurrence of the disaster just recorded, the\nlittle town of \u2014\u2014, where Aikin resided, was suddenly thrown into a state\nof the utmost horror and consternation by the report of a foul murder\nand robbery having been committed on the highway, and within a short\ndistance of the town; and of all the inhabitants who felt horror-struck\non this occasion, there was no one more horrified than Mr Thomas Aikin.\nThe report, however, of the murder and robbery was incorrect, in so far\nas the unfortunate man was still living, although little more, when\nfound in the morning, for the deed had been committed over night. Being\na stranger, he was immediately conveyed to the principal inn of the\ntown, put to bed, and medical aid called in. The fiscal, on learning\nthat the man was still in existence, instantly summoned his clerk, and,\naccompanied by a magistrate, hastened to the dying man\u2019s bedside, to\ntake down whatever particulars could be learnt from him regarding the\nassault and robbery. After patiently and laboriously connecting the half\nintelligible and disjointed sentences which they from time to time\nelicited from him, they made out that he was a cattle-dealer, that he\nbelonged to Edinburgh, that he had been in Glasgow, and that, having\nmissed the evening coach which plies between the former and the latter\ncity, he had taken the road on foot, with the view of accomplishing one\nstage, and there awaiting the coming up of the next coach. They further\nelicited from him that he had had a large sum of money upon him, of\nwhich, of course, he had been deprived. The fiscal next proceeded to\ninquire if he could identify the person or persons who attacked him. He\nmumbled a reply in the negative.\n\n\u201cHow many were there of them?\u201d inquired the magistrate. \u201cWere there more\nthan one?\u201d\n\n\u201cOnly one,\u201d muttered the unfortunate man.\n\n\u201cWas there any peculiarity in his dress or appearance that struck you?\u201d\nasked the fiscal.\n\nHe mumbled a reply, but none of the bystanders could make it out. The\nquestion was again put, and both the magistrate and fiscal stooped down\nsimultaneously to catch the answer. After an interval it came\u2014and what\nthink you it was, good reader? Why, \u201ctop boots,\u201d distinctly and\nunequivocally. The fiscal and magistrate looked at each other for a\nsecond, but neither durst venture to hint at the astounding suspicion\nwhich the mention of these remarkable objects forced upon them.\n\n\u201cHe wore top boots, you say?\u201d again inquired the fiscal, to make sure\nthat he had heard aright.\n\n\u201cY-e-s, t-o-p b-o-o-ts,\u201d was again the reply.\n\n\u201cWas he a thin man, or a stout man?\u201d\n\n\u201cA stout man.\u201d\n\n\u201cYoung or middle-aged?\u201d\n\n\u201cMiddle-aged.\u201d\n\n\u201cTall or short?\u201d\n\n\u201cShort,\u201d groaned out the sufferer, and, with that word, the breath of\nlife departed from him.\n\nThis event, of course, put an immediate end to the inquiry. The fiscal\nand magistrate now retired to consult together regarding what was best\nto be done, and to consider the deposition of the murdered man. There\nwas a certain pair of top boots present to the minds of both, but the\nwearer of them had hitherto borne an unblemished character, and was\npersonally known to them both as a kindhearted, inoffensive man. Indeed,\nup to this hour, they would as soon have believed that the minister of\nthe parish would commit a robbery as Mr Aikin\u2014we say Mr Aikin, for we\ncan no longer conceal the fact, that it was Mr Aikin\u2019s boots, however\nreluctantly admitted, that flashed upon the minds of the two gentlemen\nof whom we are now speaking.\n\n\u201cThe thing is impossible, incredible of such a man as Mr Aikin,\u201d said\nthe magistrate, in reply to the first open insinuation of the fiscal,\nalthough, in saying this, he said what was not in strict accordance with\ncertain vague suspicions which had taken possession of his own mind.\n\n\u201cWhy, I should say so too,\u201d replied the officer of the law, \u201cwere I to\njudge by the character which he has hitherto borne; but here,\u201d he said,\nholding up the deposition of the murdered man, \u201chere are circumstances\nwhich we cannot be warranted in overlooking, let them implicate whom\nthey may. There is in especial the top boots,\u201d went on the fiscal; \u201cnow,\nthere is not another pair within ten miles of us but Aikin\u2019s; for Mr\nDavidson, the only man whom I know that wears them besides, is now in\nLondon. There is the personal description, too, exact. And besides all\nthis, bailie,\u201d continued the law officer, \u201cyou will recollect that Mr\nAikin is and has been out of employment for the last six months; and\nthere is no saying what a man who has a large family upon his hands will\ndo in these circumstances.\u201d\n\nThe bailie acknowledged the force of his colleague\u2019s observations, but\nremarked, that, as it was a serious charge, it must be gone cautiously\nand warily about. \u201cFor it wad be,\u201d he said, \u201crather a hard matter to\nhang a man upon nae ither evidence than a pair o\u2019 tap boots.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoubtless it would,\u201d replied the fiscal; \u201cbut here is,\u201d he said, \u201ca\nconcatenation of circumstances\u2014a chain of evidence, so far as it goes,\nperfectly entire and connected. But,\u201d he continued, as if to reconcile\nthe bailie to the dangerous suspicion, \u201can alibi on the part o\u2019 Mr Aikin\nwill set a\u2019 to rights, and blaw the hale charge awa, like peelin\u2019s o\u2019\ningans; and if he be an innocent man, bailie, he can hae nae difficulty\nin establishing an alibi.\u201d\n\nNot so fast, Mr Fiscal, not so fast, if you please; this alibi was not\nso easily established, or rather it could not be established at all.\nMost unfortunately for poor Aikin, it turned out, upon an inquiry which\nthe official authorities thought it necessary to set on foot before\nproceeding to extremities\u2014that is, before taking any decisive steps\nagainst the object of their suspicion\u2014that he had been not only absent\nfrom his own house until a late hour of the night on which the murder\nand robbery were committed, but had actually been at that late hour on\nthe very identical road on which it had taken place. The truth is, that\nAikin had been dining with a friend who lived about a mile into the\ncountry, and, as it unfortunately happened, in the very direction in\nwhich the crime had been perpetrated. Still, could it not have been\nshown that no unnecessary time had elapsed between the moment of his\nleaving his friend\u2019s house and his arrival at his own? Such a\ncircumstance would surely have weighed something in his favour. So it\nwould, probably; but alas! even this slender exculpatory incident could\nnot be urged in his behalf; for the poor man, little dreaming of what\nwas to happen, had drunk a tumbler or two more than enough, and had\nfallen asleep on the road. In short, the fiscal, considering all the\ncircumstances of the case as they now stood, did not think it consistent\nwith his duty either to delay proceedings longer against Aikin, or to\nmaintain any further delicacy with regard to him. A report of the whole\naffair was made to the sheriff of Glasgow, who immediately ordered a\nwarrant to be made out for the apprehension of Aikin. This instrument\nwas given forthwith into the custody of two criminal officers, who set\nout directly in a post-chaise to execute their commission.\n\nArriving in the middle of the night, they found poor Aikin, wholly\nunconscious of the situation in which he stood, in bed and sound asleep.\nHaving roused the unhappy man, and barely allowed him time to draw on\nhis top boots, they hurried him into the chaise, and in little more than\nan hour thereafter, Aikin was fairly lodged in Glasgow jail, to stand\nhis trial for murder and robbery, and this mainly, if not wholly, on the\nstrength of his top boots.\n\nThe day of trial came. The judge summed up the evidence, and, in an\neloquent speech, directed the special attention of the jury to Aikin\u2019s\ntop boots: indeed, on these he dwelt so much, and with such effect, that\nthe jury returned a verdict of guilty against the prisoner at the bar,\nwho accordingly received sentence of death, but was strongly recommended\nto mercy by the jury, as well on the ground of his previous good\ncharacter, as on that of certain misgivings regarding the top boots,\nwhich a number of the jury could not help entertaining, in despite of\ntheir prominence in the evidence which was led against their unfortunate\nowner.\n\nAikin\u2019s friends, who could not be persuaded of his guilt,\nnotwithstanding the strong circumstantial proof with which it was\napparently established, availing themselves of this recommendation of\nthe jury, immediately set to work to second the humane interference; and\nProvidence in its mercy kindly assisted them. From a communication which\nthe superintendent of police in Glasgow received from the corresponding\nofficer in Edinburgh, about a week after Aikin\u2019s condemnation, it\nappeared that there were more gentlemen of suspicious character in the\nworld who wore top boots than poor Aikin. The letter alluded to\nannounced the capture of a notorious character\u2014regarding whom\ninformation had been received from Bow Street\u2014a \u201cflash cove,\u201d fresh from\nLondon, on a foraying expedition in Scotland. The communication\ndescribed him as being remarkably well dressed, and, in especial,\nalluded to the circumstance of his wearing top boots; concluding the\nwhole, which was indeed the principal purpose of the letter, by\ninquiring if there was any charge in Glasgow against such a person as he\ndescribed. The circumstance, by some fortunate chance, reached the ears\nof Aikin\u2019s friends, and in the hope that something might be made of it,\nthey employed an eminent lawyer in Edinburgh to sift the matter to the\nbottom.\n\nIn the meantime, the Englishman in the top boots was brought to trial\nfor another highway robbery, found guilty, and sentenced to death\nwithout hope of mercy. The lawyer whom Aikin\u2019s friends had employed,\nthinking this a favourable opportunity for eliciting the truth from him,\nseeing that he had now nothing more to fear in this world, waited upon\nthe unfortunate man, and, amidst a confession of a long series of\ncrimes, obtained from him that of the murder and robbery for which poor\nAikin had been tried and condemned. The consequence of this important\ndiscovery was, the immediate liberation of Aikin, who again returned in\npeace to the bosom of his family. His friends, however, not contented\nwith what they had done, represented the whole circumstances of the case\nto the Secretary of State for the Home Department; and under the\nimpression that there lay a claim on the country for reparation for the\ninjury, though inadvertent, which its laws had done to an innocent man,\nthe application was replied to in favourable terms in course of post,\nand in less than three weeks thereafter, Mr Thomas Aikin was appointed\nto a situation in the custom-house in London, worth two hundred pounds\na-year. His steadiness, integrity, and general good conduct, soon\nprocured him still further advancement, and he finally died, after\nenjoying his appointment for many years, in the annual receipt of more\nthan double the sum which we have just named. And thus ends the eventful\nhistory of Mr Thomas Aikin and his Top Boots.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh\nJournal._\n\n\n\n\n MY FIRST AND LAST PLAY.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR, M.D.\n\n\nThe time of Tammie Bodkin\u2019s apprenticeship being nearly worn through, it\nbehoved me, as a man attentive to business and the interests of my\nfamily, to cast my een around me in search of a callant to fill his\nplace, as it is customary in our trade for our young men, when their\ntime is out, taking a year\u2019s journeymanship in Edinburgh to perfect them\nin the mair intricate branches of the business, and learn the newest\nmanner of the French and London fashions, by cutting claith for the\nyoung advocates, the college students, and the rest of the principal\ntip-top bucks.\n\nHaving, though I say it myself, the word of being a canny maister, mair\nthan ane brought their callants to me, on reading the bill of \u201cAn\nApprentice Wanted\u201d plaistered on my shop window. Offering to bind them\nfor the regular time, yet not wishing to take but ane, I thocht best no\nto fix in a hurry, and make choice of him that seemed mair exactly cut\nout for my purpose. In the course of a few weeks three or four cast up,\namong whom was a laddie of Ben Aits, the mealmonger, and a son of\nWilliam Burlings, the baker; to say little of Saunders Broom, the sweep,\nthat wad fain hae putten his blackit-looking bit creature with the ae ee\nunder my wing; but I aye lookit to respectability in these matters, so\nglad was I when I got the offer of Mungo Glen.\u2014But more of this in half\na minute.\n\nI must say I was glad of any feasible excuse to make to the sweep, to\nget quit of him and his laddie,\u2014the father being a drucken\nne\u2019er-do-weel, that I wonder didna fa\u2019 lang ere this time of day from\nsome chumley-head, and get his neck broken; so I tell\u2019t him at lang and\nlast, when he came papping into the shop, plaguing me every time he\npassed, that I had fittit mysel, and that there would be nae need of his\ntaking the trouble to call again. Upon which he gaed his blackit neeve a\ndesperate thump on the counter, making the observe, that out of respect\nfor him I might have given his son the preference. Though I was a wee\npuzzled for an answer, I said to him, for want of a better, that having\na timber leg, he couldna weel crook his hough to the labroad for our\ntrade.\n\n\u201cHout, tout,\u201d said Saunders, giving his lips a smack\u2014\u201ccrook his hough,\nye body you! Do ye think his timber leg canna screw off? That\u2019ll no\npass.\u201d\n\nI was a wee dumbfoundered at this cleverness; so I said, mair on my\nguard, \u201cTrue, true, Saunders; but he\u2019s ower little.\u201d\n\n\u201cOwer little, and be hanged to ye!\u201d cried the disrespectful fellow,\nwheeling about on his heel, as he graspit the sneck of the shop door,\nand gaed a grin that showed the only clean pairts of his body\u2014to wit,\nthe whites o\u2019 his een, and his sharp teeth,\u2014\u201cOwer little!\u2014Pu, pu!\u2014He\u2019s\nlike the blackamoor\u2019s pig, then, Maister Wauch,\u2014he\u2019s like the\nblackamoor\u2019s pig\u2014he may be ver\u2019 little, but he be tam ould;\u201d and with\nthis he showed his back, clapping the door at his tail without wishing a\ngood day; and I am scarcely sorry when I confess that I never cuttit\nclaith for either father or son from that day to this ane, the losing of\nsuch a customer being no great matter at best, and amaist clear gain,\ncompared with saddling mysel wi\u2019 a callant with only ae ee and ae leg,\nthe tane having fa\u2019en a victim to the dregs of the measles, and the\nither having been harled aff wi\u2019 a farmer\u2019s threshing-mill. However, I\ngot mysel properly suited.\u2014But ye shall hear.\n\nOur neighbour, Mrs Grassie, a widow woman, unco intimate wi\u2019 our wife,\nand very attentive to Benjie when he had the chincough, had a far-away\ncousin o\u2019 the name o\u2019 Glen, that haddit out amang the howes of the\nLammermoor hills\u2014a distant part of the country, ye observe. Auld Glen, a\ndecent-looking body of a creature, had come in wi\u2019 his sheltie about\nsome private matters of business\u2014such as the buying of a horse, or\nsomething to that effect, where he could best fa\u2019 in wi\u2019t, either at our\nfair, or the Grassmarket, or sic like; so he had up-pitting free of\nexpense from Mrs Grassie, on account of his relationship, Glen being\nsecond cousin to Mrs Grassie\u2019s brother\u2019s wife, wha is deceased. I might,\nindeed, have mentioned, that our neighbour hersel had been twice\nmarried, and had the misery of seeing out baith her gudemen; but sic was\nthe will of fate, and she bore up with perfect resignation.\n\nHaving made a bit warm dinner ready\u2014for she was a tidy body, and kent\nwhat was what\u2014she thought she couldna do better than ask in a reputable\nneighbour to help her friend to eat it, and take a cheerer wi\u2019 him; as,\nmaybe, being a stranger here, he wouldna like to use the freedom of\ndrinking by himsel\u2014a custom which is at the best an unsocial\nane\u2014especially wi\u2019 nane but women-folk near him, so she did me the\nhonour to make choice of me, though I say\u2019t, wha should na say\u2019t; and\nwhen we got our jug filled for the second time, and began to grow better\nacquainted, ye would just wonder to see how we became merry, and crackit\naway just like twa pen-guns. I asked him, ye see, about sheep and cows,\nand corn and hay, and ploughing and thrashing, and horses and carts, and\nfallow land, and lambing-time, and har\u2019st, and making cheese and butter,\nand selling eggs, and curing the sturdie, and the snifters, and the\nbatts, and sic like; and he, in his turn, made enquiry regarding broad\nand narrow claith, Kilmarnock cowls, worsted comforters, Shetland hose,\nmittens, leather caps, stuffing and padding, metal and mule-buttons,\nthorls, pocket-linings, serge, twist, buckram, shaping, and sewing,\nback-splaying, rund-gooseing, measuring, and all the ither particulars\nbelanging to our trade, which he said, at lang and last, after we had\njokit thegither, was a power better ane than the farming.\n\n\u201cYe should mak yer son ane, then,\u201d said I, \u201cif ye think sae. Have ye ony\nbairns?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ve het the nail on the head. \u2019Od, man, if ye wasna sae far away, I\nwould bind our auldest callant to yersel, I\u2019m sae weel pleased wi\u2019 yer\ngentlemanly manners. But I\u2019m speaking havers.\u201d\n\n\u201cHavers here or havers there; what,\u201d said I, \u201cis to prevent ye boarding\nhim, at a cheap rate, either wi\u2019 our friend Mrs Grassie, or wi\u2019 the\nwife? Either of the twa wad be a sort of mother till him.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed, I daursay they would,\u201d answered Maister Glen, stroking his chin,\nwhich was gey rough, and hadna got a clean sin\u2019 Sunday, having had four\ndays of sheer growth\u2014our meeting, ye\u2019ll observe by this, being on the\nThursday afternoon\u2014\u201c\u2019Deed would they. \u2019Od, I maun speak to the mistress\nabout it.\u201d\n\nOn the head of this we had anither jug, three being cannie, after which\nwe were baith a wee tozy-mozy; so I daursay Mrs Grassie saw plainly that\nwe were getting into a state where we wad not easily make a halt; so,\nwithout letting on, she brought in the tea things before us, and showed\nus a play-bill, to tell us that a company of strolling play-actors had\ncome in a body in the morning, with a hale cartful of scenery and grand\ndresses, and were to make an exhibition at seven o\u2019clock, at the ransom\nof a shilling a head, in Laird Wheatley\u2019s barn.\n\n Mony a time and often had I heard of play-acting, and of players making\nthemselves kings and queens, and saying a great many wonderful things;\nbut I had never before an opportunity of making mysel a witness to the\ntruth of these hearsays. So Maister Glen being as fu\u2019 o\u2019 nonsense, and\nas fain to have his curiosity gratified as mysel, we took upon us the\nstout resolution to gang out thegither, he offering to treat me, and I\ndetermined to rin the risk of Maister Wiggie our minister\u2019s rebuke for\nthe transgression, hoping it would make no lasting impression on his\nmind, being for the first and only time. Folks shouldna at a\u2019 times be\nower scrupulous.\n\nAfter paying our money at the door, never, while I live and breathe,\nwill I forget what we saw and heard that night; it just looks to me, by\nall the world, when I think on\u2019t, like a fairy dream. The place was\ncrowded to the full; Maister Glen and me having nearly got our ribs dung\nin before we fand a seat, and them behint were obliged to mount the back\nbenches to get a sight. Right to the forehand of us was a large green\ncurtain, some five or six ells wide, a guid deal the waur of the wear,\nhaving seen service through twa three simmers; and, just in the front of\nit, were eight or ten penny candles stuck in a board fastened to the\nground, to let us see the players\u2019 feet like, when they came on the\nstage,\u2014and even before they came on the stage,\u2014for the curtain being\nscrimpit in length, we saw legs and feet moving behind the scenes very\nneatly; while twa blind fiddlers they had brought with them played the\nbonniest ye ever heard. \u2019Od, the very music was worth a sixpence of\nitsel.\n\nThe place, as I said before, was choke-full, just to excess, so that one\ncould scarcely breathe. Indeed, I never saw ony part sae crowded, not\neven at a tent-preaching, when the Rev. Mr Roarer was giving his\ndiscourses on the building of Solomon\u2019s Temple. We were obligated to\nhave the windows opened for a mouthful of fresh air, the barn being as\nclose as a baker\u2019s oven, my neighbour and me fanning our red faces wi\u2019\nour hats, to keep us cool; and, though all were half stewed, we\ncertainly had the worst o\u2019t,\u2014the toddy we had ta\u2019en having fermented the\nblood of our bodies into a perfect fever.\n\nJust at the time that the twa blind fiddles were playing \u201cThe Downfall\nof Paris,\u201d a handbell rang, and up goes the green curtain; being hauled\nto the ceiling, as I observed wi\u2019 the tail of my ee, by a birkie at the\nside, that had haud of a rope. So, on the music stopping, and all\nbecoming as still as that you might have heard a pin fall, in comes a\ndecent old gentleman at his leisure, weel powthered, wi\u2019 an auld\nfashioned coat on, waistcoat with flap-pockets, brown breeches with\nbuckles at the knees, and silk stockings with red gushets on a blue\nground. I never saw a man in sic distress; he stampit about, dadding the\nend of his staff on the ground, and imploring all the powers of heaven\nand yearth to help him to find out his runawa\u2019 daughter, that had\ndecampit wi\u2019 some ne\u2019er-do-weel loon of a half-pay captain, that keppit\nher in his arms frae her bedroom window, up twa pair o\u2019 stairs. Every\nfather and head of a family maun hae felt for a man in his situation,\nthus to be rubbit of his dear bairn, and an only daughter too, as he\ntell\u2019t us ower and ower again, as the saut, saut tears ran gushing down\nhis withered face, and he aye blew his nose on his clean calendered\npocket napkin. But, ye ken, the thing was absurd to suppose that we\nshould ken onything about the matter, having never seen either him or\nhis daughter between the een afore, and no kenning them by headmark; so\nthough we sympathised with him, as folks ought to do wi\u2019 a\nfellow-creature in affliction, we thought it best to haud our tongues,\nto see what might cast up better than he expected. So out he gaed\nstumping at the ither side, determined, he said, to find them out,\nthough he should follow them to the world\u2019s end, Johnny Groat\u2019s House,\nor something to that effect.\n\nHardly was his back turned, and amaist before ye could cry Jack\nRobinson, in comes the birkie and the very young leddy the auld\ngentleman described, arm-in-arm thegither, smoodging and lauching like\ndaft. Dog on it! it was a shameless piece of business. As true as death,\nbefore all the crowd of folk, he pat his arm round her waist, and ca\u2019ed\nher his sweatheart, and love, and dearie, and darling, and everything\nthat is sweet. If they had been courting in a close thegither on a\nFriday night, they couldna hae said mair to ane anither, or gaen greater\nlengths. I thought sic shame to be an ee-witness to sic ongoings, that I\nwas obliged at last to haud up my hat afore my face, and look down;\nthough, for a\u2019 that, the young lad, to be sic a blackguard as his\nconduct showed, was weel enough faured, and had a gude coat to his back,\nwi\u2019 double-gilt buttons, and fashionable lapells, to say little of a\nvery weel-made pair of buckskins, a little the waur o\u2019 the wear to be\nsure, but which, if they had been weel cleaned, would hae lookit amaist\nas gude as new. How they had come we never could learn, as we neither\nsaw chaise nor gig; but, from his having spurs on his boots, it is mair\nthan likely they had lightit at the back-door of the barn frae a horse,\nshe riding on a pad behint him, maybe with her hand round his waist.\n\nThe faither lookit to be a rich auld bool, baith from his manner of\nspeaking and the rewards he seemed to offer for the apprehension of his\ndaughter; but, to be sure, when so many of us were present, that had an\nequal right to the spulzie, it wadna be a great deal a thousand pounds\nwhen divided, still it was worth the looking after; so we just bidit a\nwee.\n\nThings were brought to a bearing, howsomever, sooner than either\nthemsels, I daursay, or anybody else present, seemed to hae the least\nglimpse of; for, just in the middle of their fine goings-on, the sound\nof a coming fit was heard, and the lassie taking guilt to her, cried\nout, \u201cHide me, hide me, for the sake of gudeness, for yonder comes my\nauld faither!\u201d\n\nNae sooner said than done. In he stappit her into a closet; and after\nshutting the door on her, he sat down upon a chair, pretending to be\nasleep in a moment. The auld faither came bouncing in, and seeing the\nfellow as sound as a tap, he ran forrit and gaed him sic a shake, as if\nhe wad hae shooken him a\u2019 sundry, which sune made him open his een as\nfast as he had steekit them.\n\nAfter blackguarding the chield at no allowance, cursing him up hill and\ndown dale, and ca\u2019ing him every name but a gentleman, he held his staff\nower his crown, and gripping him by the cuff o\u2019 the neck, askit him what\nhe had made o\u2019 his daughter. Never since I was born did I ever see sic\nbrazen-faced impudence. The rascal had the brass to say at ance, that he\nhadna seen word or wittens of his daughter for a month, though mair than\na hundred folks sitting in his company had seen him dauting her with his\narm round her jimpy waist not five minutes before. As a man, as a\nfather, as an elder of our kirk, my corruption was raised,\u2014for I aye\nhated leeing, as a puir cowardly sin, and an inbreak on the ten\ncommandments; and I found my neebour, Mr Glen, fidgeting on the seat as\nwell as me, so I thocht that whaever spoke first wad hae the best right\nto be entitled to the reward; whereupon, just as he was in the act of\nrising up, I took the word out of his mouth, saying, \u201cDinna believe him,\nauld gentleman\u2014dinna believe him, friend; he\u2019s telling a parcel of lees.\nNever saw her for a month! It\u2019s no worth arguing, or ca\u2019ing witnesses;\njust open that press door, and ye\u2019ll see whether I\u2019m speaking truth or\nno.\u201d\n\nThe auld man stared, and lookit dumfoundered; and the young man, instead\nof rinnin\u2019 forrit wi\u2019 his doubled nieves to strike me\u2014the only thing I\nwas feared for\u2014began a lauching, as if I had dune him a gude turn. But\nnever since I had a being, did ever I witness sic an uproar and noise as\nimmediately took place. The hale house was sae glad that the scoundrel\nhad been exposed, that they set up siccan a roar o\u2019 lauchter, and they\nthumpit away at siccan a rate at the boards wi\u2019 their feet, that at lang\nand last, wi\u2019 pushing and fidgeting, clapping their hands, and hadding\ntheir sides, down fell the place they ca\u2019 the gallery, a\u2019 the folk in\u2019t\nbeing hurled tapsy-turvy, head foremost amang the sawdust on the floor\nbelow; their guffawing sune being turned to howling, ilka ane crying\nlouder than anither at the tap of their voices, \u201cMurder! Murder! haud\naff me. Murder, my ribs are in. Murder! I\u2019m killed\u2014I\u2019m speechless!\u201d and\nither lamentations to that effect; so that a rush to the door took\nplace, in which everything was overturned\u2014the doorkeeper being wheeled\naway like wildfire; the furms strampit to pieces; the lights knockit\nout; and the twa blind fiddlers dung head foremost ower the stage, the\nbass fiddle cracking like thunder at every bruise. Siccan tearing and\nswearing, and tumbling and squealing, was never witnessed in the memory\nof man, since the building of Babel; legs being likely to be broken,\nsides staved in, een knocked out, and lives lost; there being only one\ndoor, and that a sma\u2019 ane; so that, when we had been carried aff our\nfeet that length, my wind was fairly gane, and a sick dwalm cam ower me,\nlights of a\u2019 manner of colours, red, blue, green, and orange, dancing\nbefore me, that entirely deprived me o\u2019 my common sense, till on opening\nmy een in the dark, I fand myself leaning wi\u2019 my braid side against the\nwa\u2019 on the opposite side of the close. It was some time before I mindit\nwhat had happened; so, dreading scaith, I fand first the ae arm, and\nthen the ither, to see if they were broken\u2014syne my head\u2014and syne baith\no\u2019 my legs; but a\u2019 as weel as I could discover was skin-hale and\nscart-free; on perceiving which, my joy was without bounds, having a\ngreat notion that I had been killed on the spot. So I reached round my\nhand very thankfully to tak out my pocket napkin, to gie my brow a wipe,\nwhen, lo and behold, the tail of my Sunday\u2019s coat was fairly aff an\u2019\naway\u2014dockit by the hench buttons.\n\nSae muckle for plays and play-actors\u2014the first and last, I trust in\ngrace, that I shall ever see. But indeed I could expect nae better,\nafter the warning that Maister Wiggie had mair than ance gien us frae\nthe puppit on the subject; sae, instead of getting my grand reward for\nfinding the auld man\u2019s daughter, the hale covey o\u2019 them, nae better than\na set of swindlers, took legbail, and made that very night a moonlight\nflitting, and Johnny Hammer, honest man, that had wrought frae sunrise\nto sunset, for twa days, fitting up their place by contract, instead of\nbeing well paid for his trouble, as he deserved, got naething left him\nbut a rackle of his own gude deals, a\u2019 dung to shivers.\n\n\n\n\n JANE MALCOLM:\n _A VILLAGE TALE_.\n\n\nEvery town in Scotland has its \u201ccharacter,\u201d in the shape of some\nbedlamite, innocent, or odd fish. There is something interesting about\nthese out-of-the-way beings. Everything they do is a kind of current\nchapter of biography among their neighbours;\u2014what they say is regarded\nas the words of an oracle\u2014more worthy of memory than the inquiries of\nthe laird or the advice of the parson. They are in a manner\nimmortalised.\n\nHaving, in the course of different summers, taken up a short residence\nin some of the smaller borough towns and villages scattered through\nScotland, I took no small delight in observing the peculiarities of many\nof those objects of compassion, and in tracing the source of that dismal\nmalady which laid prostrate the edifice of reason, and arrested the\nharmonious mechanism of an organized mind. The task was sometimes of a\nmelancholy nature: I found histories\u2014real histories\u2014turning upon\nincidents the most tragical, and only wonder they are so little known,\nand meet with such slender sympathy. The crisis of a well-written\nromance brings out more tears than were ever shed for the fall of man;\nbut never have I read of anything so pathetic as was developed in the\nfollowing sketch\u2014a sketch which the pen of a Scott could do little to\nadorn. The naked truth of the story is a series of catastrophes, a\nparallel to which imagination seldom produces. It was told me by a\nsister of the unfortunate female who figures so conspicuously in it.\n\nJane Malcolm was the daughter of a lint-mill proprietor in the small\ntown of K\u2014\u2014n. Her father, being a wealthy man, held for a long time the\nprovostship of the place\u2014a Scottish burgh. His family consisted of two\ndaughters and a son. Jane was the youngest of these, and her father\u2019s\nfavourite. There was something about the girl extremely attractive; she\npossessed all the advantages of personal beauty, combined with a\ngentleness of disposition and quickness of understanding, that wrought\nupon the affections of all she knew. At the manse she was peculiarly\nbeloved; the good old minister recognised in her the image of one he had\nlost; the illusion strengthened as she grew up, and Jane Malcolm was as\nmuch an inmate there as she was in the house of her father. A few years\nsaw her removed to Edinburgh, to finish an education imperfectly carried\non under the superintendence of a village governess. She returned\ngraceful and accomplished, to be looked up to by all her former\ncompanions. But Jane was not proud;\u2014her early friendships she disdained\nto supplant by a feeling so unworthy\u2014so unlike herself. Her over-bending\nnature, indeed, was her fault: it brought the vulgar and undiscerning\nmind into too much familiarity with her own. It became the cause of all\nher misery.\n\nAmong those most intimate with her was one Margaret Innes, a young and\nlively girl, but far below Jane\u2019s rank in life. The daughter of an aged\nfisherman, it was not uncommon for Jane to find her employed in offices\nthe most menial. For all this she loved her not the less. The affection\nand humble virtues of Margaret amply repaid Jane for her condescension.\nMr Malcolm himself saw no harm in this growing friendship, marked, as it\nwas, with such a strong disparity of situation. But he overlooked the\ncircumstance that Margaret Innes had a brother, a handsome, fearless\nlad. A sailor by profession, it is true he was seldom at home, but\nthough seldom, he was often enough for Jane to discover that his every\nreturn brought with it a stronger impression in his favour. When very\nyoung they were play-fellows together, and now when both were grown up,\nshe could not refuse a smile or a word, whenever, after a long voyage,\nthe light-hearted sailor returned to his native home. Sandy felt vain of\nher notice, but by no means attempted more familiarity than was\nconsistent with his station. Without daring to love, he would have done\nanything to serve Miss Malcolm, and his readiness was not unfrequently\nput to the test.\n\nNothing Jane loved better than a short excursion upon the neighbouring\nsea. The boat of the old fisherman was often in request for this\npurpose, and he himself, accompanied by his daughter Margaret, made up\nthe party on these occasions. When Sandy was at home, he supplied the\nplace of his father, and his active and skilful hand directed many a\npleasant voyage\u2014made more pleasant by a fund of amusing anecdotes and\nadventures picked up in the course of his travels. One afternoon, on the\nday after his return from the coast of Norway, this little group had\nembarked to enjoy the delightful freshness of the sea-breeze, after a\nnoon of intolerable heat. Standing up to gaze at a flock of sea-birds,\ncollected for the purpose of devouring the small fry of the herring\nwhich at that season visited the coast, Jane Malcolm accidentally fell\ninto the water. The boat receded rapidly from the spot, its sail being\nfilled by the wind. Immediately, however, Sandy Innes swam towards the\nterrified girl. She clung to him for support. It was no easy matter to\nreach the boat, carried along as it was by the breeze, and not till\nMargaret had recovered from her first alarm, was she able, by turning\nthe helm, to give them the required assistance. They were soon safe.\nThis adventure called forth the liveliest feelings of gratitude on the\npart of Jane Malcolm. She regarded the youthful sailor as her preserver,\nand thought no recompense too liberal for the service he had rendered.\nImprudently she revealed to his sister the secret of her growing\nattachment. Margaret was too generous all at once to give her brother\nthe advantage offered. She reasoned with Jane on the impropriety\u2014the\nunsuitableness of such a union as was hinted at; and, to render it\nimpracticable for the present, she induced Sandy to engage with a ship\nbound for North America. Accordingly, he again left the country.\n\nMiss Malcolm was not to be deterred. She upbraided Margaret for her want\nof feeling; and, in short, took it so much to heart, that the poor girl,\non Sandy\u2019s return, was, out of self-defence, obliged to communicate to\nhim the tidings she willingly would have hid. To be brief, they were\nmarried without Mr Malcolm\u2019s consent. This was a blow the old man never\ngot over; he died a few days after the ceremony. His only son had just\nreturned from England, a lieutenant in the army; alas! it was to lay in\nthe grave the remains of a heart-broken father. Enraged at the cause of\nthis melancholy blow, he vowed revenge against the innocent intruder\ninto his domestic peace. The feelings of his unhappy sister he thought\nno sacrifice to win retaliation; the step she had already taken showed\nthem, in his eye, to be blunted and incapable of injury. To have\nchallenged one so much his inferior never entered into his mind; he\nbrooded over a purpose more dark and sanguinary, though less consistent\nwith his honour. His design was to have the husband of his sister\nmurdered, and he appears to have formed it without a moment\u2019s\nhesitation. Professing regard for his new brother-in-law, he pretended\nto be reconciled to the unfortunate marriage, and even divided with him\nand his other sister the patrimony of the deceased. This show of\nfriendship had the effect of producing a seeming intimacy between them.\nMany a time they went out for a few hours upon fishing excursions,\nwithout any discovery being made by Sandy Innes of the growing hostility\nharboured by young Malcolm. One evening, however\u2014the latter having, by\nvarious excuses, delayed their return to shore till after sunset\u2014as the\nboat was lying quietly at anchor, about a mile from harbour, the\nunsuspecting sailor leant over to recover an oar which Malcolm had\npurposely dropped, when he found himself suddenly precipitated into the\nsea. In attempting to regain the vessel, he was driven back, and\nviolently struck with the boat-hook, which his villanous brother-in-law\nhad seized, with the intent to put the finish to his murderous\ntreachery. In this, however, he was disappointed. Sandy Innes, with\nstrong presence of mind, caught hold of the instrument, managing, at the\nsame time, to overset the boat, and thus involve Malcolm in the same\nfate with himself. Both had a hard struggle for life; but alas! without\nsuccess. Next morning the bodies of the two young men were discovered\nlying upon the beach. They were carried into Jane\u2019s habitation without\nher knowledge\u2014the unfortunate girl having gone out to a different part\nof the shore in quest of the boat, which, she fancied, had, by the wish\nof her brother, harboured all night at Inchkeith. When she returned, the\nfirst object that met her eyes was the body of her own dear husband\u2014a\ncold corpse, with the long black hair hanging down over his once noble\nbrow, and the dark eyes wide open, as if fixed in death upon her and\nheaven. A few days afterwards the young men were buried, side by\nside,\u2014for a fearful story was whispered of Malcolm\u2019s guilt: how he was\nseen by the crew of a boat that had landed, without notice, upon a\nneighbouring rock, at the moment he attempted the atrocious deed. Their\nassistance, though instantly offered, was too late, for both had gone\ndown ere they reached the spot.\n\nAfter that sad catastrophe Jane was never herself. A fever carried away\nher intellects, and left her mind in ruins. Though possessed of a\ncompetency, it has never been used. The same weeds, though now reduced\nto rags, still cover her in her long and sorrowful widowhood. The last\ntime I saw her, I saw a fearful picture\u2014a beautiful female altered to a\nrevolting spectacle of squalidness and deformity. She was gathering the\nshell-fish from among the brown layers of tangle, beyond the farthest\nebb of the tide. Now and then she broke the shells with her teeth,\nmuttering,\u2014\u201cWe shall find him here\u2014we shall find him here;\u201d and then she\nthrew the shells round about her, with a sad sigh, as if her heart were\nlonging to break, but felt chained up in a lone and weary prison. As I\npassed, I called to her\u2014\u201cJane, this is a cold day, and you seem at cold\nwork.\u201d \u201cAy! ay!\u201d she replied, \u201cand so are the worms! But did ye see him?\nBonny Sandy! If ye be gaun to the town, tell Meg Innes to come; for he\u2019s\na wild laddie, and maybe she\u2019ll ken whaur he\u2019s hidden himsel!\u201d Poor\ncreature, thought I, she will find rest in the grave!\u2014_Edin. Lit. Jour._\n\n\n\n\n BOWED JOSEPH:\n _A LAST-CENTURY EDINBURGH \u201cCHARACTER.\u201d_\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\nThe mobs of Edinburgh have ever been celebrated as among the fiercest in\nEurope. The one which accomplished the death of Porteous, as narrated in\nthe tale of the Heart of Midlothian, was a most surprising instance of\npopular vengeance, almost surpassing the bounds of belief; though it\nmust sink considerably in our admiration, when we reflect upon the power\nand ferocity which at all periods have characterised the actions of this\nmonstrous and danger-fraught collective. The time has been, when, in the\nwords of the old song, \u201call Edinburgh\u201d would \u201crise by thousands three,\u201d\nand present such a strength to the legal authorities, that all\nopposition to their capricious will would be in vain. In the younger\ndays of many now living, even the boys of the High School, and of\nHeriot\u2019s Hospital, could erect themselves into a formidable body,\nequally resistless and indomitable. It is a fact, ludicrous enough too,\nthat when the lads of these different schools were engaged in any of\nthose squabbles, formerly so frequent and fatal, between them, they\nalways showed a singular degree of political sagacity when assailed by\nthe town-guard, in immediately joining their strengths, and combining\nagainst the common foe, when for the most part they succeeded in driving\nthem from the scene of action. When such was the power of boys and\nstriplings in this ill-protected city, and such the disorderliness of\nholiday assemblies, there is little left for wonder at the ravages\ncommitted by a mob formed of adults, actuated by violent feelings of\njealousy, bigotry, and revenge.\n\nOf this uncontrollable omnipotence of the populace, the annals of\nEdinburgh present many fearful records. At the various periods of the\nReformation and the Revolution, the Chapel of Roslin was destroyed by a\nmob, whose purpose neither cooled nor evaporated during a walk of eight\nmiles. James the Sixth was besieged and threatened in his courts, and in\nthe midst of his Parliaments, by a rabble of mechanics, who, but for the\nstout walls of the Tolbooth, might perhaps have taken his life. The fine\nchapel of Holyrood-house was pillaged of not only its furniture and\nother valuables, but also of the still more sacred bones which lay\nwithin its precincts, by a mob which rose at the Revolution, and did\nsuch deeds of violence and rapine as fanaticism and ignorance alone\ncould have excited. At the unfortunate issue of the Dover expedition, at\nthe execution of Captain Green, at the Union, and at many other events\nof less importance, the populace of Edinburgh distinguished themselves\nby insurrection and acts of outrage, such as have alone found parallels,\nperhaps, in the various transactions of the French Revolution. Even so\nlate as 1812, there happened a foray of a most appalling nature; the\nsports of an occasion of rejoicing were converted into scenes of\nfrightful riot, unexampled as they were unlooked for. The fatal\nmelancholy catastrophe of this event, had, however, the good effect of\nquenching the spirit of licentiousness and blackguardism in the\nEdinburgh youth, and finally undermined that system of unity and\npromptitude in action and in council by which its mobs had so often\ntriumphed in their terrible resolutions.\n\nIn this fierce democracy, there once arose a mighty leader, who\ncontrived, by means of great boldness, sagacity, and other personal\nmerits, to subject the rabble to his will, and to elect himself dictator\nof all its motives and exploits. The person who thus found means to\ncollect all the monstrous heads of the hydra within the grand grasp of\nhis command was a little decrepit being, about four feet high, almost\ndeprived of legs, and otherwise deformed. His name was Joseph Smith, or\nmore commonly, \u201cBowed Joseph.\u201d He lived in Leith Wynd, and his trade as\na private citizen was a buff belt maker. This singular being\u2014low,\nmiserable, and contemptible as he appeared\u2014might be said to have had at\none time the complete command of the metropolis of Scotland. Whenever\nany transaction took place in the Town Council which Joseph considered\nto be of very improper tendency; whenever meal rose to whatever Joseph\nconsidered to be an improper price; whenever anything occurred in the\ncity which did not accord with Joseph\u2019s idea of right and wrong; in\nshort, \u201cwhen they werna gude bairns,\u201d this hero could, in the course of\nan hour, collect a mob of ten thousand persons, all alike ready to\nexecute his commands, or to disperse at his bidding. For this purpose,\nhe is said to have employed a drum; and never surely had \u201cfiery cross\u201d\nof the Highland chieftain such an effect upon the warlike devotion of\nhis clan, as \u201cBowed Joseph\u2019s drum\u201d had upon the _tinder_ spirits of the\nEdinburgh rabble.\n\nThe \u201clazy corner\u201d was a lazy corner no longer as he marched along\u2014the\n\u201ctown rats,\u201d as they peeped forth like old cautious snails from their\nPatmos in the High Street, drew in their horns and shut their door as he\napproached\u2014the West Bow ceased to clink as he descended. It seemed to be\ntheir enthusiasm to obey him in every order\u2014whether to sack a granary,\nbreak the windows of an offensive magistrate, or to besiege the Town\nCouncil in their chamber. With all this absolute dominion over the\naffections and obedience of the mob, it is to be recorded to the honour\nof Bowed Joseph, that however irregular the nature of his authority, he\nnever in any of his actions could be said to have transgressed the\nbounds of propriety. With great natural sagacity, he possessed a clear\nand quick-sighted faculty of judgment. And the real philanthropy of his\ndisposition was not less remarkable than his other singular qualities.\nHe was, in short, an advocate for \u201cfair play,\u201d as he called it, in\neverything. Fair play alone was the object of his government, and\nnothing else.\n\nThe following interesting story is handed down concerning Bowed Joseph,\nwhich proves his strong love of justice, as well as the humanity of his\nheart. A poor man in the Pleasance, from certain untoward circumstances,\nfound it impossible to pay his rent at Martinmas; and his hard-hearted\nlandlord, refusing a portion of the same with a forlorn promise of the\nremainder being soon paid, sold off the whole effects of the tenant, and\nthrew him, with a family of six children, in the most miserable\ncondition upon the wide world. The unfortunate man, in a fit of despair,\nimmediately put an end to his existence, by which the family were only\nrendered still more destitute. Bowed Joseph, however, did not long\nremain ignorant of the case. As soon as the affair became generally\nknown throughout the city, he shouldered his drum, and after\nhalf-an-hour\u2019s beating through the streets, found himself followed by a\nmob of ten thousand people. With this enormous army he marched to an\nopen space of ground, named in former times Thomson\u2019s Park, where,\nmounted on the shoulders of six of his lieutenant-generals, he harangued\nthem in the true \u201cCambyses vein,\u201d concerning the flagrant and fatal\nproceedings for the redress of which they were assembled. He concluded\nby directing his men to seek the premises of the cruel landlord; and as\nhis house lay directly opposite the spot in the Pleasance, there was no\ntime lost in executing his orders. The mob entered, and seized upon\nevery article of furniture that could be found, and in ten minutes the\nwhole was packed in the park. Joseph set fire to the pile with his own\nhands, though the magistrates stood by with a guard of soldiers, and\nentreated him to desist. The eight-day clock is said to have struck\ntwelve just as it was consigned to the flames.\n\nWhen such was the strength and organisation of an Edinburgh mob so late\nas the year 1780, we need scarcely be surprised at the instance on which\nthe tale of the Heart of Midlothian is founded, happening, as it did, at\na much earlier period, and when the people were prompted to their\nterrible purpose by the sternest feelings of personal revenge.\n\nIn the exercise of his perilous office, it does not appear that Bowed\nJoseph ever drew down the vengeance of the more lawfully constituted\nauthorities of the land. He was, on the contrary, in some degree\ncountenanced by the magistrates of the city, who frequently sent for him\nto the Council Chamber, in cases of emergency, to consult him on the\nbest means to be adopted for appeasing and dispersing the mob.\n\nOn an occasion of this moment, he was accustomed to look very large and\nconsequential. With one hand carelessly applied to his side, and the\nother banged resolutely down upon the table, and with as much majesty as\nfour feet of stature, and a beard of as many weeks old, could assume,\nand with as much turbulence in his fiery little eye, as if he was\nhimself a mob, he would stand before them pleading the cause of his\ncompeers, or directing the trembling Council to the most expeditious\nmethod of assuaging their fury. The dismissal of a mob, on these\noccasions, was usually accomplished at the expense of a few hogsheads of\nale, broached on the Calton Hill, and by the subsequent order of their\ndecrepit general, expressed in the simple words, \u201cDisperse, my lads.\u201d\n\nHaving for many years exercised an unlimited dominion over the\naffections of the rabble, Bowed Joseph met his death at last in a manner\nmost unworthy of his character and great reputation. He fell from the\ntop of a Leith coach in a state of intoxication, and broke his neck,\nwhich caused instantaneous death. He had been at the Leith races, and\nwas on his return to Edinburgh when the accident took place; and his\nskeleton has the honour of being preserved in the anatomical class-room\nof the College of Edinburgh.\n\nAn Edinburgh mob, although it may supply excellent subjects for tales,\nin all its characteristic fierceness and insubordination, is now a\nmatter of mere antiquity. In the present day, the working classes of\nEdinburgh, from whom it may be supposed the principal materials of the\nmobs used to be drafted, are in the highest degree orderly, both in\nprivate conduct, and in their public appearances in bodies. The printing\npress, the schoolmaster, and that general improvement of manners which\nnow prevails, have entirely altered the character of the populace, and\nany mischief now committed through the public uproar is seen to arise\nnot from the adult, but the juvenile and neglected portion of the\ncommunity.\n\n\n\n\n THE LAIRD OF WINEHOLM.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\n\u201cHave you heard anything of the apparition which has been seen about\nWineholm-place?\u201d said the dominie.\n\n\u201cNa, I never heard o\u2019 sic a thing, as yet,\u201d quoth the smith; \u201cbut I\nwadna wonder muckle that the news should turn out to be true.\u201d\n\nThe dominie shook his head, and muttered, \u201ch\u2019m\u2014h\u2019m\u2014h\u2019m,\u201d as if he knew\nmore than he was at liberty to tell.\n\n\u201cWeel, that beats the world,\u201d said the smith, as he gave up blowing the\nbellows, and looked over the spectacles at the dominie\u2019s face.\n\nThe dominie shook his head again.\n\nThe smith was now in the most ticklish quandary; eager to learn\nparticulars, and spread the astounding news through the whole village,\nand the rest of the parish to boot, but yet afraid to press the inquiry,\nfor fear the cautious dominie should take the alarm of being reported as\na tattler, and keep all to himself. So the smith, after waiting till the\nwindpipe of the great bellows ceased its rushing noise, and he had\ncovered the gloss neatly up with a mixture of small coals, culm, and\ncinders; and then, perceiving that nothing more was forthcoming from the\ndominie, he began blowing again with more energy than before\u2014changed his\nhand\u2014put the other sooty one into his breeches-pocket\u2014leaned to the\nhorn\u2014looked in a careless manner towards the window, or rather gazed on\nvacancy, and always now and then stole a sly look at the dominie\u2019s face.\nIt was quite immovable. His cheek was leaned upon his open hand, and his\neyes fixed on the glowing fire.\n\nIt was very teasing for poor Clinkum, the smith. But what could he do?\nHe took out his glowing iron, and made a shower of fire sweep through\nthe whole smithy, whereof a good part, as intended, sputtered upon the\ndominie, but he only shielded his face with his elbow, turned his\nshoulder half round and held his peace. Thump\u2014thump! clink\u2014clink! went\nthe hammer for a space; and then, when the iron was returned to the\nfire, \u201cWeel, that beats the world!\u201d quoth the smith.\n\n\u201cWhat is this that beats the world, Mr Clinkum?\u201d said the dominie, with\nthe most cool and provoking indifference.\n\n\u201cThis story about the apparition,\u201d quoth the smith.\n\n\u201cWhat story?\u201d said the dominie.\n\nNow, really this insolence was hardly to be borne, even from the learned\ndominie, who, with all his cold indifference of feeling, was sitting\ntoasting himself at a good smithy fire. The smith felt this, for he was\na man of acute feeling, and therefore he spit upon his hand and fell\na-clinking and pelting at the stithy with both spirit and resignation,\nsaying within himself, \u201cThese dominie bodies just beat the world!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat story?\u201d reiterated the dominie. \u201cFor my part I related no story,\nnor have ever given assent to a belief in such story that any man has\nheard. Nevertheless, from the results of ratiocination, conclusions may\nbe formed, though not algebraically, yet corporately by constituting a\nquantity, which shall be equivalent to the difference, subtracting the\nless from the greater, and striking a balance in order to get rid of any\nambiguity or paradox.\u201d\n\nAt the long adverb, _nevertheless_, the smith gave over blowing, and\npricked up his ears, but the definition went beyond his comprehension.\n\n\u201cYe ken that just beats the whole world for deepness,\u201d said the smith,\nand again began blowing the bellows.\n\n\u201cYou know, Mr Clinkum,\u201d continued the dominie, \u201cthat a proposition is an\nassertion of some distinct truth, which only becomes manifest by\ndemonstration. A corollary is an obvious, or easily inferred consequence\n_of_ a proposition; while a hypothesis is a _sup_position, or concession\nmade, during the process of demonstration. Now, do you take me along\nwith you? Because, if you do not, it is needless to proceed.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, yes, I understand you middling weel; but I wad like better to hear\nwhat other folks say about it than you.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd why so? Wherefore would you rather hear another man\u2019s demonstration\nthan mine?\u201d said the dominie, sternly.\n\n\u201cBecause, ye ken, ye just beat the world for words,\u201d quoth the smith.\n\n\u201cAy, ay! that is to say, words without wisdom,\u201d said the dominie, rising\nand stepping away. \u201cWell, well, every man to his sphere, and the smith\nto his bellows.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re quite wrang, maister,\u201d cried the smith after him. \u201cIt isna the\n_want_ o\u2019 wisdom in you that plagues me; it is the owerplush o\u2019t.\u201d\n\nThis soothed the dominie, who returned, and said mildly,\u2014\n\n\u201cBy-the-by, Clinkum, I want a leister of your making, for I see no other\ntradesman makes them so well. A five-grained one make it; at your own\nprice.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery weel, sir. When will you be needing it?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot till the end of the close time.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, ye may gar the three auld anes do till then.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you wish to insinuate, sir? Would you infer, because I have\nthree leisters, that therefore I am a breaker of the laws? That I, who\nam placed here as a pattern and monitor of the young and rising\ngeneration, should be the first to set them an example of\ninsubordination?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe ken, that just beats a\u2019 in words; but we ken what we ken, for a\u2019\nthat, maister.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou had better take a little care what you say, Mr Clinkum; just a\n_little_ care. I do not request you to take particular care, for of that\nyour tongue is incapable, but a very little is a correlative of\nconsequences. And mark you\u2014don\u2019t go to say that I said this or that\nabout a ghost, or mentioned such a ridiculous story.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe crabbitness o\u2019 that body beats the world!\u201d said the smith to\nhimself, as the dominie went halting homeward.\n\nThe very next man who entered the smithy door was no other than John\nBroadcast, the new laird\u2019s hind, who had also been hind to the late\nlaird for many years, and who had no sooner said his errand, than the\nsmith addressed him thus:\u2014\n\n\u201cHave _you_ ever seen this ghost that there is such a noise about?\u201d\n\n\u201cGhost? Na, goodness be thankit! I never saw a ghost in my life, save\nance a wraith. What ghost do you mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cSo you never saw nor heard tell of any apparition about Wineholm-place,\nlately?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I hae reason to be thankfu\u2019 I have not.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, that beats the world! Wow, man, but ye are sair in the dark! Do\nyou no think there are siccan things in nature, as folk no coming fairly\nto their ends, John?\u201d\n\n\u201cGoodness be wi\u2019 us! Ye gar a\u2019 the hairs o\u2019 my head creep, man. What\u2019s\nthat you\u2019re saying?\u201d\n\n\u201cHad ye never ony suspicions o\u2019 that kind, John?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo; I canna say that I had.\u201d\n\n\u201cNone in the least? Weel, that beats the world!\u201d\n\n\u201cO, haud your tongue\u2014haud your tongue! We hae great reason to be\nthankfu\u2019 that we are as we are!\u201d\n\n\u201cHow as you are?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat we are nae stocks or stanes, or brute beasts, as the minister o\u2019\nTraquair says. But I hope in God there is nae siccan a thing about my\nmaster\u2019s place as an unearthly visitor.\u201d\n\nThe smith shook his head, and uttered a long hem! hem! hem! He had felt\nthe powerful effect of that himself, and wished to make the same appeal\nto the feelings and longings after information of John Broadcast. The\nbait took; for the latent spark of superstition was kindled in the heart\nof honest John, and there being no wit in the head to counteract it, the\nportentous hint had its full sway. John\u2019s eyes stelled in his head, and\nhis visage grew long, assuming meanwhile something of the hue of dried\nclay in winter.\n\n\u201cHech, man! but that\u2019s an awsome story,\u201d exclaimed he. \u201cFolks hae great\nreason to be thankfu\u2019 that they are as they are. It is truly an awsome\nstory.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe ken, it just beats the world for that,\u201d rejoined the smith.\n\n\u201cAnd is it really thought that this laird made away wi\u2019 our auld\nmaister?\u201d said John.\n\nThe smith shook his head again, and gave a straight wink with his eyes.\n\n\u201cWeel, I hae great reason to be thankfu\u2019 that I never heard siccan a\nstory as that!\u201d said John. \u201cWha was it tauld you a\u2019 about it?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was nae less a man than our mathewmatical dominie,\u201d said the smith,\n\u201che that kens a\u2019 things, and can prove a proposition to the nineteenth\npart of a hair. But he is terrified lest the tale should spread; and\ntherefore ye maunna say a word about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na; I hae great reason to be thankfu\u2019 I can keep a secret as weel\nas the maist part of men, and better than the maist part of women. What\ndid he say? Tell us a\u2019 that he said.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is not so easy to repeat what he says, for he has sae mony\nlang-nebbit words. But he said, though it was only a supposition, yet it\nwas easily made manifest by positive demonstration.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you ever hear the like o\u2019 that? Now, have we no reason to be\nthankfu\u2019 that we are as we are? Did he say it was by poison that he was\ntaken off, or that he was strangled?\u201d\n\n\u201cNa; I thought he said it was by a collar, or collary, or something to\nthat purpose.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen it wad appear there is no doubt of the horrid transaction? I think\nthe doctor has reason to be thankfu\u2019 that he\u2019s no taken up. Is no that\nstrange?\u201d\n\n\u201cO, ye ken, it just beats the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe deserves to be torn at young horses\u2019 tails,\u201d said the ploughman.\n\n\u201cAy, or nippit to death with red-hot pinchers,\u201d quoth the smith.\n\n\u201cOr harrowed to death, like the children of Ammon,\u201d said the ploughman.\n\n\u201cNa, I\u2019ll tell you what should be done wi\u2019 him\u2014he should just be docked,\nand fired like a farcied horse,\u201d quoth the smith. \u201c\u2019Od help ye, man, I\ncould beat the world for laying on a proper punishment!\u201d\n\nJohn Broadcast went home full of terror and dismay. He told his wife the\nstory in a secret\u2014she told the dairymaid with a tenfold degree of\nsecrecy; and as Dr Davington, or the New Laird, as he was called,\nsometimes kissed the pretty dairymaid for amusement, it gave her a great\ndeal of freedom with her master, so she went straight and told him the\nwhole story to his face. He was unusually affected at hearing such a\nterrible accusation against himself, and changed colour again and again;\nand as pretty Martha, the dairymaid, supposed it was from anger, she\nfell to abusing the dominie without mercy\u2014for he was session-clerk, and\nhad been giving her some hints about her morality of which she did not\napprove. She therefore threw the whole blame upon him, assuring her\nmaster that he was the most spiteful and malicious man on the face of\nthe earth; \u201cand to show you that, sir\u201d, added Martha, wiping her eyes,\n\u201che has spread it through the hale parish that you and I baith deserve\nto sit wi\u2019 the sacking-gown on us.\u201d\n\nThis enraged the doctor still farther, and he forthwith dispatched\nMartha to desire the dominie to come up to the Place to speak with her\nmaster, as he had something to say to him. Martha went, and delivered\nher message in so insulting a manner, that the dominie suspected there\nwas bad blood a-brewing against him; and as he had too much\nself-importance to think of succumbing to any man alive, he sent an\nimpertinent answer to the laird\u2019s message, bearing that if Dr Davington\nhad any business with him, he would be so good as attend at his\nclass-room when he dismissed his scholars. And then he added, waving his\nhand towards the door, \u201cGo out. There is contamination in your presence.\nWhat hath such a vulgar fraction ado to come into the halls of\nuprightness and science?\u201d\n\nWhen this message was delivered, the doctor, being almost beside himself\nwith rage, instantly dispatched two village constables with a warrant to\nseize the dominie, and bring him before him, for the doctor was a\njustice of the peace. Accordingly, the poor dominie was seized at the\nhead of his pupils, and dragged away, crutch and all, up before the new\nlaird, to answer for such an abominable slander. The dominie denied\neverything anent it, as indeed he might, save having asked the smith the\nsimple question, \u201cif he had heard aught of a ghost at the Place?\u201d But he\nrefused to tell _why_ he had asked that question. He had his own reasons\nfor it, he said, and reasons that to him were quite sufficient; but as\nhe was not obliged to disclose them, neither would he.\n\nThe smith was then sent for, who declared that the dominie had told him\nof the ghost being seen, and a murder committed, which he called a _rash\nassassination_, and said it was obvious and easily inferred that it was\ndone by a collar.\n\nHow the dominie did storm! He even twice threatened to knock down the\nsmith with his crutch; not for the slander,\u2014he cared not for that nor\nthe doctor a pin, but for the total subversion of his grand illustration\nfrom geometry; and he, therefore, denominated the smith\u2019s head _the\nlogarithm to number one_, a reproach of which I do not understand the\ngist, but the appropriation of it pleased the dominie exceedingly, made\nhim chuckle, and put him in better humour for a good while. It was in\nvain that he tried to prove that his words applied only to the\ndefinition of a problem in geometry,\u2014he could not make himself\nunderstood; and the smith maintaining his point firmly, and apparently\nwith conscientious truth, appearances were greatly against the dominie,\nand the doctor pronounced him a malevolent and dangerous person.\n\n\u201cO, ye ken, he just beats the world for that,\u201d quoth the smith.\n\n\u201cI a malevolent and dangerous person, sir!\u201d said the dominie, fiercely,\nand altering his crutch from one place to another of the floor, as if he\ncould not get a place to set it on. \u201cDost thou call me a malevolent and\ndangerous person, sir? what, then, art thou? If thou knowest not, I will\ntell thee. Add a cipher to a ninth figure, and what does that make?\nNinety you will say. Ay, but then put a cipher _above_ a nine, and what\ndoes that make? Ha\u2014ha\u2014ha\u2014I have you there! Your case exactly in higher\ngeometry! For say the chord of sixty degrees is radius, then the sine of\nninety degrees is equal to the radius, so the secant of 0 (that is\nnihil-nothing, as the boys call it), is radius, and so is the co-sine of\n0. The versed sine of ninety degrees is radius (that is nine with a\ncipher added, you know), and the versed sine of 180 degrees is the\ndiameter; then, of course, the sine increases from nought (that is,\ncipher or nothing) till it becomes radius, and then it decreases till it\nbecomes nothing. After this you note it lies on the _contrary_ side of\nthe diameter, and consequently, if positive before, is negative now; so\nthat it must end in 0, or a cipher above a nine at most.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis unintelligible jargon is out of place here, Mr Dominie; and if you\ncan show no better reasons for raising such an abominable falsehood, in\nrepresenting me as an incendiary and murderer, I shall procure you a\nlodging in the house of correction.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, sir, the long and the short of the matter is this:\u2014I only asked at\nthat fellow there\u2014that logarithm of stupidity\u2014if he had heard aught of a\nghost having been seen about Wineholm Place. I added nothing farther,\neither positive or negative. Now, do you insist on my reasons for asking\nsuch a question?\u201d\n\n\u201cI insist on having them.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen what will you say, sir, when I inform you, and declare my\nreadiness to depone to the truth of it, that I saw the ghost myself?\nYes, sir, that I saw the ghost of your late worthy father-in-law myself,\nsir; and though I said no such thing to that decimal fraction, yet it\ntold me, sir,\u2014yes, the spirit of your father-in-law told me, sir, that\nyou are a murderer.\u201d\n\n\u201cLord, now, what think ye o\u2019 that?\u201d quoth the smith. \u201cYe had better hae\nletten him alane; for, \u2019od, ye ken, he\u2019s the deevil of a body as ever\nwas made. He just beats the world!\u201d\n\nThe doctor grew as pale as death, but whether from fear or rage, it was\nhard to say.\n\n\u201cWhy, sir,\u201d said he, \u201cyou are mad! stark, raving mad; therefore, for\nyour own credit, and for the peace and comfort of my wife and myself,\nand our credit among our retainers, you must unsay every word that you\nhave now said.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll just as soon say that the parabola and the ellipsis are the same,\u201d\nsaid the dominie; \u201cor that the diameter is not the longest line that can\nbe drawn in the circle. And now, sir, since you have forced me to\ndivulge what I was much in doubt about, I have a great mind to have the\nold laird\u2019s grave opened to-night, and have the body inspected before\nwitnesses.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you dare disturb the sanctuary of the grave,\u201d said the doctor\nvehemently, \u201cor with your unhallowed hands touch the remains of my\nvenerable and revered predecessor, it had been better for you, and all\nwho make the attempt, that you never had been born. If not then for my\nsake, for the sake of my wife, the sole daughter of the man to whom you\nhave all been obliged, let this abominable and malicious calumny go no\nfarther, but put it down; I pray of you to put it down, as you would\nvalue your own advantage.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have seen him, and spoke with him\u2014that I aver,\u201d said the dominie.\n\u201cAnd shall I tell you what he said to me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no! I\u2019ll hear no more of such absolute and disgusting nonsense,\u201d\nsaid the doctor.\n\n\u201cThen, since it hath come to this, I will declare it in the face of the\nwhole world, and pursue it to the last,\u201d said the dominie, \u201cridiculous\nas it is, and I confess that it is even so. I have seen your\nfather-in-law within the last twenty-four hours; at least a being in his\nform and habiliments, and having his aspect and voice. And he told me\nthat he believed you were a very great scoundrel, and that you had\nhelped him off the stage of time in a great haste, for fear of the\noperation of a will, which he had just executed, very much to your\nprejudice. I was somewhat aghast, but ventured to remark, that he must\nsurely have been sensible whether you murdered him or not, and in what\nway. He replied that he was not very certain, for at the time you put\nhim down, he was much in his customary way of nights\u2014very drunk; but\nthat he greatly suspected you had hanged him, for ever since he had\ndied, he had been troubled with a severe crick in his neck. Having seen\nmy late worthy patron\u2019s body deposited in the coffin, and afterwards\nconsigned to the grave, these things overcame me, and a kind of mist\ncame over my senses; but I heard him saying as he withdrew, what a pity\nit was that my nerves could not stand this disclosure! Now, for my own\nsatisfaction, I am resolved that, to-morrow, I shall raise the village,\nwith the two ministers at the head of the multitude, and have the body,\nand particularly the neck of the deceased, minutely inspected.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you do so, I shall make one of the number,\u201d said the doctor. \u201cBut I\nam resolved that, in the first place, every means shall be tried to\nprevent a scene of madness and absurdity so disgraceful to a\nwell-regulated village and a sober community.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is but one direct line that can be followed, and any other would\neither form an acute or obtuse angle,\u201d said the dominie; \u201ctherefore I am\nresolved to proceed right forward, on mathematical principles;\u201d and away\nhe went, skipping on his crutch, to arouse the villagers to the\nscrutiny.\n\nThe smith remained behind, concerting with the doctor how to controvert\nthe dominie\u2019s profound scheme of unshrouding the dead; and certainly the\nsmith\u2019s plan, viewed professionally, was not amiss\u2014\n\n\u201cO, ye ken, sir, we maun just gie him another heat, and try to saften\nhim to reason, for he\u2019s just as stubborn as Muirkirk airn. He beats the\nworld for that.\u201d\n\nWhile the two were in confabulation, Johnston, the old house servant,\ncame in, and said to the doctor\u2014\n\n\u201cSir, your servants are going to leave the house, every one, this night,\nif you cannot fall on some means to divert them from it. The old laird\nis, it seems, risen again, and come back among them, and they are all in\nthe utmost consternation. Indeed, they are quite out of their reason. He\nappeared in the stable to Broadcast, who has been these two hours dead\nwith terror, but is now recovered, and telling such a tale downstairs as\nnever was heard from the mouth of man.\u201d\n\n\u201cSend him up here,\u201d said the doctor. \u201cI will silence him. What does the\nignorant clown mean by joining in this unnatural clamour?\u201d\n\nJohn came up, with his broad bonnet in his hand, shut the door with\nhesitation, and then felt thrice with his hand if it was really shut.\n\n\u201cWell, John,\u201d said the doctor, \u201cwhat absurd lie is this that you are\nvending among your fellow-servants, of having seen a ghost?\u201d\n\nJohn picked some odds and ends of threads out of his bonnet, and said\nnothing.\n\n\u201cYou are an old superstitious dreaming dotard,\u201d continued the doctor;\n\u201cbut if you propose in future to manufacture such stories, you must,\nfrom this instant, do it somewhere else than in my service, and among my\ndomestics. What have you to say for yourself?\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, sir, I hae naething to say but this, that we hae a\u2019 muckle\nreason to be thankfu\u2019 that we are as we are.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd whereon does that wise saw bear? What relation has that to the\nseeing of a ghost? Confess then, this instant, that you have forged and\nvended a deliberate lie.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, sir, I hae muckle reason to be thankfu\u2019\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cFor what?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat I never tauld a deliberate lie in my life. My late master came and\nspoke to me in the stable; but whether it was his ghaist or himself\u2014a\ngood angel or a bad ane\u2014I hae reason to be thankfu\u2019 I never said; for I\n_do\u2014not\u2014ken_.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, pray let us hear from that sage tongue of yours, so full of\nsublime adages, what this doubtful being said to you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI wad rather be excused, an\u2019 it were your honour\u2019s will, and wad hae\nreason to be thankfu\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd why should you decline telling this?\u201d\n\n\u201cBecause I ken ye wadna believe a word o\u2019t, it is siccan a strange\nstory. O, sirs, but folks hae muckle reason to be thankful that they are\nas they are!\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, out with this strange story of yours. I do not promise to credit\nit, but shall give it a patient hearing, providing you swear that there\nis no forgery in it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, as I was suppering the horses the night, I was dressing my late\nkind master\u2019s favourite mare, and I was just thinking to mysel, an\u2019 he\nhad been leeving, I wadna hae been my lane the night, for he wad hae\nbeen standing ower me, cracking his jokes, and swearing at me in his\ngood-natured hamely way. Ay, but he\u2019s gane to his lang account, thinks\nI, and we puir frail dying creatures that are left ahint, hae muckle\nreason to be thankfu\u2019 that we are as we are; when I looks up, and behold\nthere\u2019s my auld master standing leaning against the trivage as he used\nto do, and looking at me. I canna but say my heart was a little\nastoundit, and maybe lap up through my midriff into my breath-bellows\u2014I\ncouldna say; but in the strength o\u2019 the Lord I was enabled to retain my\nsenses for a good while. \u2018John Broadcast,\u2019 said he, with a deep angry\ntone,\u2014\u2018John Broadcast, what the d\u2014l are you thinking about? You are not\ncurrying that mare half. What lubberly way of dressing a horse is that?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Lord make us thankfu\u2019, master,\u2019 says I; \u2018are you there?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Where else would you have me be at this hour of the night, old\nblockhead?\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201c\u2018In another hame than this, master,\u2019 says I; \u2018but I fear it is nae good\nane, that ye are sae soon tired o\u2019t.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018A d\u2014d bad one, I assure you,\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ay, but master,\u2019 says I, \u2018ye hae muckle reason to be thankfu\u2019 that ye\nare as ye are.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018In what respect, dotard?\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201c\u2018That ye hae liberty to come out o\u2019t a start now and then to get the\nair,\u2019 says I; and oh, my heart was sair for him when I thought o\u2019 his\nstate! And though I was thankfu\u2019 that I was as I was, my heart and flesh\nbegan to fail me, at thinking of my speaking face to face wi\u2019 a being\nfrae the unhappy place. But out he breaks again wi\u2019 a great round o\u2019\nswearing, about the mare being ill-keepit; and he ordered me to cast my\ncoat and curry her weel, for he had a lang journey to take on her the\nmorn.\n\n\u201c\u2018You take a journey on her!\u2019 says I; \u2018I doubt my new master will\ndispute that privilege wi\u2019 you, for he rides her himsel the morn.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018He ride her!\u2019 cried the angry spirit; and then he burst out into a\nlang string of imprecations, fearsome to hear, against you, sir; and\nthen added, \u2018Soon, soon, shall he be levelled with the dust!\u2014the dog!\nthe parricide! First to betray my child, and then to put down myself!\nBut he shall not escape\u2014he shall not escape!\u2019 he cried with such a\nhellish growl that I fainted, and heard no more.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, that beats the world,\u201d exclaimed the smith. \u201cI wad hae thought\nthe mare wad hae luppen ower yird and stane, or fa\u2019en down dead wi\u2019\nfright.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na,\u201d said John, \u201cin place o\u2019 that, whenever she heard him fa\u2019 a\nswearing, she was sae glad that she fell a nichering.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, but that beats the hale world a\u2019 thegither!\u201d quoth the smith. \u201cThen\nit has been nae ghaist ava, ye may depend on that.\u201d\n\n\u201cI little wat what it was,\u201d replied John, \u201cbut it was a being in nae\ngude or happy state o\u2019 mind, and is a warning to us how muckle reason we\nhae to be thankfu\u2019 that we are as we are.\u201d\n\nThe doctor pretended to laugh at the absurdity of John\u2019s narration, but\nit was with a ghastly and doubtful expression of countenance, as though\nhe thought the story far too ridiculous for any clodpoll to have\ncontrived out of his own head; and forthwith he dismissed the two\ndealers in the marvellous, with very little ceremony, the one protesting\nthat the thing beat the world, and the other that they had both reason\nto be thankful that they were as they were.\n\nNext morning the villagers, small and great, were assembled at an early\nhour to witness the lifting of the body of the late laird, and, headed\nby the established and dissenting clergymen, and two surgeons, they\nproceeded to the tomb, and soon extracted the splendid coffin, which\nthey opened with all due caution and ceremony. But instead of the\nmurdered body of their late benefactor, which they expected in good\nearnest to find, there was nothing in the coffin but a layer of gravel,\nof about the weight of a corpulent man.\n\nThe clamour against the new laird then rose all at once into a tumult\nthat it was impossible to check, every one declaring that he had not\nonly murdered their benefactor, but, for fear of discovery, had raised\nthe body, and given, or rather sold it, for dissection. The thing was\nnot to be tolerated; so the mob proceeded in a body to Wineholm Place,\nto take out their poor deluded lady, and burn the doctor and his basely\nacquired habitation to ashes. It was not till the multitude had\nsurrounded the house that the ministers and two or three other gentlemen\ncould stay them, which they only did by assuring the mob that they would\nbring out the doctor before their eyes, and deliver him up to justice.\nThis pacified the throng; but on inquiry at the hall, it was found that\nthe doctor had gone off early that morning, so that nothing further\ncould be done for the present. But the coffin, filled with gravel, was\nlaid up in the aisle, and kept open for inspection.\n\nNothing could now exceed the consternation of the simple villagers of\nWineholm at these dark and mysterious events. Business, labour, and\nemployment of every sort, were at a stand, and the people hurried about\nto one another\u2019s houses, and mingled their conjectures together in one\nheterogeneous mass. The smith put his hand to his bellows, but forgot to\nblow till the fire went out; the weaver leaned on his loom, and listened\nto the legend of the ghastly tailor. The team stood in mid-furrow, and\nthe thrasher agape over his flail; and even the dominie was heard to\ndeclare that the geometrical series of events was increasing by no\n_common_ ratio, and therefore ought to be calculated rather\narithmetically than by logarithms; and John Broadcast saw more and more\nreason for being thankfu\u2019 that he was as he was, and neither a stock,\nnor a stone, nor a brute beast.\n\nEvery new thing that happened was more extraordinary than the last; and\nthe most puzzling of all was the circumstance of the late laird\u2019s mare,\nsaddle, bridle, and all, being off before daylight next morning; so that\nDr Davington was obliged to have recourse to his own, on which he was\nseen posting away on the road towards Edinburgh. It was thus but too\nobvious that the late laird had ridden off on his favourite mare,\u2014but\nwhither, none of the sages of Wineholm could divine. But their souls\ngrew chill as an iceberg, and their very frames rigid, at the thought of\na spirit riding away on a brute beast to the place appointed for wicked\nmen. And had not John Broadcast reason to be thankfu\u2019 that he was as he\nwas?\n\nHowever, the outcry of the community became so outrageous of murder and\nfoul play, in so many ways, that the officers of justice were compelled\nto take note of it; and accordingly the sheriff-substitute, the\nsheriff-clerk, the fiscal, and two assistants, came in two chaises to\nWineholm to take a precognition; and there a court was held which lasted\nthe whole day, at which Mrs Davington, the late laird\u2019s only daughter,\nall the servants, and a great number of the villagers, were examined on\noath. It appeared from the evidence that Dr Davington had come to the\nvillage and set up as a surgeon; that he had used every endeavour to be\nemployed in the laird\u2019s family in vain, as the latter detested him; that\nhe, however, found means of inducing his only daughter to elope with\nhim, which put the laird quite beside himself, and from thenceforward he\nbecame drowned in dissipation; that such, however, was his affection for\nhis daughter, that he caused her to live with him, but would never\nsuffer the doctor to enter his door; that it was, nevertheless, quite\ncustomary for the doctor to be sent for to his lady\u2019s chamber,\nparticularly when her father was in his cups; and that on a certain\nnight, when the laird had had company, and was so overcome that he could\nnot rise from his chair, he had died suddenly of apoplexy; and that no\nother skill was sent for, or near him, but this his detested son-in-law,\nwhom he had by will disinherited, though the legal term for rendering\nthat will competent had not expired. The body was coffined the second\nday after death, and locked up in a low room in one of the wings of the\nbuilding; and nothing farther could be elicited. The doctor was missing,\nand it was whispered that he had absconded; indeed it was evident, and\nthe sheriff acknowledged that, according to the evidence taken, the\nmatter had a very suspicious aspect, although there was no direct proof\nagainst the doctor. It was proved that he had attempted to bleed the\npatient, but had not succeeded, and that at that time the old laird was\nblack in the face.\n\nWhen it began to wear nigh night, and nothing further could be learned,\nthe sheriff-clerk, a quiet considerate gentleman, asked why they had not\nexamined the wright who had made the coffin, and also placed the body in\nit. The thing had not been thought of; but he was found in court, and\ninstantly put into the witness-box, and examined on oath. His name was\nJames Sanderson, a little, stout-made, shrewd-looking man, with a very\npeculiar squint. He was examined thus by the procurator-fiscal:\u2014\n\n\u201cWere you long acquainted with the late Laird of Wineholm, James?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, ever since I left my apprenticeship; for, I suppose, about\nnineteen years.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas he very much given to drinking of late?\u201d\n\n\u201cI could not say; he took his glass geyan heartily.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you ever drink with him.\u201d\n\n\u201cO yes, mony a time.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou must have seen him very drunk, then? Did you ever see him so drunk,\nfor instance, that he could not rise?\u201d\n\n\u201cNever; for long afore that, I could not have kenned whether he was\nsitting or standing.\u201d\n\n\u201cWere you present at the corpse-chesting?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I was.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd were you certain the body was then deposited in the coffin?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; quite certain.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid you screw down the coffin lid firmly then, as you do others of the\nsame make?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I did not.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat were your reasons for that?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey were no reasons of mine; I did what I was ordered. There were\nprivate reasons, which I then wist not of. But, gentlemen, there are\nsome things connected with this affair, which I am bound in honour not\nto reveal. I hope you will not compel me to divulge them at present.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are bound by a solemn oath, James, the highest of all obligations;\nand, for the sake of justice, you must tell everything you know; and it\nwould be better if you would just tell your tale straightforward,\nwithout the interruption of question and answer.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, then, since it must be so:\u2014That day, at the chesting, the doctor\ntook me aside and said to me, \u2018James Sanderson, it will be necessary\nthat something be put into the coffin to prevent any unpleasant odour\nbefore the funeral; for owing to the corpulence, and the inflamed state\nof the body by apoplexy, there will be great danger of this.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Very well, sir,\u2019 says I; \u2018what shall I bring?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You had better only screw down the lid lightly at present, then,\u2019 said\nhe; \u2018and if you could bring a bucketful of quicklime a little while\nhence, and pour it over the body, especially over the face, it is a very\ngood thing, an excellent thing, for preventing any deleterious effluvia\nfrom escaping.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Very well, sir,\u2019 said I; and so I followed his directions. I procured\nthe lime; and as I was to come privately in the evening to deposit it in\nthe coffin, in company with the doctor alone, I was putting off the time\nin my workshop, polishing some trifle, and thinking to myself that I\ncould not find in my heart to choke up my old friend with quicklime,\neven after he was dead, when, to my unspeakable horror, who should enter\nmy workshop but the identical laird himself, dressed in his dead-clothes\nin the very same manner in which I had seen him laid in the coffin, but\napparently all streaming in blood to the feet. I fell back over against\na cart-wheel, and was going to call out, but could not; and as he stood\nstraight in the door, there was no means of escape. At length the\napparition spoke to me in a hoarse trembling voice, and it said to me,\n\u2018Jamie Sanderson! O, Jamie Sanderson! I have been forced to appear to\nyou in a d\u2014d frightful guise!\u2019 These were the very first words it spoke,\nand they were far from being a lie; but I halfflins thought to mysel\nthat a being in such circumstances might have spoken with a little more\ncaution and decency. I could make no answer, for my tongue refused all\nattempts at articulation, and my lips would not come together; and all\nthat I could do was to lie back against my new cart-wheel, and hold up\nmy hands as a kind of defence. The ghastly and blood-stained apparition,\nadvancing a step or two, held up both its hands, flying with dead\nruffles, and cried to me in a still more frightful voice, \u2018Oh, my\nfaithful old friend, I have been murdered! I am a murdered man, Jamie\nSanderson! And if you do not assist me in bringing upon the wretch due\nretribution, dire will be your punishment in the other world.\u2019\n\n\u201cThis is sheer raving, James,\u201d said the sheriff, interrupting him.\n\u201cThese words can be nothing but the ravings of a disturbed and heated\nimagination. I entreat you to recollect that you have appealed to the\nGreat Judge of heaven and earth for the truth of what you assert here,\nand to answer accordingly.\u201d\n\n\u201cI know what I am saying, my Lord Sheriff,\u201d said Sanderson; \u201cand I am\ntelling naething but the plain truth, as nearly as my state of mind at\nthe time permits me to recollect. The appalling figure approached still\nnearer and nearer to me, breathing threatenings if I would not rise and\nfly to his assistance, and swearing like a sergeant of dragoons at both\nthe doctor and myself. At length it came so close to me that I had no\nother shift but to hold up both feet and hands to shield me, as I had\nseen herons do when knocked down by a goshawk, and I cried out; but even\nmy voice failed, so that I only cried like one through his sleep.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018What the d\u2014l are you lying gaping and braying at there?\u2019 said he,\nseizing me by the wrist and dragging me after him. \u2018Do you not see the\nplight I am in, and why won\u2019t you fly to succour me?\u2019\n\n\u201cI now felt, to my great relief, that this terrific apparition was a\nbeing of flesh, blood, and bones like myself;\u2014that, in short, it was\nindeed my kind old friend the laird popped out of his open coffin, and\ncome over to pay me an evening visit, but certainly in such a guise as\nearthly visit was never paid. I soon gathered up my scattered senses,\ntook my old friend into my room, bathed him all over, and washed him\nwell with lukewarm water; then put him into a warm bed, gave him a glass\nor two of hot punch, and he came round amazingly. He caused me to survey\nhis neck a hundred times, I am sure; and I had no doubt he had been\nstrangled, for there was a purple ring round it, which in some places\nwas black, and a little swollen; his voice creaked like a door-hinge,\nand his features were still distorted. He swore terribly at both the\ndoctor and myself; but nothing put him half so mad as the idea of the\nquicklime being poured over him, and particularly over his face. I am\nmistaken if that experiment does not serve him for a theme of execration\nas long as he lives.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo he is alive, then, you say?\u201d asked the fiscal.\n\n\u201cO yes, sir, alive, and tolerably well, considering. We two have had\nseveral bottles together in my quiet room; for I have still kept him\nconcealed, to see what the doctor would do next. He is in terror for\nhim, somehow, until sixty days be over from some date that he talks of,\nand seems assured that the dog will have his life by hook or crook,\nunless he can bring him to the gallows betimes, and he is absent on that\nbusiness to-day. One night lately, when fully half seas over, he set off\nto the schoolhouse, and frightened the dominie; and last night he went\nup to the stable, and gave old Broadcast a hearing for not keeping his\nmare well enough.\n\n\u201cIt appears that some shaking motion in the coffining of the laird had\nbrought him back to himself, after bleeding abundantly both at mouth and\nnose; that he was on his feet ere he knew how he had been disposed of,\nand was quite shocked at seeing the open coffin on the bed, and himself\ndressed in his grave-clothes, and all in one bath of blood. He flew to\nthe door, but it was locked outside; he rapped furiously for something\nto drink, but the room was far removed from any inhabited part of the\nhouse, and none regarded; so he had nothing for it but to open the\nwindow, and come through the garden and the back lane leading to my\nworkshop. And as I had got orders to bring a bucketful of quicklime, I\nwent over in the forenight with a bucketful of heavy gravel, as much as\nI could carry, and a little white lime sprinkled on the top of it; and\nbeing let in by the doctor, I deposited it in the coffin, screwed down\nthe lid, and left it. The funeral followed in due course, the whole of\nwhich the laird viewed from my window, and gave the doctor a hearty\nday\u2019s cursing for daring to support his head and lay it in the grave.\nAnd this, gentlemen, is the substance of what I know concerning this\nenormous deed, which is, I think, quite sufficient. The laird bound me\nto secrecy until such time as he could bring matters to a proper bearing\nfor securing the doctor; but as you have forced it from me, you must\nstand my surety, and answer the charges against me.\u201d\n\nThe laird arrived that night with proper authority, and a number of\nofficers, to have the doctor, his son-in-law, taken into custody; but\nthe bird had flown; and from that day forth he was never seen, so as to\nbe recognised, in Scotland. The laird lived many years after that; and\nthough the thoughts of the quicklime made him drink a great deal, yet\nfrom that time he never suffered himself to get _quite_ drunk, lest some\none might take it into his head to hang him, and he not know anything\nabout it. The dominie acknowledged that it was as impracticable to\ncalculate what might happen in human affairs as to square the circle,\nwhich could only be effected by knowing the ratio of the circumference\nto the radius. For shoeing horses, vending news, and awarding proper\npunishments, the smith to this day just beats the world. And old John\nBroadcast is as thankfu\u2019 to heaven as ever that things are as they are.\n\n\n\n\n AN INCIDENT IN THE GREAT MORAY FLOODS OF 1829.\n\n BY SIR THOMAS DICK LAUDER.\n\n\nThe flood, both in the Spey and its tributary burn, was terrible at the\nvillage of Charlestown of Aberlour. On the 3d of August, Charles\nCruickshanks, the innkeeper, had a party of friends in his house. There\nwas no inebriety, but there was a fiddle; and what Scotsman is he who\ndoes not know that the well-jerked strains of a lively strathspey have a\npotent spell in them that goes beyond even the witchery of the bowl? On\none who daily inhales the breezes from the musical stream that gives\nname to the measure, the influence is powerful, and it was that day felt\nby Cruickshanks with a more than ordinary degree of excitement. He was\njoyous to a pitch that made his wife grave. Mrs Cruickshanks was deeply\naffected by her husband\u2019s jollity. \u201cSurely my goodman is daft the day,\u201d\nsaid she gravely; \u201cI ne\u2019er saw him dance at sic a rate. Lord grant that\nhe binna _fey_!\u201d[12]\n\nFootnote 12:\n\n \u201c\u2018I think,\u2019 said the old gardener to one of the maids, \u2018the gauger\u2019s\n _fie_\u2019\u2014by which word the common people express those violent spirits,\n which they think a presage of death.\u201d\u2014_Guy Mannering._\n\nWhen the river began to rise rapidly in the evening, Cruickshanks, who\nhad a quantity of wood lying near the mouth of the burn, asked two of\nhis neighbours to go and assist him in dragging it out of the water.\nThey readily complied, and Cruickshanks getting on the loose raft of\nwood, they followed him, and did what they could in pushing and hauling\nthe pieces of timber ashore, till the stream increased so much, that,\nwith one voice, they declared they would stay no longer, and, making a\ndesperate effort, they plunged over-head, and reached the land with the\ngreatest difficulty. They then tried all their eloquence to persuade\nCruickshanks to come away, but he was a bold and experienced floater,\nand laughed at their fears; nay, so utterly reckless was he, that having\nnow diminished the crazy ill-put-together raft he stood on, till it\nconsisted of a few spars only, he employed himself in trying to catch at\nand save some haycocks belonging to the clergyman, which were floating\npast him. But while his attention was so engaged, the flood was rapidly\nincreasing, till, at last, even his dauntless heart became appalled at\nits magnitude and fury. \u201cA horse! a horse!\u201d he loudly and anxiously\nexclaimed; \u201crun for one of the minister\u2019s horses, and ride in with a\nrope, else I must go with the stream.\u201d He was quickly obeyed, but ere a\nhorse arrived, the flood had rendered it impossible to approach him.\n\nSeeing that he must abandon all hope of help in that way, Cruickshanks\nwas now seen as if summoning up all his resolution and presence of mind\nto make the perilous attempt of dashing through the raging current, with\nhis frail and imperfect raft. Grasping more firmly the iron-shod pole he\nheld in his hand\u2014called in floater\u2019s language a _sting_\u2014he pushed\nresolutely into it; but he had hardly done so when the violence of the\nwater wrenched from his hold that which was all he had to depend on. A\nshriek burst from his friends, as they beheld the wretched raft dart off\nwith him down the stream, like an arrow freed from the bowstring. But\nthe mind of Cruickshanks was no common one to quail before the first\napproach of danger. He poised himself, and stood balanced, with\ndetermination and self-command in his eye, and no sound of fear, or of\ncomplaint, was heard to come from him.\n\nAt the point where the burn met the river, in the ordinary state of\nboth, there grew some trees, now surrounded by deep and strong currents,\nand far from the land. The raft took a direction towards one of these,\nand seeing the wide and tumultuous waters of the Spey before him, in\nwhich there was no hope that his loosely-connected logs could stick one\nmoment together, he coolly prepared himself, and, collecting all his\nforce into one well-timed and well-directed effort, he sprang, caught a\ntree, and clung among its boughs, whilst the frail raft, hurried away\nfrom under his foot, was dashed into fragments, and scattered on the\nbosom of the waves. A shout of joy arose from his anxious friends, for\nthey now deemed him safe; but _he_ uttered no shout in return. Every\nnerve was strained to procure help. \u201cA boat!\u201d was the general cry, and\nsome ran this way, and some that, to endeavour to procure one. It was\nnow between seven and eight o\u2019clock in the evening. A boat was speedily\nobtained, and though no one was very expert in its use, it was quickly\nmanned by people eager to save Cruickshanks from his perilous situation.\nThe current was too terrible about the tree to admit of their nearing\nit, so as to take him directly into the boat; but their object was to\nrow through the smoother water, to such a distance as might enable them\nto throw a rope to him, by which means they hoped to drag him to the\nboat. Frequently did they attempt this, and as frequently were they\nfoiled, even by that which was considered as the gentler part of the\nstream, for it hurried them past the point whence they wished to make\nthe cast of their rope, and compelled them to row up again by the side,\nto start on each fresh adventure.\n\nOften were they carried so much in the direction of the tree as to be\ncompelled to exert all their strength to pull themselves away from him\nthey would have saved, that they might avoid the vortex that would have\ncaught and swept them to destruction. And often was poor Cruickshanks\ntantalized with the approach of help, which came but to add to the other\nmiseries of his situation that of the bitterest disappointment. Yet he\nbore all calmly. In the transient glimpses they had of him, as they were\ndriven past him, they saw no blenching on his dauntless countenance\u2014they\nheard no reproach, no complaint, no sound, but an occasional short\nexclamation of encouragement to persevere in their friendly endeavours.\nBut the evening wore on, and still they were unsuccessful. It seemed to\nthem that something more than mere natural causes was operating against\nthem. \u201cHis hour is come!\u201d said they, as they regarded one another with\nlooks of awe; \u201cour struggles are vain.\u201d The courage and the hope which\nhad hitherto supported them began to fail, and the descending shades of\nnight extinguished the last feeble sparks of both, and put an end to\ntheir endeavours.\n\nFancy alone can picture the horrors that must have crept on the\nunfortunate man, as, amidst the impenetrable darkness which now\nprevailed, he became aware of the continued increase of the flood that\nroared around him, by its gradual advance towards his feet, whilst the\nrain and the tempest continued to beat more and more dreadfully upon\nhim. That these were long ineffectual in shaking his collected mind, we\nknow from the fact, afterwards ascertained, that he actually wound up\nhis watch while in this dreadful situation. But, hearing no more the\noccasional passing exclamations of those who had been hitherto trying to\nsuccour him, he began to shout for help in a voice that became every\nmoment more long-drawn and piteous, as, between the gusts of the\ntempest, and borne over the thunder of the waters, it fell from time to\ntime on the ears of his clustered friends, and rent the heart of his\ndistracted wife. Ever and anon it came, and hoarser than before, and\nthere was an occasional wildness in its note, and now and then a strange\nand clamorous repetition for a time, as if despair had inspired him with\nan unnatural energy; but the shouts became gradually shorter,\u2014less\naudible and less frequent,\u2014till at last their eagerly listening ears\ncould catch them no longer. \u201cIs he gone?\u201d was the half-whispered\nquestion they put to one another; and the smothered responses that were\nmuttered around but too plainly told how much the fears of all were in\nunison.\n\n\u201cWhat was that?\u201d cried his wife in a delirious scream; \u201cthat was his\nwhistle I heard!\u201d She said truly. A shrill whistle, such as that which\nis given with the fingers in the mouth, rose again over the loud din of\nthe deluge and the yelling of the storm. He was not yet gone. His voice\nwas but cracked by his frequent exertions to make it heard, and he had\nnow resorted to an easier mode of transmitting to his friends the\ncertainty of his safety. For some time his unhappy wife drew hope from\nsuch considerations, but his whistles, as they came more loud and\nprolonged, pierced the ears of his foreboding friends like the\nill-omened cry of some warning spirit; and it may be matter of question\nwhether all believed that the sounds they heard were really mortal.\nStill they came louder and clearer for a brief space; but at last they\nwere heard no more, save in his frantic wife\u2019s fancy, who continued to\nstart, as if she still heard them, and to wander about, and to listen,\nwhen all but herself were satisfied that she could never hear them\nagain.\n\nWet and weary, and shivering with cold, was this miserable woman, when\nthe tardy dawn of morning beheld her straining her eye-balls through the\nimperfect light, towards the trees where Cruickshanks had been last\nseen. There was something there that looked like the figure of a man,\nand on that her eyes fixed. But those around her saw, alas! too well,\nthat what she fondly supposed to be her husband was but a bunch of wreck\ngathered by the flood into one of the trees,\u2014for the one to which he\nclung had been swept away.\n\nThe body of poor Cruickshanks was found in the afternoon of next day, on\nthe Haugh of Dandaleith, some four or five miles below. As it had ever\nbeen his uniform practice to wind up his watch at night, and as it was\ndiscovered to be nearly full wound when it was taken from his pocket,\nthe fact of his having had self-possession enough to obey his usual\ncustom, under circumstances so terrible, is as unquestionable as it is\nwonderful. It had stopped at a quarter of an hour past eleven o\u2019clock,\nwhich would seem to fix that as the fatal moment when the tree was rent\naway; for when that happened, his struggles amidst the raging waves of\nthe Spey must have been few and short.\n\nWhen the men, who had so unsuccessfully attempted to save him, were\ntalking over the matter, and arguing that no human help could have\navailed him,\u2014\n\n\u201cI\u2019m thinkin\u2019 I could hae ta\u2019en him out,\u201d said a voice in the circle.\n\nAll eyes were turned towards the speaker, and a general expression of\ncontempt followed; for it was a boy of the name of Rainey, a reputed\nidiot, from the foot of Benrinnes, who spoke.\n\n\u201cYou!\u201d cried a dozen voices at once; \u201cwhat would you have done, you wise\nman?\u201d\n\n\u201cI wud hae tied an empty anker-cask to the end o\u2019 a lang, lang tow, an\u2019\nI wud hae floated it aff frae near aboot whaur the raft was ta\u2019en first\nawa; an\u2019 syne, ye see, as the stream teuk the raft till the tree, maybe\nshe wud hae ta\u2019en the cask there too; an\u2019 if Charlie Cruickshanks had\nance gotten a haud o\u2019 this rope\u2014\u2014\u201d\n\nHe would have finished, but his auditors were gone: they had silently\nslunk away in different directions, one man alone having muttered, as he\nwent, something about \u201cwisdom coming out of the mouth of fools.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n CHARLIE GRAHAM, THE TINKER.\n\n BY GEORGE PENNY.\n\n\nThe notorious Charlie Graham belonged to a gang of tinkers, who had for\na long time travelled through the country, and whose headquarters were\nat Lochgelly, in Fife. They were to be found at all markets, selling\ntheir horn spoons, which was their ostensible occupation. But there was\na great deal of business done in the pickpocket line, and other branches\nof the thieving art. About Charlie there were some remarkable traits of\ngenerosity. In the midst of all the crimes he committed, he was never\nknown to hurt a poor man, but often out of his plunder helped those in a\nstrait. His father was in the same line, and was long at the head of the\ngang; but being afterwards imprisoned for theft, housebreaking, &c., he\nwas banished the county, banished Scotland, and publicly whipped. On one\noccasion he was banished, with certification that if he returned, he was\nto be publicly whipped the first market-day, and thereafter to be\nbanished. Old Charlie was not long away when he returned, and was\napprehended and conveyed to Perth jail. A vacancy having occurred in the\noffice of executioner, the first market-day was allowed to pass without\ninflicting the sentence, upon which Charlie entered a protest, and was\nliberated. In various ways he eluded justice,\u2014sometimes by breaking the\nprison, and sometimes for want of evidence. The last time he was brought\nin, he was met by an old acquaintance, who asked, \u201cWhat is the matter\nnow?\u201d to which old Charlie replied, \u201cOh, just the auld thing, and nae\nproof;\u201d which saying has since become a proverb. But this time they did\nfind proof, and he was again publicly whipped, and sent out of the\ncountry. One of his daughters, Meg Graham, who had been bred from her\ninfancy in the same way, was every now and then apprehended for some\npetty theft. Indeed, she was so often in jail, that she got twenty-eight\ndinners from old John Rutherford, the writer, who gave the prisoners in\nthe jail a dinner every Christmas. Meg, in her young days, was reckoned\none of the first beauties of the time; but she was a wild one. She had\nbeen whipped and pilloried, but still the root of the matter remained.\n\nYoung Charlie was a man of uncommon strength and size, being about six\nfeet high, and stout in proportion. His wrist was as thick as that of\ntwo ordinary men; he had long been the terror of the country, and\nattended all markets at the head of his gang, where they were sure to\nkick up a row among themselves. Two of their women would commence a\nbattle-royal in the midst of the throng, scratch and tear one another\u2019s\ncaps, until a mob was assembled, when the rest were very busy in picking\npockets. In this way they were frequently very successful.\n\nAt a market to the west of Crieff a farmer got his pocket-book taken\nfrom him. It being ascertained that Charlie Graham and his gang were in\nthe market,\u2014who were well known to several of the respectable farmers,\nwho frequently lodged them on their way to the country,\u2014it was proposed\nto get Charlie and give him a glass, and tell him the story. Charlie\naccepted the invitation; and during the circulation of the glass, one of\nthe company introduced the subject, lamenting the poor man\u2019s loss in\nsuch a feeling way, that the right chord was struck, and Charlie\u2019s\ngenerosity roused. An appeal was made to him to lend the poor man such a\nsum, as his credit was at stake. Charlie said they had done nothing that\nday, but if anything cast up, he would see what could be done. During\nthis conversation another company came into the room; amongst whom was a\nman with a greatcoat, a Highland bonnet, and a large drover whip. After\nbeing seated, this personage was recognised as belonging to the gang,\nand they were invited to drink with them, whilst the story of the\nrobbery was repeated. On this Charlie asked his friend if he could lend\nhim forty pounds to give to the poor man, and he would repay him in a\nfew days. The man replied that he had forty pounds which he was going to\npay away; but if it was to favour a friend, he would put off his\nbusiness and help him; when, to their astonishment, the identical notes\nwhich the man had lost were tossed to him; and Charlie said that that\nwould relieve him in the meantime, and he could repay him when\nconvenient. It was evident that Charlie smelt a rat, and took this\nmethod to get off honourably. Of course, the forty pounds were never\nsought after.\n\nCharlie was one day lodged with a poor widow, who had a few acres of\nground, and kept a public-house. She complained to him that she was\nunable to raise her rent, that the factor was coming that night for\npayment, and that she was considerably deficient. Charlie gave her what\nmade it up, and in the evening went out of the way, after learning at\nwhat time the factor would be there. The factor came, received payment,\nand returned home; but on the way he was met by Charlie, who eased him\nof his cash, and returned the rent to the poor widow.\n\nThe Rev. Mr Graham of Fossoway came one day to Perth to discount some\nbills in the Bank of Scotland. Having got his bills cashed, his spirits\nrose to blood-heat, and a hearty glass was given to his friends, until\nthe parson got a little muddy. His friends, loth to leave him in that\nstate, hired a horse each to convey him home. It was dark and late when\nthey set out, and by the time they reached Damhead, where they put up\ntheir horses, it was morning. The house was re-building at the time, and\nthe family living in the barn when the parson and his friends were\nintroduced. Here they found Charlie and some of his friends over a bowl,\nof which the minister was cordially invited to partake. His companions\nalso joined, and kept it up with great glee for some time\u2014the minister\nsinging his song, and Charlie getting very big. One of the friends,\nknowing how the land lay, was very anxious to be off, for fear of the\nminister\u2019s money, and ordered out the horses; but to this Charlie would\nby no means consent. This alarmed the friends still more; as for the\nminister, he was now beyond all fear. However, in a short time a number\nof men came in and called for drink, and then Charlie, after the glass\nhad gone round, said he thought it was time for the minister to get\nhome, and went out to see them on their horses; when he told them he had\ndetained them till the return of these men, who, if they had met them,\nmight have proved dangerous neighbours; but now they could go home in\nsafety.\n\nHe was one day on his way to Auchterarder market, when he met a farmer\ngoing from home, in whose barn he had frequently lodged, when Charlie\ntold him he was to lodge with him that night. The farmer said he could\nnot take strangers into his barn in its present state, as his summer\u2019s\ncheese, and many other things, were lodged there. \u201cD\u2014n your cheese,\u201d\nreplied Charlie; \u201cdo you think, old boy, that I would lay down my\nhonesty for your trash o\u2019 cheese?\u201d They parted, and Charlie got\npermission from the gudewife for himself, as there were no others with\nhim. The farmer came home late, and knew not that Charlie was there. In\nthe morning when he went into the barn, he was astonished to find it all\nin an uproar. Upwards of twenty individuals\u2014men, women, and\nchildren\u2014were lying among the straw. The wife was called upon to see\nwhat state the barn was in; and the old man, in no very soft voice,\nrailed at her for admitting such a band. She replied that she would send\nthem away quietly: and this she did by giving them as much brose and\nmilk as they could take. On their departure, Charlie told him he was a\nmean old crab, and that his wife was worth a hundred of him. However, he\nkept his word as to the cheese, and nothing was touched.\n\nIn the market next day, a good deal of business was done in his way;\nseveral pockets were picked, and a number of petty thefts committed.\nCharlie being in the habit of dealing with respectable merchants for\nhorn spoons, he was one day in the shop getting payment for a parcel.\nThe money was counted down, but during the time his wife was taking it\nup, the merchant turned to speak to some one in the shop; the wife, on\ntaking up the money, said she wanted five shillings; the merchant said\nhe was positive he laid down the whole. She still insisted that she\nwanted five shillings, and the merchant was determined to resist; on\nwhich Charlie interfered, saying, \u201cCome, come, ye limmer, down with the\nmoney; none of your tricks here.\u201d\n\nAt one time he took it into his head to enlist for a regiment in India,\nwith a party in Perth; he did very well until they were ordered to join\nthe regiment. All the recruits being assembled but Charlie, he at last\nwas found drinking in a public-house, but would not stir a foot. The\nofficer was got, and the party attempted, after fair means had failed,\nto take him by force. They only got him the length of the street, when\nhe drew a short bludgeon from an inside pocket, and laid about him from\nright to left, in such a way that the whole were soon sprawling on the\nstreet, and he escaped. The officer, seeing what kind of a character he\nwas, desired the sergeant not to look after him, as he would have\nnothing to do with him.\n\nAt all the fairs he was present with his gang. If any row commenced he\nwas sure to take a lead,\u2014and whichever party he joined were generally\nleft masters of the field. One midsummer market at Perth, a dreadful row\ngot up between the weavers and the farmer lads, hundreds of whom\nattended the market at that time. Charlie and his friends joined the\nweavers; the streets were soon in a perfect uproar; the chapmen\u2019s stands\nwere upset, and themselves tumbled in the midst of their goods; sweeties\nand gingerbread were scattered in all directions by the pressure of the\ncontending parties; and broken heads and faces were to be seen in\nabundance. The whole fair was thrown into a dreadful state of confusion,\nuntil a party of military were brought out, who at length succeeded in\nrestoring order; but Charlie and his friends were not to be found. Many\nindividuals lost their hats, &c., and got bruised bones and torn coats;\nit was also discovered that many pockets had been picked during the\naffray.\n\nCharlie had often been convicted of theft, imprisoned, and banished the\ncounty. He not unfrequently made his escape by breaking out of prison;\nbut was at length apprehended for horse stealing; and during his\nconfinement was put in irons, in one of the strong cages in the old\njail. During his imprisonment he was very cheerful, often declaring they\ncould have no proof against him; but a short time convinced him of his\nfolly. He was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to be hanged. When\nbrought out to execution, he was attended by four artillerymen, for fear\nof resistance. He recognised many of his old acquaintances in the\nmultitude\u2014particularly the merchant with whom he dealt in spoons, and\ngave him a bow and a wave of his hand. When the fatal hour approached he\nappeared quite subdued, and submitted to his fate with calm resignation.\nAfter his body was cut down it was conveyed to the grave by an immense\nmultitude; the coffin was opened and filled with quicklime, to render it\nuseless for the surgeon.\n\nCharlie\u2019s death was a severe loss to the gang; immediately after this\nCharlie Brown, his brother-in-law, became leader. This fellow, although\nnot so large a man, was stout, firmly built, of great activity, and,\nlike Graham, had been frequently in the hands of the law, and made shift\nto get clear, until at last the fiscal was determined to have him. It\nbeing ascertained that he was in the neighbourhood, a party of light\ndragoons was sent out with the officers, who traced him to Auchtergaven.\nWhen he saw the party, he set off through the fields, until fairly run\ndown by two of the horsemen, and brought to Perth. This desperate\ncharacter had on him about eighty guineas; he was charged with several\ncrimes, convicted, and sent to Botany Bay for life. After this the gang,\nwho had for a long period infested the country, dispersed, and was\nseldom heard of.\u2014_Traditions of Perth._\n\n\n\n\n THE SNOWING-UP OF STRATH LUGAS;\n _OR, THE MATCH-MAKING LAIRD_.\n\n\nJolly old Simon Kirkton! thou art the very high-priest of Hymen. There\nis something softly persuasive to matrimony in thy contented,\ncomfortable appearance; and thy house,\u2014why, though it is situated in the\nfarthest part of Inverness-shire, it is as fertile in connubial joys as\nif it were placed upon Gretna Green. Single blessedness is a term\nunknown in thy vocabulary; heaven itself would be a miserable place for\nthee, for _there_ is neither marrying nor giving in marriage!\n\nHalf the county was invited to a grand dinner and ball at Simon\u2019s house\nin January 1812. All the young ladies had looked forward to it in joyous\nanticipation and hope, and all the young gentlemen, with considerable\nexpectation\u2014and fear. Everything was to be on the greatest scale: the\ndinner in the ancient hall, with the two family pipers discoursing sweet\nmusic between the courses, and the ball in the splendid new\ndrawing-room, with a capital band from the county town. The Duke was to\nbe there with all the nobility, rank, and fashion of the district; and,\nin short, such a splendid entertainment had never been given at Strath\nLugas in the memory of man. The editor of the county paper had a\ndescription of it in type a month before, and the milliners far and near\nnever said their prayers without a supplication for the health of Mr\nKirkton. All this time that worthy gentleman was not idle. The\ndrawing-room was dismantled of its furniture, and the floors\nindustriously chalked over with innumerable groups of flowers. The\nlarder was stocked as if for a siege; the domestics drilled into a\nknowledge of their duties; and every preparation completed in the most\nirreproachable style. I question whether Gunter ever dreamt of such a\nsupper as was laid out in the dining-room: venison in all its forms, and\nfish of every kind. It would have victualled a seventy-four to China.\n\nThe day came at last,\u2014a fine, sharp, clear day, as ever gave a bluish\ntinge to the countenance, or brought tears to \u201cbeauty\u2019s eye.\u201d There had\nbeen a great fall of snow a few days before, but the weather seemed now\nsettled into a firm, enduring frost. The laird had not received a single\napology, and waited in the hall along with his lady to receive the\nguests as they arrived.\n\n\u201cMy dear, isna that a carriage coming up the Brose-fit-knowe? Auld Leddy\nClavers, I declare. She\u2019ll be going to dress here, and the three girls.\nAnne\u2019s turned religious; so I\u2019m thinking she\u2019s ower auld to be married.\nIt\u2019s a pity the minister\u2019s no coming: his wife\u2019s just dead; but\nJeanie\u2019ll be looking out for somebody. We maun put her next to young\nGerfluin. Elizabeth\u2019s a thocht ower young; she can stay at the\nside-table with Tammy Maxwell\u2014he\u2019s just a hobbletehoy\u2014it wad be a very\ngood match in time.\u201d\n\nIn this way, as each party made its appearance, the laird arranged in a\nmoment the order in which every individual was to be placed at table;\nand even before dinner, he had the satisfaction of seeing his guests\nbreaking off into the quiet _t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eates_, which the noise and\noccupation of a general company render sweet and secluded as a meeting\n\u201cby moonlight alone.\u201d While his eye wandered round the various parties\nthus pleasantly engaged, it rested on the figure of a very beautiful\ngirl whom he had not previously remarked. She sat apart from all the\nrest, and was amusing herself with looking at the pictures suspended\nround the room, apparently unconscious of the presence of so many\nstrangers. She seemed in deep thought; but as she gazed on the\nrepresentation of a battlepiece, her face changed its expression from\nthe calmness of apathy to the most vivid enthusiasm.\n\n\u201cMercy on us a\u2019!\u201d whispered the laird to his wife, \u201cwha\u2019s she that? that\nbeautiful young lassie in the white goon? An\u2019 no\u2019 a young bachelor\nwithin a mile o\u2019 her. Deil ane o\u2019 them deserves such an angel!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a Miss Mowbray,\u201d was the reply; \u201cshe came with Mrs Carmichael,\u2014a\ngreat heiress they say: it\u2019s the first time she was ever in Scotland.\u201d\n\n\u201cAha! say ye sae? Then we\u2019ll see if we canna keep her among us noo that\nshe is come. Angus M\u2018Leod\u2014na, he\u2019ll no do\u2014he\u2019s a gude enough lad, but\nhe\u2019s no bonnie. Chairlie Fletcher\u2014he wad do weel enough; but I\u2019m\nthinking he\u2019ll do better for Bell Johnson. \u2019Od, donnered auld man, no to\nthink o\u2019 him before! Chairlie Melville\u2019s the very man\u2014the handsomest,\nbravest, cleverest chield she could hae; and if she\u2019s gotten the siller,\nso much the better for Chairlie\u2014they\u2019ll mak a bonnie couple.\u201d\n\nAnd in an instant the laird laid his hand on the shoulder of a young\nman, who was engaged with a knot of gentlemen discussing some recent\nnews from the Peninsula, and dragging him away, said,\u2014\n\n\u201cFor shame, Chairlie, for shame! Do you no see that sweet, modest lassie\na\u2019 by hersel? Gang up to her this minute\u2014bide by her as lang as ye\ncan\u2014she\u2019s weel worth a\u2019 the attention ye can pay her. Miss Mowbray,\u201d he\ncontinued, \u201cI\u2019m sorry my friend, Mrs Carmichael, has left ye sae much to\nyoursel; but here\u2019s Chairlie, or rather I should say, Mr Charles, or\nrather I should say, Lieutenant Charles Melville, that will be happy to\nsupply her place. He\u2019ll tak ye in to yer dinner, and dance wi\u2019 ye at the\nball.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll in place of Mrs Carmichael, sir?\u201d replied the young lady, with an\narch look.\n\n\u201cWeel said, my dear, weel said; but I maun leave younger folks to answer\nye. I\u2019ve seen the time I wadna hae been very blate to gie ye an answer\nthat wad hae stoppit your \u2018wee bit mou, sae sweet and bonnie.\u2019\u201d Saying\nthese words, and whispering to his young friend, \u201cStick till her,\nChairlie,\u201d he bustled off, \u201con hospitable thoughts intent,\u201d to another\npart of the room.\n\nAfter the introduction, the young people soon entered into conversation;\nand, greatly to the laird\u2019s satisfaction, the young soldier conducted\nMiss Mowbray into the hall, sat next her all the time of dinner, and\nseemed as delighted with his companion as the most match-making lady or\ngentleman could desire. The lady, on the other hand, seemed in high\nspirits, and laughed at the remarks of her neighbour with the greatest\nappearance of enjoyment.\n\n\u201cHow long have you been with Mrs Carmichael?\u201d\n\n\u201cI came the day before yesterday.\u201d\n\n\u201cRather a savage sort of country, I am afraid, you find this, after the\npolished scenes of your own land?\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you mean the country,\u201d replied the lady, \u201cor the inhabitants? They\nare not nearly such savages as I expected; some of them seem\nhalf-civilised.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is only your good-nature that makes you think us so. When you know\nus better, you will alter your opinion.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay; now don\u2019t be angry, or talk as all other Scotch people do, about\nyour national virtues. I know you are a very wonderful people\u2014your men\nall heroes, your peasants philosophers, and your women angels; but\nseriously, I was very much disappointed to find you so like other\npeople.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, what did you expect? Did you think we were \u2018men whose heads do\ngrow beneath their shoulders?\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I did not expect that; but I expected to find everything different\nfrom what I had been accustomed to. Now, the company here are dressed\njust like a party in England, and behave in the same manner. Even the\nlanguage is intelligible at times; though the laird, I must say, would\nrequire an interpreter.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, the jolly old laird! His face is a sort of polyglot dictionary\u2014it\nis the expression for good-humour, kindness, and hospitality, in all\nlanguages.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd who is that at his right hand?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat? the henchman? That\u2019s Rory M\u2018Taggart\u2014he was piper for twenty years\nin the 73d, and killed three men with his own hand at Vimiera.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd is that the reason he is called the henchman?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; henchman means, \u2018the piper with the bloody hand\u2014the slaughterer of\nthree.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a comprehensive word! It is almost equal to the laird\u2019s face.\u201d\n\nBut here the laird broke in upon their conversation.\n\n\u201cMiss Mowbray, dinna be frightened at a\u2019 the daft things the wild sodger\nis saying to you.\u201d Then he added, in a lower tone, \u201cChairlie wad settle\ndown into a douce, quiet, steady, married man, for a\u2019 his tantrums. It\nwad be a pity if a Frenchman\u2019s gun should spoil his beauty, puir\nfallow!\u201d\n\nThe young lady bowed without comprehending a syllable of the speech of\nthe worthy host.\n\n\u201cAre you likely to be soon ordered abroad?\u201d she said.\n\n\u201cWe expect the route for Spain every day; and then huzza for a peerage\nor Westminster Abbey!\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! war is a fine game when it is played at a distance. Why can\u2019t kings\nsettle their disputes without having recourse to the sword?\u201d\n\n\u201cI really can\u2019t answer your question, but I think it must be out of a\nkind regard for the interest of younger brothers. A war is a capital\nprovision for poor fellows like myself, who were born to no estate but\nthat excessively large one which the Catechism calls the \u2018estate of sin\nand misery.\u2019 But come, I see from your face you are very romantic, and\nare going to say something sentimental\u2014luckily his Grace is proposing a\nremoval into the ball-room; may I beg the honour of your hand?\u201d\n\n\u201cAha, lad!\u201d cried the laird, who had heard the last sentence; \u201care ye at\nthat wark already\u2014asking a leddy\u2019s hand on sic short an acquaintance?\nBut folk canna do\u2019t ower sune.\u201d\n\nThe bustle caused by the secession of those who preferred Terpsichore to\nBacchus, lucidly prevented Miss Mowbray\u2019s hearing the laird\u2019s\nobservation, and in a few minutes she found herself entering with heart\nand soul into the full enjoyment of a country dance.\n\nMarriages, they say, are made in heaven. Charles Melville devoutly\nwished the laird\u2019s efforts might be successful, and that one could be\nmade on earth. She was indeed, as the laird expressed it, \u201ca bonnie\ncratur to look at.\u201d I never could describe a beauty in my life\u2014so the\nloveliness of the English heiress must be left to the imagination. At\nall events, she was \u201cthe bright consummate flower of the whole wreath\u201d\nwhich was then gathered together at Strath Lugas; and even Lady Clavers\nsaid that\u2014\n\n\u201cMiss Mowbray\u2019s very weel put on indeed, for sae young a lassie. Her\nhair\u2019s something like our Anne\u2019s\u2014only I think Anne\u2019s has a wee richer\ntinge o\u2019 the golden.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreserve us a\u2019!\u201d whispered the laird; \u201cpuir Anne\u2019s hair is as red as a\ncarrot.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 dinna ye think her voice,\u201d said her ladyship\u2014\u201cdinna ye think her\nvoice is something like our Jeanie\u2019s\u2014only maybe no sae rich in the\ntone?\u201d\n\n\u201cFeth, ma\u2019am,\u201d answered the laird, \u201cI maun wait till I hear Miss Mowbray\nspeak the Gaelic, for really the saft sort o\u2019 beautiful English she\nspeaks gies her a great advantage.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs ye say, Mr Kirkton,\u201d continued her ladyship, who, like all great\ntalkers, never attended to what any one said but herself, \u201cJeanie has a\ngreat advantage ower her; but she\u2019s weel enough, for a\u2019 that.\u201d\n\nIn the meantime the young lady, who was the subject of this\nconversation, troubled herself very little as to what Lady Clavers said\nor thought on that occasion. I shall not on any account say that she was\nin love, for I highly disapprove of such a speedy surrender to Dan Cupid\nin the softer sex; but at all events she was highly delighted with the\nnovelty of the scene, and evidently pleased with her partner. No scruple\nof the same kind restrains me from mentioning the state of Charlie\nMelville\u2019s heart. He was as deeply in love as ever was the hero of a\nromance, and in the pauses of the dance indulged in various reveries\nabout love and a cottage, and a number of other absurd notions, which\nare quite common, I believe, on such occasions. He never deigned to\nthink on so contemptible an object as a butcher\u2019s bill, or how\ninconvenient it would be to maintain a wife and four or five angels of\neither sex on ninety pounds a year; but at the same time, I must do him\nthe justice to state, that, although he was a Scotsman, the fact of Miss\nMowbray\u2019s being an heiress never entered into his contemplation; and if\nI may mention my own opinion, I really believe he would have been better\npleased if she had been as portionless as himself.\n\nBut time and tide wear through the roughest day; no wonder, then, they\nwore very rapidly through the happiest evening he had ever spent. The\nDuke and the more distant visitors had taken their leave; \u201cthe mirth and\nfun grew fast and furious\u201d among the younger and better acquainted\nparties who were left; but, greatly to the mortification of the young\nsoldier, his partner was called away at the end of a dance, just when he\nhad been anticipating a delightful _t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eate_ while the next was\nforming. With his heart nearly bursting with admiration and regret, he\nwrapt her in her cloaks and shawls, and in silent dejection, with only a\nwarm pressure of the hand, which he was enchanted to find returned, he\nhanded her into Mrs Carmichael\u2019s old-fashioned open car, though the\nnight was dark and stormy,\u2014and after listening to the last sound of the\nwheels as they were lost among the snow, he slowly turned, and\nre-entered the ball-room.\n\nTheir absence, to all appearance, had not been noticed by a single\neye,\u2014a thing at which he, as a lover under such circumstances is bound\nto be, was greatly surprised. \u201cBlockheads!\u201d he said, \u201cthey would not see\nthe darkness if the sun were extinguished at midday.\u201d And he fell into a\ntrain of reflections, which, from the expression of his countenance, did\nnot seem to be of a very exhilarating nature. In about twenty minutes,\nhowever, after his return, he was roused by the henchman, whom he had\nspoken of at dinner, who beckoned him from the hall.\n\n\u201cThe bonny cratur!\u2014the bonny cratur!\u201d he began,\u2014\u201can\u2019 sic a nicht to gang\nhame in!\u2014the stars a\u2019 put out, the snaw beginning to drift, and a spate\nin the Lugas! Noo, if auld Andrew Strachan, the Leddy Carmichael\u2019s\ncoachman,\u2014doited auld body, an\u2019 mair than half fou\u2019,\u2014tries the ford, oh,\nthe lassie, the bonny lassie\u2019ll be lost! an\u2019 I\u2019ll never hae the heart to\nspend the crownpiece she slippit into my hand just afore the dancin\u2019!\u201d\n\nBut what more the worthy henchman might have said must remain a mystery\nto all succeeding time; for long before he had come to the episode of\nthe crown, Charles had rushed hatless into the open air, and dashed\nforward at the top of his speed to overtake the carriage, in time to\nwarn them from the ford. But the snow had already formed itself into\nenormous wreaths, which, besides impeding his progress, interfered\ngreatly with his knowledge of the localities; and he pursued his\ntoilsome way more in despair than hope. He shouted, in the expectation\nof his voice being heard, but he heard no reply. He stooped down to see\nthe track of the wheels, but the snow fell so fast and drifted at the\nsame time, that it was quite undistinguishable, even if the darkness had\nnot been so deep. However, onwards he pressed towards the ford, and\nshouted louder and louder as he approached it.\n\nThe roaring of the stream, now swollen to a prodigious height, drowned\nhis cries, and his eyes in vain searched for the object of his pursuit;\nfar and near he directed his gaze, and felt a transport of joy at the\nhope, which their absence presented, that they had gone round by the\nbridge and were saved. He was about to return, when he thought he heard,\nin a bend in the river, a little way down, a faint scream above the\nroaring of the torrent. Quick as lightning he rushed towards the spot,\nand hallooed as loud as he could. The shriek was distinctly repeated,\nand a great way out in the water he saw some substance of considerable\nsize. He shouted again, and a voice replied to him from the river. In an\ninstant he had plunged into the stream, and though it was rushing with\ngreat impetuosity, it was luckily not so deep as to prevent his wading.\nAnd after considerable toil, for the water was above his breast, he\nsucceeded in reaching the object he had descried from the bank. It was,\nindeed, Mrs Carmichael\u2019s car, and in it he had the inexpressible delight\nto find the two ladies, terrified, indeed, but happily in full\npossession of their presence of mind.\n\nIn a few hurried words, he desired them to trust entirely to him, and\nbegging the elder lady to remain quiet in the carriage, he lifted the\nyounger in his arms,\u2014but in the most earnest language she implored him\nto save her companion first, as she had such confidence in herself that\nshe was certain she could remain in the carriage till he had effected\nhis return. Pressing her to his heart in admiration of such magnanimity,\nhe laid her gently back, and lifting Mrs Carmichael from her seat, he\npushed desperately for the shore. The water even in this short time had\nperceptibly risen, and on reaching the bank, and depositing his burden\nin safety, he rushed once more through the torrent, fearful lest a\nmoment\u2019s delay should make it impracticable to reach the car. That light\nequipage was now shaking from the impetuous attacks of the stream, and\nat the moment when the fainting girl was lifted up, a rush of greater\nforce taking it, now unbalanced by any weight, forced it on its side,\nand rolled it off into the great body of the river. It had been carried\nmore than fifty yards below the ford, without, however, being\noverturned, and had luckily become entangled with the trunk of a tree;\nthe horse, after severe struggles, had been drowned, and his inanimate\nweight had helped to delay the progress of the carriage. The coachman\nwas nowhere to be found. Meanwhile the three, once more upon the land,\npursued their path back to Strath Lugas. Long and toilsome was the road,\nbut cheered to the young soldier by the happy consciousness that he had\nsaved his \u201cheart\u2019s idol\u201d from death. Tired, and nearly worn out with the\nharassing nature of their journey and of their feelings, they at length\nreached the hospitable mansion they had so lately quitted.\n\nThe music was still sounding, the lights still burning brightly,\u2014but\nwhen old Simon Kirkton saw the party enter his hall, no words can do\njustice to the horror of his expression. The ladies were consigned to\nthe attention of his wife. He himself took especial care of the hero of\nthe story; and after having heard the whole adventure, when the soldier,\nrefreshed, and in a suit of the laird\u2019s apparel, was entering the\ndancing room, he slapped him on the shoulder, and said\u2014\n\n\u201cDeil a doubt o\u2019t noo. If ye\u2019re no laird o\u2019 the bonny English acres, and\ngudeman o\u2019 the bonny English leddy, I\u2019ve nae skill in spaein\u2019, that\u2019s\na\u2019.\u201d\n\nThe adventure quickly spread, and people were sent off in all directions\nwith lights, to discover, if possible, the body of the unfortunate\nAndrew Strachan. After searching for a long time, our friend the\nhenchman thought he heard a voice close beside him, on the bank. He held\ndown his lantern, and, sure enough, there he saw the object of their\npursuit, lying at the very edge of the water, and his body on the land!\nThe water from time to time burst over his face, and it was only on\nthese occasions that an almost inarticulate grunt showed that the\ncomatose disciple of John Barleycorn was yet alive. The henchman\nsummoned his companions, and on attentively listening to the groans, as\nthey considered them, of the dying man, they distinctly heard him, as he\nattempted to spit out the water which broke in tiny waves over his\nmouth, exclaiming, \u201cFaugh, faugh! I doot ye\u2019re changing the liquor\u2014a wee\ndrap mair whisky, and a sma\u2019 spoonfu\u2019 o\u2019 sugar.\u201d The nodding charioteer\nhad been ejected from his seat on the first impetus of the \u201cspate,\u201d and\nbeen safely floated to land, without perceiving any remarkable change of\nsituation. It is needless to say he was considerably surprised to\ndiscover where he was on being roused by the henchman\u2019s party.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s my belief,\u201d said Jock Stewart, the piper, \u201cthe drucken body thocht\nhe was tipplin\u2019 a\u2019 the time in the butler\u2019s ha\u2019! It wad be a gude deed\nto let the daidlin\u2019 haveril follow his hat and wig; and I\u2019m thinkin\u2019 by\nthis time they\u2019ll be down about Fort-George.\u201d\n\nThe weather was become so stormy, and the snow so deep, that it was\nimpossible for any one to leave the house that night. The hospitable\nlaird immediately set about making accommodation for so large a party,\nand by a little management he contrived to render everybody comfortable.\nThe fiddlers were lodged in the barn, the ladies settled by the\nhalf-dozen in a room, and a supply of cloaks was collected for the\ngentlemen in the hall. Where people are willing to be pleased, it is\nastonishing how easy they find it. Laughter long and loud resounded\nthrough all the apartments, and morn began to stand \u201cupon the misty\nmountain-tops\u201d ere sleep and silence took possession of the mansion.\nNext day the storm still continued. The prospect, as far as the eye\ncould reach, was a dreary waste of snow; and it was soon perceived, by\nthose who were skilful in such matters, that the whole party were fairly\nsnowed-up, and how long their imprisonment might last no one could tell.\nIt was amazing with what equanimity the intelligence was listened to;\none or two young ladies, who had been particularly pleased with their\npartners, went as far as to say it was delightful.\n\nThe elders of the party bore it with great good-humour, on being assured\nfrom the state of the larder that there was no danger of a famine; and,\nabove all, the laird himself, who had some private schemes of his own to\nserve, was elevated into the seventh heaven by the embargo laid on his\nguests.\n\n\u201cIf this bides three days there\u2019ll be a dizzen couple before Leddy-day.\nIt\u2019s no possible for a lad and a lass to be snawed up thegither three\ndays without melting;\u2014but we\u2019ll see the night how it\u2019s a\u2019 to be managed.\nHas onybody seen Mrs Carmichael and Miss Mowbray this morning?\u201d\n\nBut before this question could be answered the ladies entered the room.\nThey were both pale from their last night\u2019s adventure; but while the\nelder lady was shaking hands with her friends, and receiving their\ncongratulations, the eyes of her young companion wandered searchingly\nround the apartment till they fell on Charles Melville. Immediately a\nflush came over her cheek, which before was deadly pale, and she started\nforward and held out her hand. He rushed and caught it, and even in\npresence of all that company could scarcely resist the inclination to\nput it to his lips.\n\n\u201cThanks! thanks!\u201d was all she said; and even in saying these short words\nher voice trembled, and a tear came to her eye. But when she saw that\nall looks were fixed on her, she blushed more deeply than ever, and\nretired to the side of Mrs Carmichael. The scene passed by no means\nunheeded by the laird.\n\n\u201cStupid whelp!\u201d he said, \u201cwhat for did he no kiss her, an it were just\nto gie her cheeks an excuse for growing sae rosy? \u2019Od, if I had saved\nher frae drooning, I wadna hae been sae nice,\u2014that\u2019s to say, my dear,\u201d\nhe added to his wife, who was standing by, \u201cif I hadna a wife o\u2019 my\nain.\u201d\n\nThe storm lasted for five days. How the plans of the laird with regard\nto the matrimonial comforts of his guests prospered, I have no intention\nof detailing. I believe, however, he was right in his predictions, and\nthe minister was presented with eight several sets of tea-things within\nthree months. Many a spinster at this moment looks back with regret to\nher absence from the snow-party of Strath Lugas, and dates all her\nmisfortunes from that unhappy circumstance. On the fourth morning of\ntheir imprisonment the laird was presented with a letter from Charles\nMelville. In it he informed him that he dared not be absent longer, in\ncase of his regiment being ordered abroad, and that he had taken his\nchance and set off on his homeward way in spite of the snow. It ended\nwith thanks for all his kindness, and an affectionate farewell. When\nthis was announced to the party they expressed great regret at his\nabsence. It seemed to surprise them all. Mrs Carmichael was full of\nwonder on the occasion; but Miss Mowbray seemed totally unmoved by his\ndeparture. She was duller in spirits than before, and refused to dance;\nbut in other respects the mirth was as uproarious, and the dancing as\njoyous, as ever;\u2014and in a day the snow was sufficiently cleared away\u2014the\nparty by different conveyances broke up\u2014and the laird was left alone,\nafter a week of constant enjoyment.\n\n\nFour years after the events I have related, a young man presented\nhimself for the first time in the pump-room at Bath. The gossips of that\nbusy city formed many conjectures as to who and what he could be. Some\nthought him a foreigner, some a man of consequence _incog._; but all\nagreed that he was a soldier and an invalid. He seemed to be about\nsix-and-twenty, and was evidently a perfect stranger. After he had\nstayed in the room a short time, and listened to the music, he went out\ninto the street, and just as he made his exit by one door, the marvels\nof the old beldames who congregated under the orchestra were called into\nactivity by the entrance, through the other, of a young lady leaning on\nthe arm of an old one. Even so simple an incident as this is sufficient\nin a place like Bath to give rise to various rumours and conjectures.\nShe was tall, fair, and very beautiful, but she also seemed in bad\nhealth, and to be perfectly unknown. Such an event had not occurred at\nthe pump-room for ages before. Even the master of the ceremonies was at\nfault. \u201cAs near as he could guess, to the best of his conjecture, he\nbelieved he had never seen either the gentleman or the lady.\u201d\n\nWhile surmises of all kinds were going their rounds in this manner, the\ngentleman pursued his walk up Milsom Street. His pace was slow, and his\nstrength did not seem equal even to so gentle an exertion. He leant for\nsupport upon his walking-stick, and heard, mingled with many coughs, a\nvoice which he well knew, calling,\u2014\n\n\u201cChairlie\u2014Chairlie Melville, I say! pull, ye deil\u2019s buckie,\u2014ugh\u2014ugh!\u2014sic\na confounded conveyance for a Highland gentleman. Ah, Chairlie, lad,\u201d\nsaid our old acquaintance the laird, who had now got up to where his\nfriend was standing, \u201csad times for baith of us. Here am I sent here wi\u2019\na cough that wad shake a kirk, ugh\u2014ugh.\u2014An\u2019 the gout in baith my\nfeet,\u2014to be hurled about in a chair that gangs upon wheels,\u2014ugh\u2014ugh,\u2014by\na lazy English vagabond that winna understand a word that I say till\nhim.\u2014An\u2019 you,\u201d and here the old man looked up in the young soldier\u2019s\nface\u2014\u201cOh, Chairlie, Chairlie! is this what the wars hae brocht ye\nto?\u2014ugh\u2014ugh\u2014yer verra mither wadna ken ye,\u2014but come awa,\u2014come awa to my\nlodgings in Pultney Street, and tell us a\u2019 about what ye\u2019ve been\ndoin\u2019,\u2014ugh\u2014ugh,\u2014my fit, my fit,\u2014pu\u2019 awa\u2019, ye ne\u2019er-do-weel; turn about,\nand be hanged till ye,\u2014do ye no ken the road to Pultney Street yet? Come\nawa, Chairlie, my man, dinna hurry.\u201d And thus mingling his commands to\nhis chairman, with complaints of the gout to his friend, the laird led\nthe way to his lodgings.\n\nCharlie\u2019s story was soon told. He had shared in all the dangers and\ntriumphs of the last three years of the war. He had been severely\nwounded at Waterloo, and had come to Bath with a debilitated frame and a\nmajor\u2019s commission. But though he spoke of past transactions as gaily as\nhe could, the quick eyes of the laird perceived there was some \u201csecret\nsorrow\u201d which weighed down his spirits.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 did ye meet with nae love adventure in your travels? For ye maunna\ntell me a bit wound in the shouther would mak ye sae doun-hearted as ye\nare. Is there nae Spanish or French lassie that gies ye a sair heart?\nTell it a\u2019 to me, an\u2019 if I can be of ony use in bringin\u2019 it about, ye\nmay depend I\u2019ll do all in my power to help ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d replied Charles, smiling at the continued match-making\npropensities of his friend; \u201cI shall scarcely require your services on\nthat score. I never saw Frenchwoman or Spaniard that cost me a single\nsigh.\u201d And here, as if by the force of the word itself, the young man\nsighed.\n\n\u201cWeel, it must be some English or Scotch lassie then; for it\u2019s easy to\nbe seen that somebody costs ye a sigh. I ance thocht you were in a fair\nway o\u2019 winnin\u2019 yon bonny cratur ye saved frae the spate o\u2019 the Lugas;\nbut ye gaed awa in such a hurry the plant hadna time to tak root.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe was too rich for the poor penniless subaltern to look to,\u201d replied\nthe young man, a deep glow coming over his face.\n\n\u201cHavers! havers! She wad hae given a\u2019 her lands yon night for a foot o\u2019\ndry grund. An\u2019 as ye won her, ye had the best right to wear her. And I\u2019m\nmuckle mista\u2019en if the lassie didna think sae hersel.\u201d\n\n\u201cMiss Mowbray must have overrated my services; but at all events I had\nno right to take advantage of that fortunate accident to better my\nfortunes, by presuming on her feelings of gratitude to her preserver.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat for no? what for no?\u201d cried the laird; \u201cye should hae married her\non the spot. There were eight couples sprang frae the snaw-meeting\u2014ye\nshould hae made the ninth, and then ye needna hae had a ball put through\nyour shouther, nor ever moved frae the braw holmes o\u2019 Surrey. \u2019Od, I\nwish it had been me that took her out o\u2019 the water; that is, if I had\nbeen as young as you, and Providence had afflicted me with the loss o\u2019\nMrs Kirkton.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf I had been on a level with her as to fortune\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cWeel, but noo yer brither\u2019s dead, ye\u2019re heir o\u2019 the auld house, an\u2019\nye\u2019re a major\u2014what\u2019s to forbid the banns noo?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have never heard of Miss Mowbray from that hour to this. In all\nprobability she is married to some lucky fellow\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cShe wasna married when I saw Mrs Carmichael four months since; she was\nin what leddies call delicate health though; she had aye been melancholy\nsince the time of the water business. Mrs Carmichael thought ye were a\ngreat fule for rinnin\u2019 awa.\u201d\n\n\u201cMrs Carmichael is very kind.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed is she,\u201d replied the laird, \u201cas kind-hearted a woman as ever\nlived. She\u2019s maybe a thocht ower auld, or I dinna doubt she wad be very\nhappy to marry you hersel.\u201d\n\n\u201cI hope her gratitude would not carry her to such an alarming length,\u201d\nsaid Charles, laughing. \u201cIt would make young men rather tender of saving\nladies\u2019 lives.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf I knew where she was just now, I wad soon put everything to rights.\nIt\u2019s no ower late yet, though ye maun get fatter before the marriage\u2014ye\nwad be mair like a skeleton than a bridegroom. But, save us! what\u2019s the\nmatter wi\u2019 ye? are ye no weel? headache? gout? what is\u2019t, man? Confound\nmy legs, I canna stir. Sit down, and rest ye.\u201d\n\nBut Charles, with his eyes intently fixed on some object in the street,\ngazed as if some horrible apparition had met his sight. Alternately\nflushed and pale, he continued as if entranced, and then, deeply\nsighing, sunk senseless on the floor.\n\n\u201cRory, Rory!\u201d screamed the laird\u2014\u201cugh, ugh! oh, that I could get at the\nbell! Cheer up, Chairlie. Fire! fire! ugh, ugh!\u2014the lad will be dead\nbefore a soul comes near him. Rory, Rory!\u201d\n\nAnd luckily the ancient henchman, Rory MacTaggart, made his appearance\nin time to save his master from choking through fear and surprise.\nCharlie was soon recovered, and, when left again alone with the laird,\nhe said\u2014\n\n\u201cAs I hope to live, I saw her from this very window, just as we were\nspeaking of her. Even her face I saw! Oh, so changed and pale! But her\nwalk\u2014no _two_ can have such a graceful carriage!\u201d\n\n\u201cSeen wha?\u201d said the laird. \u201cMrs Carmichael? For it was her we were\nspeaking o\u2019\u2014ay, she\u2019s sair changed; and her walk is weel kent; only I\nthocht she was a wee stiffer frae the rheumatism last year. But whaur is\nshe?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt was Miss Mowbray I saw. She went into that house opposite.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat! the house wi\u2019 the brass knocker, green door\u2014the verandah with the\nflower-pots, an\u2019 twa dead geraniums?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen just ring the bell, and tell that English cratur to pu\u2019 me in the\nwee whirligig across the street.\u201d\n\n\u201cImpossible, my dear laird! recollect your gout.\u201d\n\n\u201cDeil hae the gout and the cough too! Order the chair; I\u2019ll see if it\u2019s\nher in five minutes.\u201d\n\nAnd away, in spite of all objections and remonstrances, went the laird\nto pay his visit. Now, if any one should doubt of the success of his\nnegotiations, I\u2014the writer of this story\u2014Charles Melville, late major,\n\u2014th regiment, shall be happy to convince him of it, if he will drop in\non me any day at Mowbray Hall, by my own evidence, and also that of my\nhappy and still beautiful Madeline, though she is the mother of three\nrosy children, who at this moment are making such an intolerable noise\nthat I cannot understand a sentence I am writing. I may just mention,\nthat the laird attended the wedding, and that his cough entirely left\nhim. He does not suffer an attack of the gout more than once a year. He\nhas adopted my second boy, and every autumn we spend three months with\nhim at Strath Lugas. Oh, that all match-makers were as innocent and\ndisinterested as jolly old Simon Kirkton!\u2014_Blackwood\u2019s Magazine._\n\n\n\n\n EZRA PEDEN.\n\n BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.\n\n\n I sat and watched while all men slept, and lo!\n Between the green earth and the deep green sea\n I saw bright spirits pass, pure as the touch\n Of May\u2019s first finger on the eastern hill.\n Behind them followed fast a little cloud;\n And from the cloud an evil spirit came\u2014\n A damn\u00e8d shape\u2014one who in the dark pit\n Held sovereign sway; and power to him was given\n To chase the bless\u00e8d spirits from the earth,\n And rule it for a season.\n Soon he shed\n His hellish slough, and many a subtle wile\n Was his to seem a heavenly spirit to man.\n First he a hermit, sore subdued in flesh,\n O\u2019er a cold cruse of water and a crust,\n Poured out meek prayers abundant. Then he changed\n Into a maid when she first dreams of man,\n And from beneath two silken eyelids sent\n The sidelong light of two such wondrous eyes,\n That all the saints grew sinners. He subdued\n Those wanton smiles, and grew a reverend dame,\n With wintry ringlets, and grave lips, which dropt\n Proverbial honey in her grandson\u2019s ear.\n Then a professor of God\u2019s Word he seemed,\n And o\u2019er a multitude of upturned eyes\n Showered blessed dews, and made the pitchy path,\n Down which howl damn\u00e8d spirits, seem the bright\n Thrice-hallowed way to heaven. Yet grimly through\n The glorious veil of those seducing shapes\n Frowned out the fearful spirit.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nThe religious legend which supplies my story with the motto, affords me\nno further assistance in arranging and interpreting the various\ntraditional remembrances of the colloquies between one of the chiefs of\nthe ancient Presbyterian Kirk and one of the inferior spirits of\ndarkness. It is seldom that tradition requires any illustration; its\nvoice is clear, and its language simple. It seeks to conceal nothing;\nwhat it can explain it explains, and scorns, in the homely accuracy of\nits protracted details, all mystery and reservation. But in the present\nstory, there is much which the popular spirit of research would dread to\nhave revealed;\u2014a something too mystical and hallowed to be sought into\nby a devout people. Often as I have listened to it, I never heard it\nrepeated without mutual awe in the teller and the auditor. The most\nintrepid peasant becomes graver and graver as he proceeds, stops before\nthe natural termination of the story, and hesitates to pry into the\nsupernatural darkness of the tradition. It would be unwise, therefore,\nto seek to expound or embellish the legend,\u2014it shall be told as it was\ntold to me; I am but as a humble priest responding from the traditionary\noracles, and the words of other years pass without change from between\nmy lips.\n\nEzra Peden was one of the shepherds of the early Presbyterian flock, and\ndistinguished himself as an austere and enthusiastic pastor; fearless in\nhis ministration, delighting in wholesome discipline, and guiding in the\nway of grace the peer as well as the peasant. He grappled boldly with\nthe infirmities and sins of the times; he spared not the rod in the way\nof his ministry; and if in the time of peril he laid his hand on the\nsword, in the time of peace his delight was to place it on the horns of\nthe altar. He spared no vice, he compounded with no sin, and he\ndiscussed men\u2019s claims to immortal happiness with a freedom which made\nthem tremble. Amid the fervour of his eloquence, he aspired, like some\nof his fellow-professors of that period, to the prophetic mantle. Plain\nand simple in his own apparel, he counted the mitred glory and exterior\nmagnificence of the hierarchy a sin and an abomination, and preferred\npreaching on a wild hill, or in a lonesome glen, to the most splendid\nedifice.\n\nWherever he sojourned, dance and song fled;\u2014the former he accounted a\ndevoting of limbs which God made to the worship of Satan; the latter he\nbelieved to be a sinful meting out of wanton words to a heathen measure.\nSatan, he said, leaped and danced, and warbled and sung, when he came to\nwoo to perdition the giddy sons and daughters of men. He dictated the\ncolour and the cut of men\u2019s clothes\u2014it was seemly for those who sought\nsalvation to seek it in a sober suit; and the ladies of his parish were\nobliged to humble their finery, and sober down their pride, before his\nsarcastic sermons on female paintings, and plumings, and perfumings, and\nthe unloveliness of love-locks. He sought to make a modest and sedate\ngrace abound among women; courtship was schooled and sermoned into\nchurch controversy, and love into mystical professions; the common\ncivilities between the sexes were doled out with a suspicious hand and a\njealous charity, and the primrose path through the groves of dalliance\nto the sober vale of marriage was planted with thorns and sown with\nbriars.\n\nHe had other endowments not uncommon among the primitive teachers of the\nWord. In his day, the empire of the prince of darkness was more manifest\namong men than now, and his ministry was distinguished, like the reign\nof King Saul, by the persecution of witches, and elves, and evil\nspirits. He made himself the terror of all those who dealt in\ndivinations, or consulted the stars, or sought to avert witchcraft by\nsinful spell and charm, instead of overcoming it by sorrowings and\nspiritual watchings. The midnight times of planetary power he held as\nthe prime moments of Satan\u2019s glory on earth, and he punished Hallowmas\nrevellers as chief priests in the infernal rites. He consigned to church\ncensure and the chastening of rods a wrinkled dame who sold a full sea\nand a fair wind to mariners, and who insulted the apostles, and made a\nmystical appeal to the twelve signs of heaven in setting a brood goose\nwith a dozen eggs. His wrath, too, was observed to turn against all\nthose who compounded with witches, and people who carried evil influence\nin their eyes\u2014this was giving tribute to the fiend, and bribing the\nbottomless pit.\n\nHe rebuked the venerable dame, during three successive Sundays, for\nplacing a cream bowl and new-baked cake in the paths of the nocturnal\nelves who, she imagined, had plotted to steal her grandson from the\nmother\u2019s bosom. He turned loose many Scripture threatenings against\nthose diminutive and capricious beings, the fairies, and sought to\npreach them from the land. He prayed on every green hill, and held\ncommunings in every green valley. He wandered forth at night, as a\nspiritual champion, to give battle to the enemies of the light. The\nfairies resigned the contest with a foe equipped from such an armoury,\nand came no more among the sons and daughters of men. The sound of their\nminstrelsy ceased on the hill; their equestrian processions were seen no\nmore sweeping past at midnight beneath the beam of the half-filled moon;\nand only a solitary and sullen elf or two remained to lament the loss of\ntheir immemorial haunts. With the spirits of evil men and the lesser\nangels of darkness he waged a fierce and dubious war; he evoked an\nancient ghost from a ruined tower, which it had shared for generations\nwith the owl; and he laid or tranquillized a fierce and troubled spirit\nwhich had haunted the abode of a miser in a neighbouring churchyard, and\nseemed to gibber and mumble over his bones. All these places were\npurified by prayer, and hallowed by the blessing of the gifted pastor\nEzra Peden.\n\nThe place of his ministry seemed fitted by nature, and largely endowed\nby history, for the reception and entertainment of all singular and\npersonified beliefs. Part was maritime, and part mountainous, uniting\nthe a\u00ebrial creeds of the shepherds with the stern and more imposing\nbeliefs of the husbandman, and the wild and characteristic superstitions\nof the sailors. It often happened, when he had marched against and\nvanquished a sin or a superstition of native growth, he was summoned to\nwage war with a new foe; to contend with a legion of errors, and a\nstrange race of spirits from the haunted coasts of Norway or Sweden. All\naround him on every side were records of the mouldering influence of the\nenemies of faith and charity. On the hill where the heathen Odin had\nappeared to his worshippers in the circle of granite, the pillars of his\nRunic temple promised to be immortal; but the god was gone, and his\nworship was extinct. The sword, the spear, and the banner, had found\nsanctuary from fields of blood on several lofty promontories; but\nshattered towers and dismantled castles told that for a time hatred,\noppression, and revenge had ceased to triumph over religion. Persecution\nwas now past and gone, a demon exorcised by the sword had hallowed three\nwild hills and sanctified two little green valleys with the blood of\nmartyrs. Their gravestones, bedded among heather or long grass, cried up\nto heaven against their oppressors in verses which could not surely fail\nto elude the punishment awarded by the Kirk against poesy. Storms, and\nquicksands, and unskilful mariners, or, as common belief said, the evil\nspirits of the deep, had given to the dangerous coast the wrecks of\nthree stately vessels; and there they made their mansions, and raised\nwhirlwinds, and spread quicksands, and made sandbanks, with a wicked\ndiligence, which neither prayer nor preaching could abate. The forms\nunder which these restless spirits performed their pranks have\nunfortunately been left undefined by a curious and poetical peasantry.\n\nIt happened one winter, during the fifteenth year of the ministry of\nEzra Peden, and in the year of grace 1705, that he sat by his fire\npondering deep among the treasures of the ancient Presbyterian worthies,\nand listening occasionally to the chafing of the coming tide against\ncliff and bank, and the fitful sweep of heavy gusts of wind over the\nroof of his manor. During the day he had seemed more thoughtful than\nusual; he had consulted Scripture with an anxious care, and fortified\nhis own interpretation of the sacred text by the wisdom of some of the\nchiefs and masters of the calling. A Bible, too, bound in black oak, and\nclasped with silver, from the page of which sin had received many a\nrebuke, and the abominations of witchcraft and sorcery had been cleansed\nfrom the land, was brought from its velvet sanctuary and placed beside\nhim. Thus armed and prepared, he sat like a watcher of old on the towers\nof Judah; like one who girds up his loins and makes bare his right arm\nfor some fierce and dubious contest.\n\nAll this stir and preparation passed not unnoticed of an old man, his\npredecessor\u2019s coeval, and prime minister of the household; a person\nthin, religious, and faithful, whose gifts in prayer were reckoned by\nsome old people nearly equal to those of the anointed pastor. To such a\ndistinction Josiah never thought of aspiring; he contented himself with\nswelling the psalm into something like melody on Sunday; visiting the\nsick as a forerunner of his master\u2019s approach, and pouring forth prayers\nand graces at burials and banquetings, as long and dreary as a hill\nsermon. He looked on the minister as something superior to man; a being\npossessed by a divine spirit; and he shook his head with all its silver\nhairs, and uttered a gentle groan or two, during some of the more rapt\nand glowing passages of Ezra\u2019s sermons.\n\nThis faithful personage stood at the door of his master\u2019s chamber,\nunwilling to go in, and yet loath to depart. \u201cJosiah, thou art called,\nJosiah,\u201d said Ezra, in a grave tone, \u201cso come hither; the soul of an\nevil man, a worker of iniquity, is about to depart; one who drank the\nblood of saints, and made himself fat with the inheritance of the\nrighteous. It hath been revealed to me that his body is sorely troubled;\nbut I say unto you, he will not go from the body without the strong\ncompulsion of prayer, and therefore am I summoned to war with the enemy;\nso I shall arm me to the task.\u201d\n\nJosiah was tardy in speech, and before he could reply, the clatter of a\nhorse\u2019s hoofs was heard at the gate: the rider leapt down, and, splashed\nwith mire and sprinkled with sleet, he stood in an instant before the\nminister.\n\n\u201cAh, sir,\u201d said the unceremonious messenger, \u201chaste! snatch up the looms\nof redemption, and bide not the muttering of prayer, else auld Mahoun\nwill have his friend Bonshaw to his cauldron, body and soul, if he hasna\nhim half-way hame already. Godsake, sir, start and fly, for he cannot\nshoot over another hour! He talks of perdition, and speaks about a broad\nroad and a great fire, and friends who have travelled the way before\nhim. He\u2019s no his lane, however,\u2014that\u2019s one comfort; for I left him\nconversing with an old cronie, whom no one saw but himself\u2014one whose\nbones are ripe and rotten; and mickle they talked of a place called\nTophet,\u2014a hot enough region, if one can credit them; but I aye doubt the\naccounts of such travellers,\u2014they are like the spies of the land of\npromise\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cSilence thine irreverent tongue, and think of thy latter end with fear\nand trembling,\u201d said Ezra, in a stern voice. \u201cMount thy horse, and\nfollow me to the evil man, thy master; brief is the time, and black is\nthe account, and stern and inexorable will the summoning angel be.\u201d\n\nAnd leaping on their horses, they passed from the manse, and sought out\nthe bank of a little busy stream, which, augmented by a fall of sleet,\nlifted up a voice amid its rocky and desolate glen equal to the clamour\nof a mightier brook. The glen or dell was rough with sharp and\nprojecting crags, which, hanging forward at times from opposite sides,\nseemed to shut out all further way; while from between their dark-gray\nmasses the rivulet leapt out in many divided streams. The brook again\ngathered together its waters, and subsided into several clear deep\npools, on which the moon, escaping for a moment from the edge of a cloud\nof snow, threw a cold and wavering gleam. Along the sweeps of the stream\na rough way, shaped more by nature than by the hand of man, winded among\nthe rocks; and along this path proceeded Ezra, pondering on the\nvicissitudes of human life.\n\nAt length he came where the glen expanded, and the sides became steep\nand woody; amid a grove of decaying trees, the mansion of Bonshaw rose,\nsquare and gray. Its walls of rough granite were high and massive; the\nroof, ascending steep and sharp, carried a covering of red sandstone\nflags; around the whole the rivulet poured its scanty waters in a deep\nmoat, while a low-browed door, guarded by loopholes, gave it the\ncharacter of a place of refuge and defence. Though decayed and war-worn\nnow, it had, in former times, been a fair and courtly spot. A sylvan\nnook or arbour, scooped out of the everlasting rock, was wreathed about\nwith honeysuckle; a little pool, with a margin studded with the earliest\nprimroses, lay at its entrance; and a garden, redeemed by the labour of\nman from the sterile upland, had its summer roses and its beds of\nlilies, all bearing token of some gentle and departed inhabitant.\n\nAs he approached the house, a candle glimmered in a small square window,\nand threw a line or two of straggling light along the path. At the foot\nof the decayed porch he observed the figure of a man kneeling, and\npresently he heard a voice chanting what sounded like a psalm or a\nlyke-wake hymn. Ezra alighted and approached,\u2014the form seemed insensible\nof his presence, but stretched his hands towards the tower; and while\nthe feathery snow descended on his gray hair, he poured his song forth\nin a slow and melancholy manner.\n\n\u201cI protest,\u201d said the messenger, \u201chere kneels old William Cameron, the\nCovenanter. Hearken, he pours out some odd old-world malison against\nBonshaw. I have heard that the laird hunted him long and sore in his\nyouth, slew his sons, burned his house, threw his two bonny daughters\ndesolate,\u2014that was nae gentle deed, however,\u2014and broke the old mother\u2019s\nheart with downright sorrow. Sae I canna much blame the dour auld carle\nfor remembering it even now, though the candles of Bonshaw are burning\nin the socket, and his light will soon be extinguished for ever. Let us\nhearken to his psalm or his song; it is no every night we have\nminstrelsy at Bonshaw gate, I can tell ye that.\u201d\n\nThe following are the verses, which have been preserved under the title\nof \u201cAne godly exultation of William Cameron, a chosen vessel, over\nBonshaw, the persecutor.\u201d I have adopted a plainer, but a less\ndescriptive title\u2014\n\n THE DOWNFALL OF DALZELL.\n\n I.\n\n The wind is cold, the snow falls fast,\n The night is dark and late,\n As I lift aloud my voice and cry\n By the oppressor\u2019s gate.\n There is a voice in every hill,\n A tongue in every stone;\n The greenwood sings a song of joy,\n Since thou art dead and gone;\n A poet\u2019s voice is in each mouth,\n And songs of triumph swell,\n Glad songs, that tell the gladsome earth\n The downfall of Dalzell.\n\n II.\n\n As I raised up my voice to sing,\n I heard the green earth say,\n Sweet am I now to beast and bird,\n Since thou art passed away:\n I hear no more the battle shout,\n The martyrs\u2019 dying moans;\n My cottages and cities sing\n From their foundation-stones;\n The carbine and the culverin\u2019s mute,\u2014\n The death-shot and the yell\n Are turned into a hymn of joy,\n For thy downfall, Dalzell\n\n III.\n\n I\u2019ve trod thy banner in the dust,\n And caused the raven call\n From thy bride-chamber to the owl\n Hatched on thy castle wall;\n I\u2019ve made thy minstrels\u2019 music dumb,\n And silent now to fame\n Art thou, save when the orphan casts\n His curses on thy name.\n Now thou may\u2019st say to good men\u2019s prayers\n A long and last farewell:\n There\u2019s hope for every sin save thine,\u2014\n Adieu, adieu, Dalzell!\n\n IV.\n\n The grim pit opes for thee her gates,\n Where punished spirits wail,\n And ghastly Death throws wide his door,\n And hails thee with a Hail.\n Deep from the grave there comes a voice,\n A voice with hollow tones,\n Such as a spirit\u2019s tongue would have\n That spoke through hollow bones:\u2014\n \u201cArise, ye martyred men, and shout\n From earth to howling hell;\n He comes, the persecutor comes!\n All hail to thee, Dalzell!\u201d\n\n V.\n\n O\u2019er an old battle-field there rushed\n A wind, and with a moan\n The severed limbs all rustling rose,\n Even fellow bone to bone.\n \u201cLo! there he goes,\u201d I heard them cry,\n \u201cLike babe in swathing band,\n Who shook the temples of the Lord,\n And passed them \u2019neath his brand.\n Cursed be the spot where he was born,\n There let the adders dwell,\n And from his father\u2019s hearthstone hiss:\n All hail to thee, Dalzell!\u201d\n\n VI.\n\n I saw thee growing like a tree,\u2014\n Thy green head touched the sky,\u2014\n But birds far from thy branches built,\n The wild deer passed thee by;\n No golden dew dropt on thy bough,\n Glad summer scorned to grace\n Thee with her flowers, nor shepherds wooed\n Beside thy dwelling-place;\n The axe has come and hewed thee down,\n Nor left one shoot to tell\n Where all thy stately glory grew:\n Adieu, adieu, Dalzell!\n\n VII.\n\n An ancient man stands by thy gate,\n His head like thine is gray;\n Gray with the woes of many years,\n Years fourscore and a day.\n Five brave and stately sons were his;\n Two daughters, sweet and rare;\n An old dame, dearer than them all,\n And lands both broad and fair;\u2014\n Two broke their hearts when two were slain,\n And three in battle fell,\u2014\n An old man\u2019s curse shall cling to thee,\u2014\n Adieu, adieu, Dalzell!\n\n VIII.\n\n And yet I sigh to think of thee,\n A warrior tried and true\n As ever spurred a steed, when thick\n The splintering lances flew.\n I saw thee in thy stirrups stand,\n And hew thy foes down fast,\n When Grierson fled, and Maxwell failed,\n And Gordon stood aghast;\n And Graeme, saved by thy sword, raged fierce\n As one redeemed from hell.\n I came to curse thee,\u2014and I weep:\n So go in peace, Dalzell!\n\nWhen this wild and unusual hymn concluded, the Cameronian arose and\ndeparted, and Ezra and his conductor entered the chamber of the dying\nman.\n\nHe found him stretched on a couch of state, more like a warrior cut in\nmarble than a breathing being. He had still a stern and martial look,\nand his tall and stalwart frame retained something of that ancient\nexterior beauty for which his youth was renowned. His helmet, spoiled by\ntime of its plumage, was placed on his head; a rusty corslet was on his\nbosom; in his arms, like a bride, lay his broad and famous sword; and as\nhe looked at it, the battles of his youth passed in array before him.\nArmour and arms hung grouped along the walls, and banners, covered with\nmany a quaint and devotional device, waved in their places as the\ndomestic closed the door on Ezra and the dying warrior in the chamber of\npresence.\n\nThe devout man stood and regarded his ancient parishioner with a meek\nand sorrowful look; but nothing visible or present employed Bonshaw\u2019s\nreflections or moved his spirit\u2014his thoughts had wandered back to\nearlier years, and to scenes of peril and blood. He imagined himself at\nthe head of his horsemen in the hottest period of the persecution,\nchasing the people from rock to rock, and from glen to cavern. His\nimagination had presented to his eye the destruction of the children of\nWilliam Cameron. He addressed their mother in a tone of ironical\nsupplication,\u2014\n\n\u201cWoman, where is thy devout husband, and thy five holy sons? Are they\nbusied in interminable prayers or everlasting sermons? Whisper it in my\near, woman,\u2014thou hast made that reservation doubtless in thy promise of\nconcealment. Come, else I will wrench the truth out of thee with these\ngentle catechists, the thumbscrew and the bootikin. Serving the Lord,\nsayest thou, woman? Why, that is rebelling against the king. Come, come,\na better answer, else I shall make thee a bride for a saint on a bloody\nbed of heather!\n\nHere he paused and waved his hand like a warrior at the head of armed\nmen, and thus he continued,\u2014\n\n\u201cCome, uncock thy carbine, and harm not the woman till she hear the good\ntidings. Sister saint, how many bairns have ye? I bless God, saith she,\nfive\u2014Reuben, Simon, Levi, Praisegod, and Patrick. A bonny generation,\nwoman. Here, soldier, remove the bandages from the faces of those two\nyoung men before ye shoot them. There stands Patrick, and that other is\nSimon;\u2014dost thou see the youngest of thy affections? The other three are\nin Sarah\u2019s bosom\u2014thyself shall go to Abraham\u2019s. The woman looks as if\nshe doubted me;\u2014here, toss to her those three heads\u2014often have they lain\nin her lap, and mickle have they prayed in their time. Out, thou\nsimpleton! canst thou not endure the sight of the heads of thine own\nfair-haired sons, the smell of powder, and the flash of a couple of\ncarbines?\u201d\n\nThe re-acting of that ancient tragedy seemed to exhaust for a little\nwhile the old persecutor. He next imagined himself receiving the secret\ninstructions of the Council.\n\n\u201cWhat, what, my lord, must all this pleasant work fall to me? A reeking\nhouse and a crowing cock shall be scarce things in Nithsdale. Weepings\nand wailings shall be rife\u2014the grief of mothers, and the moaning of\nfatherless babes. There shall be smoking ruins and roofless kirks, and\nprayers uttered in secret, and sermons preached at a venture and a\nhazard on the high and solitary places. Where is General Turner?\u2014Gone\nwhere the wine is good?\u2014And where is Grierson?\u2014Has he begun to talk of\nrepentance?\u2014Gordon thinks of the unquenchable fire which the martyred\nCameronian raved about; and gentle Graeme vows he will cut no more\nthroats unless they wear laced cravats. Awell, my lords; I am the king\u2019s\nservant, and not Christ\u2019s, and shall boune me to the task.\u201d\n\nHis fancy flew over a large extent of time, and what he uttered now may\nbe supposed to be addressed to some invisible monitor; he seemed not\naware of the presence of the minister.\n\n\u201cAuld, say you, and gray-headed, and the one foot in the grave; it is\ntime to repent, and spice and perfume over my rottenness, and prepare\nfor heaven? I\u2019ll tell ye, but ye must not speak on\u2019t\u2014I tried to pray\nlate yestreen\u2014I knelt down, and I held up my hands to heaven\u2014and what\nthink ye I beheld? a widow woman and her five fair sons standing between\nme and the Most High, and calling out, \u2018Woe, woe, on Bonshaw.\u2019 I threw\nmyself with my face to the earth, and what got I between my hands? A\ngravestone which covered five martyrs, and cried out against me for\nblood which I had wantonly shed. I heard voices from the dust whispering\naround me; and the angel which watched of old over the glory of my house\nhid his face with his hands, and I beheld the evil spirits arise with\npower to punish me for a season. I\u2019ll tell ye what I will do\u2014among the\nchildren of those I have slain shall my inheritance be divided; so sit\ndown, holy sir, and sit down, most learned man, and hearken to my\nbequest. To the children of three men slain on Irongray Moor\u2014to the\nchildren of two slain on Closeburn-hill\u2014to\u2014no, no, no, all that crowd,\nthat multitude, cannot be the descendants of those whom I doomed to\nperish by the rope, and the pistol, and the sword. Away, I say, ye\ncongregation of zealots and psalm-singers!\u2014disperse, I say, else I shall\ntrample ye down beneath my horse\u2019s hoofs! Peace, thou whiteheaded\nstirrer of sedition, else I shall cleave thee to the collar!\u2014wilt thou\npreach still?\u201d\n\nHere the departing persecutor uttered a wild imprecation, clenched his\nteeth, leaped to his feet, waved his sword, and stood for several\nmoments, his eyes flashing from them a fierce light, and his whole\nstrength gathered into a blow which he aimed at his imaginary adversary.\nBut he stiffened as he stood\u2014a brief shudder passed over his frame, and\nhe was dead before he fell on the floor, and made the hall re-echo.\n\nThe minister raised him in his arms\u2014a smile of military joy still\ndilated his stern face\u2014and his hand grasped the sword hilt so firmly\nthat it required some strength to wrench it from his hold. Sore, sore\nthe good pastor lamented that he had no death-bed communings with the\ndeparted chief, and he expressed this so frequently, that the peasantry\nsaid, on the day of his burial, that it would bring back his spirit to\nearth and vex mankind, and that Ezra would find him particularly\nuntractable and bold. Of these whisperings he took little heed, but he\nbecame somewhat more grave and austere than usual.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\nIt happened on an evening about the close of the following spring, when\nthe oat braird was flourishing, and the barley shot its sharp green\nspikes above the clod, carrying the dew on the third morning, that Ezra\nPeden was returning from a wedding at Buckletiller. When he left the\nbridal chamber it was about ten o\u2019clock. His presence had suppressed for\na time the natural ardour for dancing and mirth which characterises the\nScotch; but no sooner was he mounted, and the dilatory and departing\nclatter of his horse\u2019s hoofs heard, than musicians and musical\ninstruments appeared from their hiding-places. The floor was\ndisencumbered of the bridal dinner-tables, the maids bound up their long\nhair, and the hinds threw aside their mantles, and, taking their places\nand their partners, the restrained mirth broke out like a whirlwind. Old\nmen looked on with a sigh, and uttered a feeble and faint remonstrance,\nwhich they were not unwilling should be drowned in the abounding and\naugmenting merriment.\n\nThe pastor had reached the entrance of a little wild and seldom\nfrequented glen, along which a grassy and scarce visible road winded to\nan ancient burial-ground. Here the graceless and ungodly merriment first\nreached his ears, and made the woody hollow ring and resound. Horse and\nrider seemed possessed of the same spirit\u2014the former made a full halt\nwhen he heard the fiddle note, while the latter, uttering a very audible\ngroan, and laying the bridle on his horse\u2019s neck, pondered on the wisest\nand most effectual way of repressing this unseemly merriment\u2014of\ncleansing the parish of this ancient abomination. It was a beautiful\nnight; the unrisen moon had yet a full hour of travel before she could\nreach the tops of the eastern hills; the wind was mute, and no sound was\nabroad save the chafing of a small runnel, and the bridal mirth.\n\nWhile Ezra sat casting in his own mind a long and a dubious contest with\nthis growing and unseemly sin, something like the shadowy outline of a\nhorse and rider appeared in the path. The night was neither light nor\ndark, and the way, grassy and soft, lay broad and uninterrupted between\ntwo hazel and holly groves. As the pastor lifted up his eyes, he beheld\na dark rider reining up a dark horse side by side with his own, nor did\nhe seem to want any accoutrement necessary for ruling a fine and\nintractable steed. As he gazed, the figure became more distinct; it\nseemed a tall martial form, with a slouched hat and feather, and a dark\nand ample mantle, which was muffled up to his eyes. From the waist\ndownward all was indistinct, and horse and rider seemed to melt into one\ndark mass visible in the outline alone. Ezra was too troubled in spirit\nto court the intrusion of a stranger upon his meditations; he bent on\nhim a look particularly forbidding and stern, and having made up his\nmind to permit the demon of mirth and minstrelsy to triumph for the\npresent, rode slowly down the glen.\n\nBut side by side with Ezra, and step by step, even as shadow follows\nsubstance, moved the mute and intrusive stranger. The minister looked at\nhis companion, and stirred his steed onward; with corresponding speed\nmoved the other, till they came where the road branched off to a ruined\ncastle. Up this way, with the wish to avoid his new friend, Ezra turned\nhis horse; the other did the same. The former seemed suddenly to change\nhis mind, and returned to the path that led to the old burial-ground;\nthe latter was instantly at his side, his face still hidden in the folds\nof his mantle.\n\nNow, Ezra was stern and unaccommodating in kirk controversy, and the\nmeek and gentle spirit of religion, and a sense of spiritual interest,\nhad enough to do to appease and sober down a temper naturally bold, and\neven warlike. Exasperated at this intruding stranger, his natural\ntriumphed over his acquired spirit, and lifting his riding-stick, and\nstarting up in his stirrups, he aimed a blow equal to the unhorsing of\nany ordinary mortal. But the weapon met with no obstruction\u2014it seemed to\ndescend through air alone. The minister gazed with dread on this\ninvulnerable being; the stranger gazed on him; and both made a halt like\nmen preparing for mortal fray. Ezra, who felt his horse shuddering\nbeneath him, began to suspect that his companion pertained to a more\ndubious state of existence than his own, and his grim look and sable\nexterior induced him to rank him at once among those infamous and evil\nspirits which are sometimes permitted to trouble the earth, and to be a\ntorment to the worthy and the devout.\n\nHe muttered a brief and pithy prayer, and then said,\u2014\n\n\u201cEvil shape, who art thou, and wherefore comest thou unto me? If thou\ncomest for good, speak; if for my confusion and my harm, even do thine\nerrand; I shall not fly from thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cI come more for mine own good than for thy harm,\u201d responded the figure.\n\u201cFar have I ridden, and much have I endured, that I might visit thee and\nthis land again.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you suffer in the flesh, or are you tortured in the spirit?\u201d said\nthe pastor, desirous to know something certain of his unwelcome\ncompanion.\n\n\u201cIn both,\u201d replied the form. \u201cI have dwelt in the vale of fire, in the\nden of punishment, hollow, and vast, and dreadful; I have ridden through\nthe region of snow and the land of hail; I have swam through the liquid\nwilderness of burning lava,\u2014passed an illimitable sea, and all for the\nlove of one hour of this fair green earth, with its fresh airs and its\nnew-sprung corn.\u201d\n\nEzra looked on the figure with a steady and a penetrating eye. The\nstranger endured the scrutiny.\n\n\u201cI must know of a truth to whom and what I speak\u2014I must see you face to\nface. Thou mayest be the grand artificer of deceit come to practise upon\nmy immortal soul. Unmantle thee, I pray, that I may behold if thou art a\npoor and an afflicted spirit punished for a time, or that fierce and\nrestless fiend who bears the visible stamp of eternal reprobation.\u201d\n\n\u201cI may not withstand thy wish,\u201d muttered the form in a tone of\nmelancholy, and dropping his mantle, and turning round on the pastor,\nsaid, \u201cHast thou forgotten me?\u201d\n\n\u201cHow can I forget thee?\u201d said Ezra, receding as he spoke. \u201cThe stern and\nhaughty look of Bonshaw has been humbled indeed. Unhappy one, thou art\nsorely changed since I beheld thee on earth with the helmet-plume\nfanning thy hot and bloody brow as thy right hand smote down the blessed\nones of the earth! The Almighty doom\u2014the evil and the tormenting\nplace\u2014the vile companions\u2014have each in their turn done the work of\nretribution upon thee; thou art indeed more stern and more terrible, but\nthou art not changed beyond the knowledge of one whom thou hast hunted\nand hounded, and sought to slay utterly.\u201d\n\nThe shape or spirit of Bonshaw, dilated with anger, and in a quicker and\nfiercer tone, said\u2014\n\n\u201cBe charitable; flesh and blood, be charitable. Doom not to hell-fire\nand grim companions one whose sins thou canst not weigh but in the\nbalance of thine own prejudices. I tell thee, man of God, the\nuncharitableness of the sect to which thou pertainest has thronged the\nland of punishment as much as those who headed, and hanged, and stabbed,\nand shot, and tortured. I may be punished for a time, and not wholly\nreprobate.\u201d\n\n\u201cPunished in part, or doomed in whole, thou needs must be,\u201d answered the\npastor, who seemed now as much at his ease as if this singular colloquy\nhad happened with a neighbouring divine. \u201cA holy and a blessed spirit\nwould have appeared in a brighter shape. I like not thy dubious words,\nthou half-punished and half-pardoned spirit. Away, vanish! shall I speak\nthe sacred words which make the fiends howl, or wilt thou depart in\npeace?\u201d\n\n\u201cIn peace I come to thee,\u201d said the spirit, \u201cand in peace let me be\ngone. Hadst thou come sooner when I summoned thee, and not loitered away\nthe precious death-bed moments, hearkening the wild and fanciful song of\none whom I have deeply wronged, this journey might have been spared\u2014a\njourney of pain to me, and peril to thyself.\u201d\n\n\u201cPeril to me!\u201d said the pastor; \u201cbe it even as thou sayest. Shall I fly\nfor one cast down, over whose prostrate form the purging fire has\npassed? Wicked was thy course on earth\u2014many and full of evil were thy\ndays\u2014and now thou art loose again, thou fierce and persecuting spirit,\u2014a\nwoe, and a woe to poor Scotland!\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are loose who never were bound,\u201d answered the spirit of Bonshaw,\ndarkening in anger, and expanding in form, \u201cand that I could soon show\nthee. But, behold, I am not permitted;\u2014there is a watcher\u2014a holy one\ncome nigh prepared to resist and to smite. I shall do thee no harm, holy\nman\u2014I vow by the pains of punishment and the conscience-pang\u2014now the\nwatcher has departed.\u201d\n\n \u201cOf whom speakest thou?\u201d inquired Ezra. \u201cHave we ministering spirits\nwho guard the good from the plots of the wicked ones? Have we evil\nspirits who tempt and torment men, and teach the maidens ensnaring\nsongs, and lighten their feet and their heads for the wanton dance?\u201d\n\n\u201cStay, I pray thee,\u201d said the spirit; \u201cthere are spirits of evil men and\nof good men made perfect, who are permitted to visit the earth, and\npower is given them for a time to work their will with men. I beheld one\nof the latter even now, a bold one and a noble; but he sees I mean not\nto harm thee, so we shall not war together.\u201d\n\nAt this assurance of protection, the pastor inclined his shuddering\nsteed closer to his companion, and thus he proceeded:\u2014\n\n\u201cYou have said that my sect\u2014my meek and lowly, and broken, and long\npersecuted remnant\u2014have helped to people the profound hell; am I to\ncredit thy words?\u201d\n\n\u201cCredit them or not as thou wilt,\u201d said the spirit; \u201cwhoso spilleth\nblood by the sword, by the word, and by the pen, is there: the false\nwitness; the misinterpreter of the Gospel; the profane poet; the profane\nand presumptuous preacher; the slayer and the slain; the persecutor and\nthe persecuted; he who died at the stake, and he who piled the\nfaggot;\u2014all are there, enduring hard weird and penal fire for a time\nreckoned and days numbered. They are there whom thou wottest not of,\u201d\nsaid the confiding spirit, drawing near as he spoke, and whispering the\nnames of some of the worthies of the Kirk, and the noble, and the\nfar-descended.\n\n\u201cI well believe thee,\u201d said the pastor; \u201cbut I beseech thee to be more\nparticular in thy information: give me the names which some of the chief\nministers of woe in the nether world were known by in this. I shall hear\nof those who built cathedrals and strongholds, and filled thrones\nspiritual and temporal.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, that thou wilt,\u201d said the spirit, \u201cand the names of some of the\nmantled professors of God\u2019s humble Presbyterian Kirk also; those who\npreached a burning fire and a devouring hell to their dissenting\nbrethren, and who called out with a loud voice, \u2018Perdition to the sons\nand daughters of men; draw the sword; slay and smite utterly.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cThou art a false spirit assuredly,\u201d said the pastor; \u201cyet tell me one\nthing. Thy steed and thou seem to be as one, to move as one, and I\nobserved thee even now conversing with thy brute part; dost thou ride on\na punished spirit, and is there injustice in hell as well as on earth?\u201d\n\nThe spirit laughed.\n\n\u201cKnowest thou not this patient and obedient spirit on whom I ride?\u2014what\nwouldst thou say if I named a name renowned at the holy altar? the name\nof one who loosed the sword on the bodies of men, because they believed\nin a humble Saviour, and he believed in a lofty. I have bestrode that\nmitred personage before now; he is the hack to all the Presbyterians in\nthe pit, but he cannot be spared on a journey so distant as this.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo thou wilt not tell me the name of thy steed?\u201d said Ezra; \u201cwell, even\nas thou wilt.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay,\u201d said the spirit, \u201cI shall not deny so good a man so small a\nmatter. Knowest thou not George Johnstone, the captain of my troop,\u2014as\nbold a hand as ever bore a sword and used it among fanatics? We lived\ntogether in life, and in death we are not divided.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn persecution and in punishment, thou mightest have said, thou\nscoffing spirit,\u201d said the pastor. \u201cBut tell me, do men lord it in\nperdition as they did on earth; is there no retributive justice among\nthe condemned spirits?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have condescended on that already,\u201d said the spirit, \u201cand I will tell\nthee further: there is thy old acquaintance and mine, George Gordon;\npunished and condemned though he be, he is the scourge, and the whip,\nand the rod of fire to all those brave and valiant men who served those\nequitable and charitable princes, Charles Stewart, and James, his\nbrother.\u201d\n\n\u201cI suspect why those honourable cavaliers are tasting the cup of\npunishment,\u201d said the pastor; \u201cbut what crime has sedate and holy George\ndone that his lot is cast with the wicked?\u201d\n\n\u201cCanst thou not guess it, holy Ezra?\u201d answered the spirit. \u201cHis crime\nwas so contemptible and mean that I scorn to name it. Hast thou any\nfurther questions?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou spoke of Charles Stuart, and James, his brother,\u201d said the pastor;\n\u201cwhen sawest thou the princes for whom thou didst deluge thy country\nwith blood, and didst peril thine own soul?\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! thou cunning querist,\u201d said the spirit, with a laugh; \u201ccanst thou\nnot ask a plain question? Thou askest questions plain and pointed enough\nof the backsliding damsels of thy congregation\u2014why shouldst thou put thy\nsanctified tricks on me, a plain and straightforward spirit, as ever\nuttered response to the godly? Nevertheless, I will tell thee; I saw\nthem not an hour ago\u2014Charles saddled me my steed; wot ye who held my\nstirrup?\u2014even James, his brother. I asked them if they had any message\nto the devout people of their ancient kingdom of Scotland. The former\nlaughed, and bade me bring him the kirk repentance-stool for a throne.\nThe latter looked grave, and muttered over his fingers like a priest\ncounting his beads; and hell echoed far and wide with laughter at the\ntwo princes.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, ay!\u201d said the pastor; \u201cso I find you have mirth among you: have you\ndance and song also?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, truly,\u201d answered the spirit; \u201cwe have hymns and hallelujahs from\nthe lips of that holy and patriotic band who banished their native\nprinces, and sold their country to an alien; and the alien himself rules\nand reigns among them; and when they are weary with the work of praise,\ncertain inferior and officious spirits moisten their lips with cupfuls\nof a curious and cooling liquid, and then hymn and thanksgiving\nrecommence again.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh, thou dissembler,\u201d said the minister; \u201cand yet I see little cause\nwhy they should be redeemed, when so many lofty minds must wallow with\nthe sinful for a season. But, tell me; it is long since I heard of Claud\nHamilton,\u2014have you seen him among you? He was the friend and follower of\nthe alien\u2014a mocker of the mighty minds of his native land\u2014a scoffer of\nthat gifted and immortal spirit which pours the glory of Scotland to the\nuttermost ends of the earth\u2014tell me of him, I pray.\u201d\n\nLoud laughed the spirit, and replied in scorn\u2014\n\n\u201cWe take no note of things so mean and unworthy as he; he may be in some\nhole in perdition, for aught I know or care. But, stay; I will answer\nthee truly. He has not passed to our kingdom yet; he is condemned to the\npunishment of a long and useless life on earth; and even now you will\nfind him gnawing his flesh in agony to hear the name he has sought to\ncast down renowned over all the earth.\u201d\n\nThe spirit now seemed impatient to be gone; they had emerged from the\nglen; and vale and lea, brightened by the moon, and sown thick with\nevening dew, sparkled far and wide.\n\n\u201cIf thou wouldst question me farther,\u201d said the frank and communicative\nspirit of Bonshaw, \u201cand learn more of the dead, meet me in the old\nburial-ground an hour before moon-rise on Sunday night: tarry at home if\nthou wilt; but I have more to tell thee than thou knowest to ask about;\nand hair of thy head shall not be harmed.\u201d\n\nEven as he spoke the shape of horse and rider underwent a sudden\ntransformation\u2014the spirit sank into the shape of a steed, the steed rose\ninto the form of the rider, and wrapping his visionary mantle about him,\nand speaking to his unearthly horse, away he started, casting as he flew\na sudden and fiery glance on the astonished pastor, who muttered, as he\nconcluded a brief prayer,\u2014\n\n\u201cThere goes Captain George Johnstone, riding on his fierce old master!\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\n\nThe old burial-ground, the spirit\u2019s trysting-place, was a fair but a\nlonely spot. All around lay scenes renowned in tradition for blood, and\nbroil, and secret violence. The parish was formerly a land of warrior\u2019s\ntowers, and of houses for penance, and vigil, and mortification. But the\nReformation came, and sacked and crushed down the houses of devotion;\nwhile the peace between the two kingdoms curbed the courage, and\nextinguished for ever the military and predatory glory of those old\nGalwegian chieftains. It was in a burial-ground pertaining to one of\nthose ancient churches, and where the peasants still loved to have their\ndust laid, that Ezra trusted to meet again the shadowy representative of\nthe fierce old Laird of Bonshaw.\n\nThe moon, he computed, had a full hour to travel before her beams would\nbe shed on the place of conference, and to that eerie and deserted spot\nEzra was observed to walk like one consecrating an evening hour to\nsolitary musing on the rivulet side. No house stood within half a mile;\nand when he reached the little knoll on which the chapel formerly stood,\nhe sat down on the summit to ponder over the way to manage this singular\nconference. A firm spirit, and a pure heart, he hoped, would confound\nand keep at bay the enemy of man\u2019s salvation; and he summed up, in a\nshort historical way, the names of those who had met and triumphed over\nthe machinations of fiends. Thus strengthened and reassured, he rose and\nlooked around, but he saw no approaching shape. The road along which he\nexpected the steed and rider to come was empty; and he walked towards\nthe broken gate, to cast himself in the way, and show with what\nconfidence he abode his coming.\n\nOver the wall of the churchyard, repaired with broken and carved stones\nfrom the tombs and altar of the chapel, he now looked, and it was with\nsurprise that he saw a new made widow kneeling over her husband\u2019s grave,\nand about to pour out her spirit in lamentation and sorrow. He knew her\nform and face, and the deepest sorrow came upon him. She was the\ndaughter of an old and a faithful elder: she had married a seafaring\nyouth, and borne him one fair child. Her husband was returning from a\ndistant voyage; had entered the sea of Solway; his native hills\u2014his own\nhome\u2014rose to his view, and he saw the light streaming from the little\nchamber window, where his wife and his sweet child sat awaiting his\nreturn. But it was not written that they were to meet again in life. She\nheard the sweep of a whirlwind, and she heard a shriek, and going to her\nchamber-door, she saw the ship sinking, and her husband struggling in\nthe agitated water. It is needless to lengthen a sorrowful story: she\nnow threw herself weeping over his grave, and poured out the following\nwail:\u2014\n\n\u201cHe was the fairest among men, yet the sea swept him away: he was the\nkindest hearted, yet he was not to remain. What were all other men\ncompared to him,\u2014his long curling hair, and his sweet hazel eyes, and\nhis kind and gladsome tongue? He loved me long, and he won me from many\nrivals; for who could see his face, and not love him? who could listen\nto his speech, and refuse him aught? When he danced, maids stood round,\nand thought his feet made richer music than the instruments. When he\nsang, the maids and matrons blessed him; and high-born dames loved the\nsong of my frank and gentle sailor. But there is no mercy in the ocean\nfor the sons of men; and there is nought but sorrow for their daughters.\nMen go gray-headed to the grave, who, had they trusted the unstable\ndeeps, would have perished in their prime, and left fatherless babes,\nand sorrowing widows. Alas, alas! in lonely night, on this eerie spot,\non thy low and early grave, I pour forth my heart! Who now shall speak\npeace to my mind, and open the latch of my little lonely home with thy\nkind and anxious hand? Who now shall dandle my sweet babe on his knee,\nor love to go with me to kirk and to preaching,\u2014to talk over our old\ntales of love and courtship,\u2014of the secret tryst and the bridal joy!\u201d\n\nAnd, concluding her melancholy chant, she looked sorrowfully and\nsteadfastly at the grave, and recommenced anew her wailing and her\ntears.\n\nThe widow\u2019s grief endured so long that the moon began to make her\napproach manifest by shooting up a long and a broad stream of thin,\nlucid, and trembling light over the eastern ridge of the Cumberland\nhills. She rose from her knees, shed back her moist and disordered\nlocks, showing a face pale but lovely, while the watery light of two\nlarge dark eyes, of liquid and roving blue, was cast mournfully on the\nway homewards, down which she now turned her steps to be gone. Of what\npassed in the pastor\u2019s mind at this moment, tradition, which sometimes\nmocks, and at other times deifies, the feelings of men, gives a very\nunsatisfactory account. He saw the hour of appointment with his shadowy\nmessenger from the other world arrive and pass without his appearance;\nand he was perhaps persuaded that the pure, and pious, and overflowing\ngrief of the fair young widow had prevented the intrusion of a form so\nungracious and unholy. As she advanced from the burial-ground, the\npastor of her parish stood mute and sorrowful before her. She passed him\nas one not wishing to be noticed, and glided along the path with a slow\nstep and a downcast eye.\n\nShe had reached the side of a little lonely stream, which glided half\nseen, half hid, underneath its banks of broom and honeysuckle, sprinkled\nat that hour with wild daisies, and spotted with primroses\u2014when the\nvoice of Ezra reached her ears. She made a full stop, like one who hears\nsomething astounding, and turned round on the servant of the altar a\nface radiant with tears, to which her tale of woe, and the wild and\nlonely place, added an interest and a beauty.\n\n\u201cYoung woman,\u201d he began, \u201cit is unseemly in thee to bewail thy loss at\nthis lonely hour, and in this dreary spot: the youth was given to thee,\nand ye became vain. I remarked the pride of thy looks, and the gaudiness\nof thine apparel, even in the house of holiness; he is taken from thee,\nperhaps, to punish thy pride. There is less meekness in thy sorrow than\nthere was reason in thy joy; but be ye not discomforted.\u201d\n\nHere the weeping lady turned the sidelong glance of her swimming eyes on\nEzra, shed back the locks which usurped a white brow and snowy temples,\nand folding her hands over a bosom, the throbbings of which made the\ncambric that concealed it undulate like water, stood still, and drank in\nhis words of comfort and condolence.\n\nTradition always conducts Ezra and the mariner\u2019s widow to this seldom\nfrequented place. A hundred and a hundred times have I mused over the\nscene in sunlight and moonlight; a hundred and a hundred times have I\nhearkened to the wild and variable accounts of the peasantry, and sought\nto make bank, and bush, and stream, and tree assist in unravelling the\nmystery which must still hang over the singular and tragic catastrophe.\nStanding in this romantic place, a pious man, not over-stricken in\nyears, conversing with a rosy young widow, a vain and a fair creature, a\nbank of blossomed flowers beside them, and the new risen moon scattering\nher slant and ineffectual beams on the thick budded branches above\nthem,\u2014such is the picture which tradition invariably draws, while\nimagination endeavours to take up the tender thread of the story, and\nimagination must have this licence still. Truth contents herself with\nthe summary of a few and unsatisfactory particulars. The dawn of morning\ncame, says Truth, and Ezra had not returned to his manse. Something evil\nhath happened, said Imagination, scattering as she spoke a thousand\ntales of a thousand hues, many of which still find credence among the\npious people of Galloway.\n\nJosiah, the old and faithful servant of Ezra, arrived in search of his\nmaster at the lonely burial-ground, about the dawn of the morning. He\nhad become alarmed at his long absence, and his alarm was not abated by\nthe unholy voices which at midnight sailed round the manse and kirk,\nsinging, as he imagined, a wild and infernal hymn of joy and\nthanksgiving. He traced his steps down the footpath by the rivulet side\ntill he came to the little primrose bank, and found it trodden upon and\npressed as if two persons had been seated among the flowers. Here all\nfurther traces ceased, and Josiah stood pondering on the power of evil\nspirits, and the danger of holding tryst with Beelzebub or any of the\nlesser spirits of darkness.\n\nHe was soon joined by an old shepherd, who told a tale which pious men\nrefuse to believe, though they always listen to it. The bright moonlight\nhad made him imagine it was morning, and he arose and walked forth to\nlook at his lambs on the distant hill\u2014the moon had been up for nearly an\nhour. His way lay near the little lonely primrose bank, and as he walked\nalong he heard the whispering of tongues: he deemed it some idle piece\nof lovemaking, and he approached to see who they might be. He saw what\nought not to be seen, even the reverend Ezra seated on the bank, and\nconversing with a buxom young dame and a strange one. They were talking\nwondrous kindly. He observed them for a little space; the young dame was\nin widow\u2019s weeds; the mariner\u2019s widow wore the only weeds, praise be\nblest, in the parish, but she was a raven to a swan compared to the\nquean who conversed with the minister. She was indeed passing fair, and\nthe longer he looked on her she became the lovelier\u2014ower lovely for mere\nflesh and blood. His dog shrunk back and whimpered, and an owl that\nchased a bird in the grove uttered a scream of terror as it beheld her,\nand forsook its prey. At length she turned the light of her eyes on\nhimself; Will-o\u2019-the-wisp was but a proverb to them; they had a glance\nhe should never get the better of, and he hardly thought his legs\ncarried him home, he flew with such supernatural speed.\n\n\u201cBut, indeed,\u201d added the cautious peasant, \u201cI have some doubts that the\nwhole was a fiction of the auld enemy, to make me think ill of the douce\nman and the godly; and if he be spared to come home, so I shall tell\nhim. But if Ezra, pious man, is heard of nae mair, I shall be free to\nbelieve that what I heard I heard, and what I saw I saw. And Josiah,\nman, I may as weel give you the benefit of my own opinion. I\u2019ll amaist\naver on my Bible, that the minister, a daring man and a courageous,\u2014ower\ncourageous, I doubt,\u2014has been dared out to the lonely place by some he,\nor, maybe, she-fiend\u2014the latter maist likely; and there he has been\novercome by might or temptation, and now Satan may come atween the\nstilts of the gospel plough, for the right hand of Ezra will hold it no\nlonger; or I shouldna wonder,\u201d added the shepherd, \u201cbut that the old\ndour persecutor Bonshaw has carried him away on his fiend-steed Geordie\nJohnstone; conscience! nought mair likely; and I\u2019ll warrant even now\nthey are ducking him in the dub of perdition, or picking his banes ahint\nthe hallan o\u2019 hell.\u201d\n\nThe whole of this rustic prediction was not fulfilled. In a little deep\nwild dell, at the distance of a gunshot, they found Ezra Peden lying on\nthe ground, uttering words which will be pardoned, since they were the\nwords of a delirious tongue. He was carried home amid the sympathy and\nsorrow of his parishioners; he answered no question, nor seemed to\nobserve a single face, though the face of many a friend stood round him.\nHe only raved out words of tenderness and affection, addressed to some\nimaginary person at his side; and concluded by starting up, and raising\nsuch an outcry of horror and amazement, as if the object of his regard\nhad become a demon: seven strong men could hardly hold him. He died on\nthe third day, after making a brief disclosure, which may be readily\ndivined from this hasty and imperfect narrative.\n\n\n\n\n YOUNG RONALD OF MORAR:\n _A TRADITIONARY TALE OF THE WESTERN HIGHLANDS_.\n\n\nAngus Macdonald, a son of Clanranald, having quarrelled with his\nneighbour and namesake, the Laird of Morar, he made an irruption into\nthat district, at the head of a select portion of his followers. One of\nhis men was celebrated for his dexterity as a marksman; and on their\nmarch he gave a proof of this, by striking the head off the _canna_, or\nmoss cotton, with an arrow. This plant is common on mossy ground in the\nHighlands; it is as white as the driven snow, and not half the size of\nthe lily.\n\nHaving got possession of the cattle, Angus was driving away the\n_spreith_ to his own country; but Dugald of Morar pursued him with a few\nservants who happened to be at hand; and, being esteemed a man of great\nbravery, Angus had no wish to encounter him. He ordered the marksman to\nshoot him with an arrow; but the poor fellow, being unwilling to injure\nDugald, aimed high, and overshot him. Angus observed this, and expressed\nhis surprise that a man who could hit the _canna_ yesterday, could not\nhit Dugald\u2019s broad forehead that day; and drawing his sword, swore that\nhe would cleave the marksman\u2019s head should he miss him again. John then\nreluctantly drew his bow, and Dugald fell to rise no more.\n\nAngus got into his hands the only son of the dreaded Morar, then very\nyoung; and the treatment which the unfortunate boy received was\ncalculated to injure his health and shorten his life. A poor girl, who\nattended the calves, had pity on him, and at last contrived to carry him\naway, wrapped up in a large fleece of wool. Having escaped from her\npursuers, she made her way to the house of Cameron of Lochiel. Here she\nand the boy were most hospitably received; and, according to the custom\nof the country in those days, they passed a year and a day without being\nasked any question. At the end of that period, Lochiel made inquiry\nregarding the boy, and the girl candidly told him her story. He thus\ndiscovered that the boy was the son of his own wife\u2019s sister; but he\nconcealed the whole from his lady, of whose secrecy he was not very\nconfident. But he treated young Ronald with great kindness. Lochiel had\na son much of the same age; the two boys frequently quarrelled, and the\nlady was angry to see her own son worsted. She at last swore that \u201cthe\ngirl and her vagabond must quit the house next morning.\u201d The generous\nLochiel set out with the boy to Inverness, where he boarded him under a\nfalse name, and placed the woman in the service of a friend in the\nneighbourhood, that she might have an eye to his condition.\n\nRonald received such education as befitted his birth; and when he grew\nup to manhood, he paid a visit to Lochiel, his kind benefactor, in\nLochaber, who was so much satisfied with him, that he determined on\ngiving him his powerful assistance in recovering his paternal estate,\nwhich was then in the possession of Angus.\n\nLochiel ordered a hundred men to attend himself and Ronald on this\noccasion; and they arrived in Morar on a Sunday, when the usurper and\nall his people were in church at mass. He congratulated the young man on\nthe opportunity he now had of avenging his father\u2019s blood, and\ndestroying all his enemies at once, by burning them in the church.\nRonald humanely objected, that though many of those persons then in the\nchurch were guilty of his father\u2019s death, yet there were others innocent\nof that crime; and he declared that if his estate could not be recovered\notherwise, he would rather want it, and trust to Providence and his own\nvalour. Lochiel did not at all relish such sentiments, and left Ronald\nto his fate.\n\nRonald took refuge in a cavern, and the daughter of Angus, his only\nchild, frequently passed that way, in looking after her father\u2019s fold.\nHe sometimes got into conversation with her; and, though but a child,\nshe became attached to him. He prevailed upon her to get his shirts\nwashed for him. Her father having accidentally discovered the linen\nbleaching, observed the initial letters of Ronald\u2019s name; and making\ninquiry into the circumstances, soon suspected that he was at hand. He\nattempted to persuade his daughter to decoy Ronald into his power; but\nshe told the young man all that her father proposed to her; and he,\nfinding that Angus was still thirsting for his blood, immediately left\nthe country, and took the girl along with him. With much difficulty he\nconveyed her in safety to Inverness, from whence he procured a passage\nto France, where he placed her in a convent. He entered the French army,\nand was much distinguished for his bravery; he was thus enabled to\nsupport himself, and to defray the expense of her education. When the\nyoung woman was of age, they were married, and returned to Scotland.\nRonald having obtained strong recommendations to the king, he found\nmeans of being reconciled to Angus, who was then old, and had become\nvery penitent. He made great professions of friendship and attachment to\nRonald; but his daughter was always doubtful of his sincerity, and it\nwould appear that she had justly appreciated his disposition. One night,\nRonald having feigned intoxication and retired to rest, the old\nbarbarian calculated that he would sleep very soundly, and slunk into\nhis apartment, armed with a dirk, to stab his son-in-law; but the young\nman watched the treacherous hypocrite, and put him to death. Ronald\nobtained possession of his paternal estate, and, after a long and\nprosperous life, became the founder of a very respectable family.\u2014_Lit.\nGazette._\n\n\n\n\n THE BROKEN RING.\n\n BY ONE OF THE AUTHORS OF THE \u201cODD VOLUME.\u201d\n\n\n\u201cHout, lassie,\u201d said the wily Dame Seton to her daughter, \u201cdinna blear\nyour een wi\u2019 greeting. What would honest Maister Binks say, if he were\nto come in the now, and see you looking baith dull and dour? Dight your\neen, my bairn, and snood back your hair\u2014I\u2019se warrant you\u2019ll mak a\nbonnier bride than ony o\u2019 your sisters.\u201d\n\n\u201cI carena whether I look bonny or no, since Willie winna see me,\u201d said\nMary, while her eyes filled with tears. \u201cOh, mother, ye have been ower\nhasty in this matter; I canna help thinking he will come hame yet, and\nmake me his wife. It\u2019s borne in on my mind that Willie is no dead.\u201d\n\n\u201cPut awa such thoughts out o\u2019 your head, lassie,\u201d answered her mother;\n\u201cnaebody doubts but yoursel that the ship that he sailed in was\nwhumelled ower in the saut sea\u2014what gars you threep he\u2019s leeving that\ngate?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe ken, mother,\u201d answered Mary, \u201cthat when Willie gaed awa on that\nwearifu\u2019 voyage, \u2018to mak the crown a pound,\u2019 as the auld sang says, he\nleft a kist o\u2019 his best claes for me to tak care o\u2019; for he said he\nwould keep a\u2019 his braws for a day that\u2019s no like to come, and that\u2019s our\nbridal. Now, ye ken it\u2019s said, that as lang as the moths keep aff folk\u2019s\nclaes, the owner o\u2019 them is no dead,\u2014so I e\u2019en took a look o\u2019 his bit\nthings the day, and there\u2019s no a broken thread among them.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe had little to do to be howking among a dead man\u2019s claes,\u201d said her\nmother; \u201cit was a bonny like job for a bride.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut I\u2019m no a bride,\u201d answered Mary, sobbing. \u201cHow can ye hae the heart\nto speak o\u2019t, mother, and the year no out since I broke a ring wi\u2019 my\nain Willie!\u2014Weel hae I keepit my half o\u2019t; and if Willie is in this\nworld, he\u2019ll hae the other as surely.\u201d\n\n\u201cI trust poor Willie is in a better place,\u201d said the mother, trying to\nsigh; \u201cand since it has been ordered sae, ye maun just settle your mind\nto take honest Maister Binks; he\u2019s rich, Mary, my dear bairn, and he\u2019ll\nlet ye want for naething.\u201d\n\n\u201cRiches canna buy true love,\u201d said Mary.\n\n\u201cBut they can buy things that will last a hantle longer,\u201d responded the\nwily mother; \u201cso, Mary, ye maun tak him, if you would hae me die in\npeace. Ye ken I can leave ye but little. The house and bit garden maun\ngang to your brother, and his wife will mak him keep a close\nhand;\u2014she\u2019ll soon let you see the cauld shouther. Poor relations are\nunco little thought o\u2019; so, lassie, as ye would deserve my benison,\ndinna keep simmering it and wintering it any longer, but take a gude\noffer when it\u2019s made ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll no hae him till the year is out,\u201d cried Mary. \u201cWha kens but the\nship may cast up yet?\u201d\n\n\u201cI fancy we\u2019ll hae to gie you your ain gate in this matter,\u201d replied the\ndame, \u201cmair especially as it wants but three weeks to the year, and\nwe\u2019ll need that to hae ye cried in the kirk, and to get a\u2019 your braws\nready.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, mother, mother, I wish ye would let me die!\u201d was Mary\u2019s answer, as\nshe flung herself down on her little bed.\n\nDelighted at having extorted Mary\u2019s consent to the marriage, Dame Seton\nquickly conveyed the happy intelligence to her son-in-law elect, a\nwealthy burgess of Dunbar; and having invited Annot Cameron, Mary\u2019s\ncousin, to visit them, and assist her in cheering the sorrowful bride,\nthe preparations for the marriage proceeded in due form.\n\nOn the day before that appointed for the wedding, as the cousins sat\ntogether, arranging the simple ornaments of the bridal dress, poor\nMary\u2019s feelings could no longer be restrained, and her tears fell fast.\n\n\u201cDear sake, Mary, gie ower greeting,\u201d said Annot; \u201cthe bonny white satin\nribbon is wringing wet.\u201d\n\n\u201cSing her a canty sang to keep up her heart,\u201d said Dame Seton.\n\n\u201cI canna bide a canty sang the day, for there\u2019s ane rinnin\u2019 in my head\nthat my poor Willie made ae night as we sat beneath the rowan-tree outby\nthere, and when we thought we were to gang hand in hand through this\nwearifu\u2019 world,\u201d and Mary began to sing in a low voice.\n\nAt this moment the door of the dwelling opened, and a tall,\ndark-complexioned woman entered, and saying, \u201cMy benison on a\u2019 here,\u201d\nshe seated herself close to the fire, and lighting her pipe, began to\nsmoke, to the great annoyance of Dame Seton.\n\n\u201cGudewife,\u201d said she gruffly, \u201cye\u2019re spoiling the lassie\u2019s gown, and\nraising such a reek, so here\u2019s an awmous to ye, and you\u2019ll just gang\nyour ways, we\u2019re unco thrang the day.\u201d\n\n\u201cNae doubt,\u201d rejoined the spaewife, \u201ca bridal time is a thrang time, but\nit should be a heartsome ane too.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd hae ye the ill-manners to say it\u2019s otherwise?\u201d retorted Dame Seton.\n\u201cGang awa wi\u2019 ye, without anither bidding; ye\u2019re making the lassie\u2019s\nbraws as black as coom.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill ye hae yer fortune spaed, my bonny May?\u201d said the woman, as she\nseized Mary\u2019s hand.\n\n\u201cNa, na,\u201d answered Mary, \u201cI ken it but ower weel already.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou\u2019ll be married soon, my bonny lassie,\u201d said the sibyl.\n\n\u201cHech, sirs, that\u2019s piper\u2019s news, I trow,\u201d retorted the dame, with great\ncontempt; \u201ccan ye no tell us something better worth the hearing?\u201d\n\n\u201cMaybe I can,\u201d answered the spaewife. \u201cWhat would you think if I were to\ntell you that your daughter keeps the half o\u2019 the gold ring she broke\nwi\u2019 the winsome sailor lad near her heart by night and by day?\u201d\n\n\u201cGet out o\u2019 my house, ye tinkler!\u201d cried Dame Seton, in wrath; \u201cwe want\nto hear nae such clavers.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe wanted news,\u201d retorted the fortune-teller; \u201cand I trow I\u2019ll gie ye\nmair than you\u2019ll like to hear. Hark ye, my bonnie lassie, ye\u2019ll be\nmarried soon, but no to Jamie Binks,\u2014here\u2019s an anchor in the palm of\nyour hand, as plain as a pikestaff.\u201d\n\n\u201cAwa wi\u2019 ye, ye leein\u2019 Egyptian that ye are,\u201d cried Dame Seton, \u201cor I\u2019ll\nset the dog on you, and I\u2019ll promise ye he\u2019ll no leave ae dud on your\nback to mend another.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wadna rede ye to middle wi\u2019 me, Dame Seton,\u201d said the fortune-teller.\n\u201cAnd now, having said my say, and wishing ye a blithe bridal, I\u2019ll just\nbe stepping awa;\u201d and ere another word was spoken, the gipsy had crossed\nthe threshold.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll no marry Jamie Binks,\u201d cried Mary, wringing her hands; \u201csend to\nhim, mother, and tell him sae.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe sorrow take the lassie,\u201d said Dame Seton; \u201cwould you make yoursel\nand your friends a warld wonder, and a\u2019 for the clavers o\u2019 a leein\u2019\nEgyptian,\u2014black be her fa\u2019, that I should ban.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, mother, mother!\u201d cried Mary, \u201chow can I gie ae man my hand, when\nanother has my heart?\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth, lassie,\u201d replied her mother, \u201ca living joe is better than a dead\nane ony day. But whether Willie be dead or living, ye shall be Jamie\nBinks\u2019 wife the morn. Sae tak nae thought o\u2019 that ill-deedy body\u2019s\nwords, but gang ben the house and dry your een, and Annot will put the\nlast steek in your bonny white gown.\u201d\n\nWith a heavy heart Mary saw the day arrive which was to seal her fate;\nand while Dame Seton is bustling about, getting everything in order for\nthe ceremony, which was to be performed in the house, we shall take the\nliberty of directing the attention of our readers to the outside\npassengers of a stagecoach, advancing from the south, and rapidly\napproaching Dunbar. Close behind the coachman was seated a middle-aged,\nsubstantial-looking farmer, with a round, fat, good-humoured face, and\nat his side was placed a handsome young sailor, whose frank and jovial\nmanner, and stirring tale of shipwreck and captivity, had pleasantly\nbeguiled the way.\n\n\u201cAnd what\u2019s taking you to Dunbar the day, Mr Johnstone?\u201d asked the\ncoachman.\n\n\u201cJust a wedding, John,\u201d answered the farmer. \u201cMy cousin, Jamie Binks, is\nto be married the night.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe has been a wee ower lang about it,\u201d said the coachman.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m thinking,\u201d replied the farmer, \u201cit\u2019s no the puir lassie\u2019s fault\nthat the wedding hasna been put off langer; they say that bonny Mary has\nlittle gude will to her new joe.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat Mary is that you are speaking about?\u201d asked the sailor.\n\n\u201cOh, just bonny Mary Seton that\u2019s to be married the night,\u201d answered the\nfarmer.\n\n\u201cWhew!\u201d cried the sailor, giving a long whistle.\n\n\u201cI doubt,\u201d said the farmer, \u201cshe\u2019ll be but a waefu\u2019 bride, for the sough\ngangs that she hasna forgotten an auld joe; but ye see he was away, and\nno likely to come back, and Jamie Binks is weel to pass in the world,\nand the mother, they say, just made her life bitter till the puir lassie\nwas driven to say she would take him. It is no right in the mother, but\nfolks say she is a dour wife, and had aye an ee to the siller.\u201d\n\n\u201cRight!\u201d exclaimed the young sailor, \u201cshe deserves the cat-o\u2019-nine\ntails!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhisht, whisht, laddie,\u201d said the farmer. \u201cPreserve us! where is he\ngaun?\u201d he continued, as the youth sprung from the coach and struck\nacross the fields.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019ll be taking the short cut to the town,\u201d answered the coachman,\ngiving his horses the whip.\n\nThe coach whirled rapidly on, and the farmer was soon set down at Dame\nSeton\u2019s dwelling, where the whole of the bridal party was assembled,\nwaiting the arrival of the minister.\n\n\u201cI wish the minister would come,\u201d said Dame Seton.\n\n\u201cWe must open the window,\u201d answered Annot, \u201cfor Mary is like to swarf\nawa.\u201d\n\nThis was accordingly done, and as Mary sat close by the window, and\ngasping for breath, an unseen hand threw a small package into her lap.\n\n\u201cDear sirs, Mary,\u201d said Dame Seton, \u201copen up the bit parcel, bairn; it\nwill be a present frae your Uncle Sandie; it\u2019s a queer way o\u2019 gieing it,\nbut he ne\u2019er does things like ony ither body.\u201d The bridal guests\ngathered round Mary as she slowly undid fold after fold. \u201cHech!\u201d\nobserved Dame Seton, \u201cit maun be something very precious to be in such\nsma\u2019 bouk.\u201d The words were scarcely uttered when the half of a gold ring\nlay in Mary\u2019s hand.\n\n\u201cWhere has this come frae?\u201d exclaimed Mary, wringing her hands. \u201cHas the\ndead risen to upbraid me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, Mary, but the living has come to claim you,\u201d cried the young\nsailor, as he vaulted through the open window, and caught her in his\narms.\n\n\u201cOh, Willie, Willie, where hae ye been a\u2019 this weary time?\u201d exclaimed\nMary, while the tears fell on her pale cheek.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a tale for another day,\u201d answered the sailor; \u201cI can think of\nnothing but joy while I haud you to my breast, which you will never\nleave mair.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere will be twa words to that bargain, my joe,\u201d retorted Dame Seton.\n\u201cLet go my bairn, and gang awa wi\u2019 ye; she\u2019s trysted to be this honest\nman\u2019s wife, and his wife she shall be.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na, mistress,\u201d said the bridegroom, \u201cI hae nae broo o\u2019 wedding\nanother man\u2019s joe: since Willie Fleming has her heart, he may e\u2019en tak\nher hand for me.\u201d\n\n\u201cGude save us,\u201d cried the farmer, shaking the young sailor by the hand,\n\u201clittle did I ken wha I was speaking to on the top of the coach. I say,\nguidwife,\u201d he continued, \u201cye maun just let Willie tak her; nae gude e\u2019er\nyet come o\u2019 crossing true love.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed, that\u2019s a truth,\u201d was answered by several bonny bridesmaids. Dame\nSeton, being deserted by her allies, and finding the stream running so\nstrongly against her, at length gave an unwilling consent to the\nmarriage of the lovers, which was celebrated amidst general rejoicings;\nand at the request of his bride, Willie, on his wedding-day, attired\nhimself in the clothes which the moths had so considerately spared for\nthe happy occasion.\n\n\n\n\n A PASSAGE OF MY LIFE.\n\n\nMaiden aunts are very tough. Their very infirmities seem to bring about\na new term of life. They are like old square towers\u2014nobody knows when\nthey were built, and nobody knows when they will tumble down. You may\nunroof them, unfloor them, knock in their casements, and break down\ntheir doors, till the four old black walls stand, and stand through\nstorm and sunshine year after year, till the eye, accustomed to\ncontemplate the gradual decay of everything else, sickens to look at\nthis anomaly in nature. My aunt, dear good soul, seemed resolved never\nto die,\u2014at least to outlive her hopeful nephew. I thought she was to\nprove as perdurable as a dried mummy,\u2014she was by this time equally\nyellow and exsiccated as any of the daughters of Pharaoh.\n\nI had run myself quite aground. But my extravagances, as well as my\ndistresses, I had the policy to conceal from my aged relative. She,\nhonest lady, occasionally had pressed me to accept of some slight\npittances of two or three \u00a350\u2019s at different times, which, after much\ndifficulty and entreaty, I made a merit of accepting, stoutly asserting\nthat I only received them to avoid hurting her feelings\u2014that my own\nincome was amply sufficient for the limited wants of a scholar, or to\nany one who could put in practice the rules of wholesome economy; but\nthis trifle certainly would enable me to purchase a few rather expensive\npublications which I could not otherwise have hoped to do, and which\nwould prove of essential use in furthering the progress of the two great\nworks I had commenced while at college, and had been busy with ever\nsince, viz.: \u201cA History of Antediluvian Literature, Arts, and Sciences,\u201d\nand, \u201cA Dissertation on the Military Tactics of the Assyrians,\u201d which I\nintended should appear along with the last volume of Valpy\u2019s Greek\nDictionary, or the first of Sir James Mackintosh\u2019s History of Great\nBritain.\n\nFortune at last grew tired of persecuting me; she fairly turned her\nwheel, and put me on the brightest spoke. My aunt\u2019s factor called one\nday, and let me know that he thought I should make my visits at\nBroadcroft more frequent\u2014take a little interest in looking over the\nditching and draining of the estate (short-sighted man, he little knew\nhow much I had ditched and drained it by anticipation!)\u2014walk through the\nwoods and plantations, and bestow my opinion as to thinning them (they\nwere long ago, in my own mind, transferred to the timber-yard)\u2014apply\nmyself a little to master the details of business connected with\nagricultural affairs, such as markets, green and white crops, manure,\n&c. &c.; and concluded by telling me that his son was a remarkably\nclever lad, knew country matters exceedingly well, and would be a most\nvaluable acquisition as factor or land grieve to any gentleman of\nextensive landed property. The drift of this communication I perfectly\nunderstood. I listened with the most profound attention, lamented my own\nignorance of the subjects wherein his clever son was so much at home,\nand wished only that I had an estate, that I might entrust it to the\ncare of so intelligent a steward. After dispatching a bottle or two of\nclaret, we parted mutually pleased.\n\nHe had seen my aunt\u2019s will, and, in the fulness of his heart, ran over\nthe legal jargon which constituted me the owner of Broadcroft,\nLilliesacre, Kittleford, Westerha\u2019, Cozieholm, Harperston, and Oxgang,\nwith hale parts and pendicles, woods and fishings, mills and mill-lands,\nmuirs and mosses, rights of pasturage and commonty. I never heard more\ndelightful music all my days than the hour I spent hearkening to this\nold rook cawing over the excellent lands that were mine in prospective.\nMy aunt\u2019s letters, after this, I found assumed a querulous tone, and\nbecame strongly impregnated with religious commonplaces\u2014a sure sign to\nme that she herself was now winding up her earthly affairs\u2014and generally\nconcluded with some such sentence as this: \u201cI am in a comfortable frame\nof spirit, but my fleshly tabernacle is sorely decayed\u2014great need hath\nit of a sure prop in the evening of its days.\u201d These epistles I\nregularly answered, seasoning them with scriptural texts as well as I\ncould. Some, to be sure, had no manner of connection or application\nwhatsoever; but I did not care for that if they were there. I stuck them\nthick and threefold, for I knew my aunt was an indulgent critic,\nprovided she got plenty of matter. I took the precaution also of paying\nthe postage, for I learned, with something like satisfaction, that of\nlate she had become rather parsimonious in her habits. I also heard that\nshe daily took much comfort in the soul-searching and faith-fortifying\ndiscourses of Mr Samuel Salmasius Sickerscreed, a migratory preacher of\nsome denomination or other, who had found it convenient for some months\nto pitch his tent in the Broadcroft. Several of my aunt\u2019s letters told\nme, in no measured terms, her high opinion of his edifying gifts. With\nthese opinions, as a matter of course, I warmly coincided. Sheet after\nsheet now poured in from Broadcroft. I verily thought all the worthy\ndivines, from the Reformation downwards, had been put in requisition to\nbatter me to pieces with choice and ghostly counsel.\n\nThis infliction I bore up against with wonderful fortitude, and repaid\nwith my weightiest metal. To supply the extraordinary drafts thus made\non my stores of devout phraseology, I had to call in my worthy friend\nTom \u2014\u2014. He had been a regularly-bred theologian, but finding the casque\nmore fitting for his hot head than the presbyter\u2019s cowl, he now lived in\nelegant starvation as a dashing cornet in the \u2014\u2014 Dragoons, and a better\nfellow never breathed. His assistance was of eminent service: when we\nexhausted our own invention, we immediately transcribed the sermon of\nsome forgotten divine of last century, and sent it thundering off. These\nwe denominated _shells_. At this time Tom\u2019s fortune and mine were\nhanging on the same pin; we were both up to the chin in debt; we had\nstretched our respective personal credits, as far as they would go, for\neach other. We were involved in such a beautiful multitude and labyrinth\nof mutual obligations, that we could neither count them nor see our way\nout of them. In the holy siege of Broadcroft citadel we therefore joined\nheart and hand.\n\nIn this manner things went on smoothly. My aunt was becoming daily\nweaker, seldom left her own bedroom, and permitted no person to see her\nsave the Rev. S. S. Sickerscreed. Indeed, every letter I received from\nmy aunt intimated more plainly than its predecessor that I might make up\nmy mind for a great and sudden change, and prepare myself for\nafflictions. As in duty bound, my answers breathed of sorrow and\nresignation\u2014lamented the mutability of this world\u2014its nothingness\u2014the\nutter vanity of all earthly joys. I really loved the good old lady; but\nI was hampered most villanously. I knew not a spot where I could put the\nsole of my foot, without some legal mine blowing me up a shivered rag\ninto the azure firmament,\u2014a fate a thousand times more picturesque than\npleasant. I may therefore be excused for confessing that I looked upon\nmy aunt\u2019s release from this world as the dawn of my own deliverance.\nYet, even then, I felt shame when I looked into the chambers of my\nheart, and found that every feeling of grief I had there for my aunt\u2019s\nillness was beautifully edged with a gleam of satisfaction. The\ncypresses and yews, and other mournful trees that threw their pensive\nshadows around me, were positively resting above a burning volcano of\njoy. No; it was not in human nature for a desperate man like me to\nexclude from his contemplation the bills, bonds, moneys, and manors that\nhad accumulated for years under her thrifty and prudent management.\n\nOne morning, while musing in this indescribable state of feeling, a\nlittle ragged boy, besmeared with dust and sweat, whom I recognised as\nturnspit and running footman of the establishment at Broadcroft, thrust\na crumpled greasy-like billet in my hand.\n\n\u201cCome awa, laird, come awa, gin ye would like to see your auld auntie\nafore she gangs aff a\u2019thegither.\u201d\n\nI started up, threw down the \u201cSporting Magazine,\u201d and instinctively\nsnatched up my hat.\n\n\u201cWhen did it happen, wee Jamie?\u201d\n\n\u201cThis morning, nae far\u2019er gane\u2014but come awa; everything\u2019s gaun\ntap-salteerie at Braidcraft\u2014sae unexpected by us a\u2019! Has your horse been\nfed yet? Dinna put aff, but come awa. We\u2019re a\u2019 dementit ower the way,\nand ye\u2019re muckle wanted, and sair missed.\u201d\n\nWith this wee Jamie darted away; I roared after him to obtain further\nparticulars, but wee Jamie shot off like an arrow, only twisting his\nhead over his shoulder, notwithstanding his trot, he screamed\u2014\n\n\u201cGerss maunna grow under my heels, if I care for my lugs. But it\u2019s a\u2019 by\nnoo, and there\u2019s nae gude in granin\u2019.\u201d\n\nWith which sapient remark the kitchen boy got out of hearing, and soon\nout of sight.\n\nI now hastily broke the black wax of the billet. The note was subscribed\nby Mr S. S. Sickerscreed, and was written in his most formal small-text\nhand. He had been a schoolmaster in his youth, and could write legibly,\nwhich no gentleman who regards his _caste_ should do. The three big S S\nS were dearer to me than a collar of knighthood. It required my\nimmediate presence at Broadcroft to talk over certain serious and\nimpressive matters. So had Mr Samuel Salmasius Sickerscreed penned his\nbillet, and in the fulness of my heart I gave the poor man credit for an\nexcess of delicacy more than I ever noticed had belonged to him before.\nPoor dear man, he, too, has lost a valuable friend. Judging of the\nexquisiteness of my feelings by the agony of his own, he has kindly\ndelayed the fatal announcement of my aunt\u2019s demise, till my heart has\nbeen prepared to meet the shock with becoming fortitude. How\nconsiderate\u2014how very compassionate he has been! Worthy man\u2014would I could\nrepay his kindness with a benifice! Thus did I soliloquise over the\ndispatch from Broadcroft; but notwithstanding the tumult which it and\nits bearer raised in my bosom, I did not omit communicating to Tom the\nunexpected change which a few hours had produced in our destinies, and\ncharging him at the same time to moderate his transports till I returned\nwith a confirmation of our hopes.\n\nThen backing my stoutest hunter, and taking a crow\u2019s flight across the\ncountry, I spared not her heaving flanks, nor drew bridle, till I\nreached the long, straight, dusky avenue that led to the tall, narrow\nslip of a house yclept Broadcroft Place. Here I slackened my pace, and\nleft my wearied and panting brute to crawl as lazily as she liked along\nthe avenue. I, too, lengthened my visage to the requisite degree\nnecessary for the melancholy purpose on which I came. The very trees had\na lugubrious and sepulchral aspect. I took them in fancy to be so many\n_Sawlies_ waiting the time for heading the funeral procession of my\nlamented aunt. They seemed to mourn for her in sincere sorrow, and, in\nfact, walking under their shadows disposed my mind very much to\nmelancholy. Now a green leaf, now a withered one, dropped on my beaver\nas I passed, and in the deep silence that reigned around me, I could\nnot, despite my constitutional recklessness, be wholly insensible to the\nappeals these mute emblems of man\u2019s mortality made to reflection.\n\nBut a pleasanter train of feelings arose when I looked at the stately\ntrunks of the venerable oaks, their immense girth, and (with a glow of\npatriotic virtue, quite common now-a-days) pictured forth to myself how\nadmirably they were suited to bear Britannia\u2019s thunders triumphantly\nacross the wave. Yes, every tree of them shall be devoted to the service\nof my country. Perish the narrow thought, that for its own gratification\nwould allow them to vegetate in unprofitable uselessness, when they can\nbe so beneficially employed for the state. Every old, druidical-looking\noak which my eye scanned was, of course, devoted to the axe. I already\nsaw the timber yards piled with Broadcroft oak, and the distant sea my\nimagination soon whitened with a fleet of noble barks wholly built of\nthem. Thus did I speculate till I reached the end of the avenue, where,\nto my surprise, I found a travelling post-chaise and four drawn up\nbefore the door of the mansion. This vehicle, an apparition of rare\noccurrence in so secluded a part of the country, and at the residence of\nso retired a lady as my departed aunt, was literally crushed with\ntrunks, and boxes, and bags, and packages of one kind or another,\nstrapped above, behind, and before it.\n\nBeing never unfertile in surmises, I immediately guessed that the\nequipage I saw must, of necessity, belong to the clerk to the signet, my\naunt\u2019s city lawyer, who had trundled himself into the country with the\nwhole muniments of my estate, for the mere purpose of welcoming me, and\nregulating my deceased relative\u2019s affairs. His prompt appearance, I\nattributed, with my usual goodness of heart, to the kindly foresight of\nMr Samuel. I really did not know how I could sufficiently recompense him\nfor the warm, disinterested, and valuable services he had rendered in\nthis season of affliction. But my aunt must have remembered him in her\ntestament. She was ever grateful. She cannot possibly have overlooked\nhim. As the d\u2014l would have it, I then asked myself, now, if your aunt\nhas forgotten Mr Samuel Salmasius Sickerscreed altogether, how will you\nact? At first, I said he must have \u00a3100 at least; then as I looked on my\nown necessities, the uncertainty of rents, the exorbitance of taxes,\nthis sum speedily subsided into half the amount. And by the time I\nfairly reached my aunt\u2019s door, I found my mind reconciling itself to the\nhandsome duty of presenting Mr Sickerscreed with a snuff-box, value \u00a32,\n10s., a mourning ring worth 30s., a new coat, and ten guineas; in all,\nsome twenty pieces of gold or thereby.\n\nOn alighting, I gave my horse to the servant to walk and cool. John was\nold as his late mistress\u2014a very good, foolish, gray-headed domestic,\nmarvellously fond of the family he served with, and marvellously fond of\nconversation. He looked profoundly melancholy when he took my reins.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019ll be a sair dispensation to you, Maister William,\u201d quoth John,\n\u201cthis morning\u2019s news. Ye wud be wonderfully struck and put about when ye\nheard it.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is, indeed,\u201d said I, throwing as much of mournfulness as possible\ninto the tones of my voice. \u201cHeavy news indeed, and most unexpected.\nGreat cause have I to grieve. My poor dear aunt to be thus lost to me\nfor ever!\u201d\n\n\u201cNae doubt, nae doubt, Maister William, ye maun hae a heavy heartfu\u2019. We\nwere a\u2019 jalousing as muckle,\u2014that\u2019s me, Souple Rab, and wee Jamie;\nhowever, it\u2019ll no do to be coosten down a\u2019thegither,\u2014a rainy night may\nbring a blithe morrow. Every thing is uncertain in this world but death!\nBut come on, Kate;\u201d and John and my reeking jade disappeared in the\ndirection towards the stable; John, no doubt, bursting with impatience\ntill he could communicate to his select cabinet, Souple Rab and wee\nJamie, the awsome and doncie looks of the young laird.\n\nI was yet lingering on the threshold in a most comfortable frame of\nmind, when the door was thrown open. Imagine my horror when the first\nfigure I saw was my aunt herself, not in the drapery of the grave, but\nbedizzened with ribbons from head to heel, and leaning her withered hand\non the arm of the Reverend Mr Sickerscreed. I gasped for breath\u2014my\ntongue swelled and clung to the roof of my mouth\u2014my eyes literally\nstarted from their sockets as if they would leave their bony casements\naltogether. Had I not caught hold of the porch, down I should have\ndropped.\n\n\u201cAm I in my senses, aunt? Do I see you really alive? Is this no unreal\nmockery\u2014no cruel hallucination? Resolve me, for Heaven\u2019s sake, else I go\nmad.\u201d\n\n\u201cDear me, nephew,\u201d said the old lady, \u201cwhat agitates you so? I feel so\nglad that you have paid me this visit ere I set off on my marriage jaunt\nwith the elect of my heart, your worthy connection, Mr Sickerscreed.\u201d\n\n\u201cMarriage!\u201d thundered I, \u201cmarriage!\u2014I came to mourn over your bier, not\nto laugh at your bridal. O, the infernal cruelty, Mr What\u2019s-your-name,\nto despatch your pharisaical letter sealed with black wax.\u201d\n\n\u201cYoung wrathful,\u201d meekly rejoined Mr Samuel, \u201cit was dark green wax,\nmost emblematic, as I said to your aunt, my dear spouse, of the unfading\nverdure of our harmonious affections.\u201d\n\n\u201cBlack and green fiends dog you to Satan,\u201d roared I. \u201cWhat an ass you\nhave made of me! Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness. Oh!\nBroadcroft, Lilliesacre, Kittleford, Cozieholm, and Oxgang, perished in\nthe clap of a hand, and for ever! The churchman\u2019s paw is upon you, and a\npoor fellow has no chance now of a single rood!\u201d\n\nWith some more stuff of this kind, I parted with my venerable aunt and\nher smooth-tongued spouse. These petrifactions of humanity had the\ncharity, I suppose, to consider me moon-struck. I heard Mr Samuel\nsweetly observe, that verily the young lad\u2019s scholarship had driven him\nmad. I wished the rogue at the bottom of the Red Sea, or in the farthest\nbog of Connaught, paring turf and cultivating potatoes\u2014anywhere but\nwhere I now saw him. I could have eaten him up raw and unsodden, without\nsalt or pepper, where he stood\u2014ground his bones to dust, or spit upon\nhim till he was drowned in the flood of my spite. I did neither; but\nthrowing myself again on the back of Kate, off I scampered home, more\nlike a fury than a man.\n\nIn my way there was not a rascal I met but seemed to my heated\nimagination to know my misfortunes, and enjoy, with sly satisfaction,\ntheir fearful consummation. Two fellows I cut smartly across the cheek;\nthey were standing coolly by the wayside, with their hands in their\npockets, interchanging winks, and thrusting their tongues provokingly\nout like hounds on a hot day. They did not relish the taste of my thong,\nand one of them made an awkward squelsh into a ditch on receipt, head\nover heels, immensely to my heart\u2019s content.\n\nIt was evening when I reached the little village where my head-quarters\nfor some weeks had been established. To add to my miseries, I found that\nTom had, in my absence, with his usual volatility of temperament, been\nentertaining a numerous party in the Cross Keys, on the faith of my\naccession of property. When I rode past the tavern, my ears were\nassailed with most extraordinary sounds of festivity, and my head\nendangered by a shower of bottles and glasses that his reckless boon\ncompanions were discharging from the windows. Some of these windows,\ntoo, were illuminated with multitudes of _dips_\u2014the extravagant\ndog!\u2014three to the pound. And some coarse transparencies were flaunting\nin my face pithy sentences, such as\u2014\u201cA Glorious Revolution,\u201d \u201cSplendid\nVictory,\u201d \u201cJubilee to Hopeless Creditors,\u201d \u201cIntelligence\nExtraordinary!!\u201d &c. Then, at every pause of the maddening din, the\nexplosion of another bottle of champagne smote my ear like a\ndeath-knell. Cork after cork popped against the ceiling\u2014crack, crack,\nthey went like a running fire along a line of infantry, while loud above\nthe storm rose the vociferations of my jolly friend, as he cheered them\non to another bumper, with all the honours, or volunteered his own song.\nPoor Tom, he had only one song, which he wrote himself, and never failed\nto sing to the deafening of every one when he was drunk. It was never\nprinted, and here you have as much of it as I remember, to vary the\nmelancholy texture of my story:\u2014\n\nSONG.\n\n Fill a can, let us drink,\n For \u2019tis nonsense to think\n Of the cares that may come with to-morrow;\n And \u2019tis folly as big\n As the Chancellor\u2019s wig,\n To dash present joy with dull sorrow.\n Hip! hip! hip! fill away;\n Our life\u2019s but a day,\n And \u2019twere pity that it proved a sad one;\n \u2019Twas in a merry pin\n Our life did begin,\n And we\u2019ll close it, brave boys, in a mad one!\n Hip! hip! hip! &c.\n\n Never shrink, boys, but stand,\n With a can in each hand,\n Like a king with his globe and his sceptre;\n And though slack in your joints,\n Yet thus armed at all points,\n The devil himself can\u2019t you capture.\n Hip! hip! hip! fill aright,\n Should he seek us to-night,\n We\u2019ll toss off the old rogue as a whetter;\n When the hot cinder\u2019s down,\n Take my oath on\u2019t, you\u2019ll own,\n That good luck could not furnish a better.\n Hip! hip! hip! &c.\n\n Dull sophists may say,\n Who have ne\u2019er wet their clay,\n That merry old wine gives no bliss,\n But the flask\u2019s sparkling high,\n Gives the dotards the lie,\n Crying, kiss me, my roaring lads, kiss!\n Hip! hip! hip! jolly boys!\n He who quarrels with those joys,\n Which the longer they\u2019re sipped of grow sweeter,\n May he live to be wise,\n And then when he sighs\n For a smack, let him choke with this metre.\n Hip! hip! hip! &c.\n\nThis was followed with what Tom emphatically styled a grand crash of\nmelody; that is, overturning the table, and burying in one\nindiscriminate ruin, bowls, bottles, glasses, and all things brittle.\n\nMy heart sickened at the riot, and, broken in spirit and penniless, I\nretreated to my lodgings.\n\nHere I had at least peace to ruminate over my prostrate fortunes; but as\nmeditation would not mend them, and next morning would assuredly bring\nthe dire intelligence of my aunt\u2019s marriage, I, that same night, made a\nforced march, anxious to secure a convenient spot for rustication and\nretirement, till fortune should again smile, or the ferocity of my\ncreditors be somewhat tamed. Poor Tom! I had the savage satisfaction of\nbreaking up his carousal by a few cabalistic words written in a strong\nhalf-text hand: \u201cStole away! Done up.\u2014Fooled and finished.\u2014Run, if you\nlove freedom, and hate stone walls. You will find me earthed in the old\nhole.\u201d\n\nNext evening I was joined by my luckless shadow. He had a hard run for\nit; the scent lay strong, and the pack were sure-nosed and keen as\nrazors. But he threw them out from his superior knowledge of localities.\nAfter this we both became exceedingly recluse and philosophical in our\nhabits. We had the world to begin anew, and we had each our own very\nparticular reasons for not making a noise about it.\u2014_Paisley Magazine._\n\n\n\n\n THE COURT CAVE:\n _A LEGENDARY TALE OF FIFESHIRE_.\n\n BY DRUMMOND BRUCE.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n\nA few years before the pride of Scotland had been prostrated by English\nbows and bills, on the disastrous day of Flodden, the holding of\nBalmeny, in the county of Fife, was possessed by Walter Colville, then\nconsiderably advanced in years. Walter Colville had acquired this small\nestate by the usual title to possession in the days in which he lived.\nWhen a mere stripling, he had followed the latest Earl of Douglas, when\nthe banner of the bloody heart floated defiance to the Royal Stuart. But\nthe wavering conduct of Earl James lost him at Abercorn the bravest of\nhis adherents, and Walter Colville did not disdain to follow the example\nof the Knight of Cadzow. He was rewarded with the hand of the heiress of\nBalmeny, then a ward of Colville of East Wemyss. That baron could not of\ncourse hesitate to bestow her on one who brought the king\u2019s command to\nthat effect; and in the brief wooing space of a summer day, Walter saw\nand loved the lands which were to reward his loyal valour, and wooed and\nwedded the maiden by law appended to the enjoyment of them. The marriage\nproved fruitful; for six bold sons sprung up in rapid succession around\nhis table, and one \u201cfair May\u201d being added at a considerable interval\nafter, Walter felt, so far as his iron nature could feel, the pure and\nholy joys of parental love, as his eye lighted on the stalwart frames\nand glowing aspects of his boys, and on the mild blue eyes and blooming\nfeatures of the young Edith, who, like a fair pearl set in a carcanet of\njaspers, received an added lustre from her singleness. But alas for the\nstability of human happiness! The truth of the deep-seated belief that\nthe instrument of our prosperity shall also be that of our decay, was\nmournfully displayed in the house of Walter Colville. By the sword had\nhe cut his way to the station and wealth he now enjoyed; by the sword\nwas his habitation rendered desolate, and his gray hairs whitened even\nbefore their time. On the field of Bannockburn\u2014once the scene of a more\nglorious combat\u2014three of his sons paid with their lives for their\nadherence to the royal cause. Two more perished with Sir Andrew Wood,\nwhen Steven Bull was forced to strike to the \u201cFloure and Yellow\nCarvell.\u201d The last, regardless of entreaties and commands, followed the\nfortunes of the \u201cWhite Rose of York,\u201d when Perkin Warbeck, as history\nmalignantly continues to style the last Plantagenet, carried his fair\nwife and luckless cause to Ireland; and there young Colville found an\nuntimely fate and bloody grave near Dublin.\n\nThus bereft of so many goodly objects of his secret pride, the heart of\nWalter Colville naturally sought to compensate the losses which it had\nsustained in an increased exercise of affection towards his daughter.\nThe beauties of infancy had now been succeeded by those of ripening\nmaidenhood. The exuberant laugh, which had so often cheered his hours of\ncare or toil, while she was yet a child, had given place to a smile\nstill more endearing to his time-stricken feelings; face and form had\nbeen matured into their most captivating proportions, and nothing\nremained of the blue-eyed, fair-haired child, that had once clung round\nhis knee, save the artless openness of her disposition, and the\nunsullied purity of her heart. Yet, strange to tell, the very intensity\nof his affection was the source of bitter sorrow to her who was its\nobject, and his misdirected desire to secure her happiness, threatened\nto blench, with the paleness of secret sorrow, the cheek it was his\ndearest wish to deck with an ever-during smile of happiness.\n\nEdith Colville was but an infant when her three brothers fell at\nSauchie, and had scarcely completed her eighteenth year, when the death\nof her youngest brother made her at once the object of her father\u2019s\nundivided regard, and of pursuit to many who saw and were smitten with\ncharms in the heiress of Balmeny, which had failed to attract their\nattention while her brother yet stood between the maiden and that\nheritage. But the heart they now deemed worth the winning was no longer\nhers to give. The death of her mother while she was yet a child, had\nleft her her own mistress long before the period when maternal care is\nmost essential; and Edith\u2019s love was sought and won by one who had\nlittle but youth and a warm heart to recommend him.\n\nArthur Winton was the orphan son of a small proprietor in the\nneighbourhood, who, having been deprived of the best part of his\nproperty by what he conceived the injustice of King James III., and the\nrapacity of his favourite Cochrane, was easily induced to join the\ninsurgent nobles who wrought the destruction of that monarch. He was,\nhowever, disappointed in his expectations of personal reward, having\nfallen in the conflict; and his son was too young to vindicate his claim\nin an age so rude as that of which we write.\n\nWalter Colville, whose family had been so sadly thinned in the battle we\nhave mentioned, though they had fought on the other side, naturally bore\nno goodwill to the boy; but his younger son, who was nearly of the same\nage, viewed him with different feelings. He was much about the house of\nBalmeny; and, to be brief, he won the affections of the young Edith long\nbefore she knew either their nature or their value. Until the departure\nof young Walter Colville, Arthur\u2019s visits were attributed by the old man\nto his friendship for his son, but when Edith had unhappily become his\nheiress, he at once attributed them to their proper cause. A stern\nprohibition of their repetition was the consequence, and the lovers were\nhenceforth reduced to hurried and sorrowful meetings in secret.\n\nOn the morning wherein we have chosen to begin the following veritable\nnarrative, the youthful pair had met unobserved, as they imagined, in a\nshady corner of Balmeny wood, and had begun, the one to lament, and the\nother to listen, when the sudden apparition of the angry father checked\nthe pleasing current of their imaginings.\n\nHe drew his sword as he approached, but the recollection of his seventy\nyears, and his now enfeebled arm, crossing his mind, he replaced the\nuseless weapon, and contented himself with demanding how the youth had\ndared thus clandestinely to meet his daughter.\n\nArthur attempted to allay his anger, and to plead his passion as he best\ncould; but the grim and angry frown that sat on Walter Colville\u2019s brow,\nas he listened to him, soon showed how vainly he was speaking, and he\nceased in confusion.\n\n\u201cHave you finished, young master?\u201d said Colville, with a sneer. \u201cThen\nlisten: you are not the wooer I look for to Edith. I should prefer him\nsomething richer, something wiser, and something truer to the king, than\nany son of your father is likely ever to prove; so set your heart at\nrest on that matter. And you giglot, sooth! to your rock and your\nchisart. But stay; before you go, tell this gallant gay to prowl no\nlonger about my dwelling. By St Bride, an he does, he may chance to meet\na fox\u2019s fate!\u201d\n\n\u201cDear father,\u201d said the weeping girl, \u201cupbraid us not. Never will I\ndisobey you, never be his, without your own consent.\u201d\n\n\u201cHold there,\u201d replied Colville, smiling grimly, \u201cI ask no more.\u201d And he\nled away the maiden, who dared not so much as steal a parting look.\n\nArthur Winton bore this fiat of the old man, and the dutiful\nacquiescence of his daughter (though he doubtless thought the latter\npushed to the very extreme of filial obedience), if not with equanimity,\nat least with so much of it as enabled him to leave the presence of his\nmistress and her father with something like composure. He wandered\nslowly to the beach, which lay at no great distance, as if he had hoped\nto inhale with the cool breeze that floated from off the waters, some\nportion of the calmness in which they then lay bound, his mind occupied\nin turning over ill-assorted plans for the future, ever broken in upon\nby some intruding recollection of the past. The place where he now\nwalked was one well calculated, according to the creed of those who\nbelieve in the power exercised over the mind by the face of external\nnature, to instil soothing and tranquillizing feelings. It was a smooth\ngrassy lawn, forming the bottom of a gentle eminence, undulating and\nstretching downwards to the pebbly beach, among whose round white stones\nthe quiet waters of the Firth fell kissingly. The view was bounded to\nthe north by the rising eminences we have mentioned, and shut in on the\nwest by the woody promontory which is still crowned by Wemyss Castle. To\nthe eastward several rocky eminences stretch into the Firth, the more\ndistant still increasing their seaward march until the bay is closed by\nthe distant point of Kincraig. Before him lay the silver Firth, and,\nhalf-veiled in distance, the green fields and hills of Lothian,\nterminated by the picturesque Law of North Berwick, and the great Bass,\nfrowning like some vast leviathan awakening from his sleep. One or two\nwhite-sailed barks lay motionless upon the water. The effect of the\nwhole was so stilling and sedative, that Arthur, half forgetting his\nrecent disappointment, stretched himself upon the sward, and abandoned\nhimself to contemplation.\n\nWhile he lay thus chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy, the sounds\nof distant song and merriment occasionally broke upon his ear. He at\nfirst regarded them as the mere offspring of imagination, but at length\nthe choral swell of a seemingly joyous ballad, followed by a hearty,\nfar-reverberated shout, convinced him that the merry-making was real,\nand at no great distance. He started to his feet in some alarm, for his\nfirst impression was that the Good Neighbours were holding their revels\nnear him, and he well knew the danger of being detected as a prying\noverlooker of their mystic merriment. A moment served to dissipate this\nfear. The voices which he had listened to were too rough and boisterous\never to be mistaken for the singing of those tiny minstrels, whose\nloudest notes never exceeded in sound the trumpet of the bee. There was\nno fairy ring round the spot on which he had lain, nor was the hour\neither the \u201ceye of day\u201d or that of midnight, at which, as is well known,\nthe elfin power was most formidable. After looking and listening for\nsome time, he ascertained that the sounds proceeded from a cave, which\nwe have not yet mentioned, but which forms a striking ornament to the\nbeach, and an object of considerable interest to the geologist, having\nbeen doubtless formed long before the Forth had found its present modest\nlimits. Being anxious to dispel the feelings that now preyed on his\npeace, by a diversion of whatever kind, he walked towards the place. As\nhe approached, the mirth was renewed with increased vehemence, and he\nperceived, at the western entrance of the cave, a female, from whose\nswarthy hue and singular habiliments he at once divined the nature of\nits present inmates. The woman, whose features were stern and somewhat\nrepulsive, wore a long gown, of some coarse dark-coloured material,\nwhich fell almost to her feet, having short wide sleeves, which left the\narms at perfect liberty, and coming up to the neck, was there fastened\nwith a golden brooch. Her head-dress consisted of a red and yellow\ncoloured shawl, twisted fantastically into a conical shape. Pendants of\ngold hung from her ears, and rings of the same metal, in many of which\nwere set rubies and other sparkling gems, garnished her tawny fingers.\nArthur at once recognised an Egyptian or gipsy in the dark-featured\ndamsel who stood before him, and hesitated a moment whether he should\npursue the determination of mixing with the revellers within, to which\nhis eager desire of escaping from his present unhappy feelings had\nprompted him. The Egyptians were in those days of a much darker\ncharacter than the remnants of their descendants, which, in spite of\npress-gangs and justice-warrants, still linger amongst us. Murder among\nthemselves was a thing of everyday occurrence, and desperate robberies,\ncommitted upon the king\u2019s lieges, by no means rare. The present gang,\nfrom their vociferation, seemed in a state of excitement likely to\nremove any little restraints which the fear of the law\u2019s vengeance might\nat another time have imposed on them, and the features of the woman,\ncontrary to their custom, wore no look of invitation, but rather seemed\nto deepen into a warning frown the nearer he approached the door at\nwhich she was posted. On the other hand, the honour of the race, to such\nas trusted them, was proverbial. His curiosity to know more intimately\nthe manners of a people so remarkable as the Egyptians then were, and\nstill are\u2014perhaps a latent wish of being able to extract from their\nprophetic powers some favourable auspice to his almost expiring hopes\u2014or\nthat nameless something which at times impels us to court the danger we\nat other times shun with care\u2014all conspired to induce him to enter the\ncave, and he accordingly attempted to do so. In this, however, he was\nopposed by the gipsy, who, stepping exactly in his way, waved her arm in\na repelling attitude; and, seeing him disinclined to obey this silent\ninjunction, coming still closer to him, whispered, \u201cGet you gone; your\nlife will be endangered if you enter here.\u201d\n\nBefore Arthur could reply to this injunction, she who gave it was\nsuddenly attacked by a man, who, issuing from the entrance, struck her a\nsmart blow across the shoulders with a staff which he carried, and then,\nwith a scowling look and angry accent, spoke a few words to her in a\nlanguage which Arthur understood not. She muttered something in reply,\nand proceeded towards the beach. \u201cThe woman is mad at times, young sir,\u201d\nsaid the man, now addressing Arthur. \u201cHeed her not, I beseech you. We\nare only a few wandering puir folks, making merry, and if you wish to\nshare our revelry, enter, and welcome. Some of our women may be able to\nread your weird, should you so incline; you have nothing to fear.\u201d\n\nArthur was by no means satisfied either that the woman was mad, or that\nthe man meant him fairly; but as he could not now retreat without\nbetraying his fear to the dark searching eye which the gipsy bent on\nhim, and was besides conscious that he possessed a well-proved sword,\nand considerable skill and strength in the handling of it, he signified\nhis wish to join the merrymaking, and followed the gipsy into the cave.\n\nOn entering he found himself in the interior of a high-roofed cavern, of\nconsiderable extent, partly exposed to the seaward side by two arched\nopenings between the lofty recesses of rock which support the roof, that\ntowards the east being the smaller and lower of the two; and the other\nrising in height nearly to the roof, affording a view of the Firth, and\nadmitting light to the place.\n\nThe inhabitants of the cave had ranged themselves along the north and\ninner side. Nearest the western entrance, stretched on sacks,\nsheepskins, cloaks, and other nondescript articles of clothing, sat, or\nrather lay, ten or twelve men, with rather more than double that number\nof women, all busily engaged in drinking; farther off, some ragged\ncrones were busily superintending the operation of a wood fire on a\nsuspended pot; while, farther off still, a few barebacked asses, and a\nplentiful variety of worse clad children, were enjoying their common\nstraw.\n\nArthur was immediately introduced to the company of carousers, some of\nwhom received him with a shout of welcome, but others with evident\ndissatisfaction; and he overheard, as he seated himself, what seemed an\nangry expostulation and reply pass between his conductor and one of the\nparty. This individual, who was evidently the chief of the gang, was an\naged man, with a beard of silver gray, which, as he sat, descended to\nhis lap, entirely covering his breast. His head was quite bald, with the\nexception of a few hairs that still struggled for existence behind his\nears, and this, added to the snowy whiteness of his eyebrows, and the\ndeep wrinkles in his brow and cheeks, would have conferred an air of\nreverence on his countenance, had not the sinister expression of his\nsmall and fiery-looking eyes destroyed the charm. On each side of him\nsat a young girl\u2014the prettiest of the company; and the familiar manner\nin which they occasionally lolled on the old man\u2019s bosom, and fondled\nwith his neck and beard, showed the intimate terms on which they lived\nwith him. The rest of the men were of various ages, and though all of\nthem were marked with that mixed expression of daring recklessness and\nextreme cunning which has long been \u201cthe badge of all their tribe,\u201d they\nattracted (with one exception) little of Arthur\u2019s attention. Of the\nwomen, the very young ones were extremely pretty, the middle-aged and\nold ones, more than equally ugly. Young and old, pretty and\nill-favoured, all were alike deficient in that retiring modesty of\nexpression without which no face can be accounted truly lovely, and the\nwant of which darkens into hideousness the plainness of homely features.\nThey joined freely in the draughts, which their male companions were\nmaking from the horns, which, filled with wine and ale, circulated among\nthe company, and laughed as loud and joked as boldly as they did.\n\nArthur seated himself in silence, and, somewhat neglectful of the\nkindness of the female who sat next him, occupied himself in surveying\nthe motley group before him. His eye soon rested on a man seated next\nthe damsel who occupied the place immediately to the left of the chief,\nand the moment he did he became anxious and interested. The individual\nwas a man of rather more than middle height, of a muscular, though by no\nmeans brawny frame. His countenance was ruddy, and of a pleasant\nmirthful expression; his eyes were full, of a dark hazel colour; his\nnose, though prominent, gracefully formed, and his mouth small and\npiquant. His beard was of a dark auburn hue, and he wore moustaches of\nthe same colour. He was dressed in a hodden-gray doublet and hose, which\nwere fastened round his body by a strong leathern girdle, from which\nhung a broad sword of the two-edged shape. The manner of this individual\nwas evidently different from those of his present companions, and that\nfrom the very pains which he took to assimilate it. There was all their\nmirth without their grossness, and his kind, affable demeanour to the\nfemale part of the company differed widely from the blunt and sometimes\nbrutal behaviour of his comrades.\n\n\u201cWho is that on the left of the old man?\u201d whispered Arthur to the man\nwho had introduced him.\n\n\u201cThat\u2014that\u2019s his favourite dell,\u201d replied the man.\n\n\u201cNay, I mean not the woman\u2014the man upon her left.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, I know not\u2014he\u2019s none of us\u2014strayed in like you to share the\nrevelry, I fancy,\u2014though, if he takes not better care of his eyes and\nhands, an inch or two of cold iron will pay his reckoning. I think he\ndallies too much with the mort.\u201d\n\nThe cool, even tone in which this annunciation of probable murder was\nuttered, rendered the communication more startling to Arthur than if it\nhad been made with a vindictive exclamation or suppressed groan; and he\nlooked anxiously and steadily on the stranger, whose gallant bearing\nmore and more attracted him. The latter had observed him more than once\nbending his eyes on him, and was not apparently pleased with the\nstrictness of his scrutiny. Twice, when their eyes met, the stranger had\nchecked a rising frown by emptying the horn which he held in his hand;\nthe third time he set it down untasted, and, fixing on Arthur a look of\ncalm commanding dignity, which seemed more native to him than aught\naround, exclaimed, in a deep and powerful accent,\u2014\n\n\u201cFriend, wherefore peer you so steadily this way? If you have aught to\nsay, out with it\u2014if not, reserve your ogling for some of the fair eyes\nnear you.\u201d\n\nArthur felt abashed beneath the rebuke which his solicitude for this\nindividual had exposed him to, and he could only mutter in reply\nsomething about the young damsel beside him.\n\n\u201cAh! ah!\u201d replied the stranger, resuming his good humour, \u201cit is to her\nyour looks were sent? Soul of Bruce! but she is well worthy of your\nwonder. Never\u2014and I have seen many bright eyes\u2014have I lighted on a pair\nso witching.\u201d Then, turning to the object of these praises, he took her\nhand, and whispered in her ear something, which, though inaudible to\nthose present, was evidently of no unpleasing nature, as her dimpling\ncheek unquestionably testified.\n\nThe patriarch had viewed, for some time, with ill-dissembled anger, the\napproaches of the stranger to the temporary sovereign of his affections.\nBut whether he thought them becoming too close, or was enraged at the\nplacidity with which they were received, his indignation now burst out,\nand as is usual in matters of violence, the weight of his vengeance fell\nheaviest on the weaker individual. He smote the girl violently on the\ncheek, and, addressing the stranger in a voice hoarse with passion,\npoured forth a torrent of words which were to Arthur utterly\nunintelligible.\n\nThe stranger, who did not seem to understand the expressions of this\naddress, could not, however, mistake its meaning. The language of\npassion is universal\u2014and the flashing eye and shrivelled brow of the\nEgyptian chief were too unequivocal to be misunderstood. He remained\nsilent but a moment, and then, drawing from his bosom a purse,\napparently well-filled, he took out a golden Jacobus, and proffered it\nto the patriarch, as a peace-offering to his awakened anger. The fire of\nindignation fled from the old man\u2019s eyes as they lighted on the gold,\nbut they were instantaneously lighted up by a fiercer and more deadly\nmeaning. Arthur could observe significant looks circulating among the\nmen, who also began to speak to one another in a jargon unintelligible\nto him. He felt convinced that the purse which the incautious stranger\nhad produced had determined them to destroy him; and, prepossessed with\nthis idea, he saw at once the necessity of the keenest observation, and\nof the danger which attended his scrutiny being detected. He pretended\nto begin to feel the influence of the potations in which he had\nindulged, and apparently occupied himself in toying with the willing\ndell who sat beside him. He now perceived one or two of the men rise,\nand proceed to the several openings of the cave, evidently to see that\nno one approached from without, or perhaps to cut off retreat. He saw,\ntoo, that they plied the stranger and himself with wine and ale; and,\nmore convincing than all, he perceived on the darkening brow and\ngleaming eye of the hoary Egyptian, the awakening excitement of a\nmurderous design. The stranger, in the meantime, apparently unconscious\nof the peril he was in, began again to bandy kind words and looks with\nthe favourite of the chief. The old man looked grimly on, but did not\nnow seem to wish to interrupt the dalliance. Suddenly he drew his hand\nfrom his bosom. It was filled with a dagger, which he raised high,\nevidently with the intention of slaying the unguarded stranger, who was\ntoo much occupied with the eyes and hands of the beauty to perceive his\nvillanous intention.\n\nArthur, who at the moment was lifting to his mouth the ponderous pewter\n\u201cstoup,\u201d or flagon, containing the ale on which the Egyptians were\nregaling, saw the wretch\u2019s intent, and on the impulse of the moment\nflung the vessel at the lifted hand. His aim was fortunately true; the\nvillain\u2019s arm fell powerless by his side, while the dagger flew to a\nconsiderable distance. Arthur then rose, and crying hastily to the\nstranger to defend himself, drew his blade and made towards him.\n\nThe stranger had perceived the intended blow, though, entangled as he at\nthe moment was, he would unquestionably have fallen a victim to it. He\nnow leaped hastily up, and exclaiming loudly, \u201c_Morte de ma\nvie!_\u2014Treason!\u201d drew out his sword, and looked for the foe. Arthur now\njoined him, and, setting their backs to the rocky wall of the cave, they\nprepared to defend themselves against the enraged gipsies, who, now\nshouting wildly, drew from under their cloaks long sharp knives, which\nthey brandished furiously in their faces.\n\nThe stranger swept his sword around him in a manner that proved him a\npractised master, and Arthur manfully seconding him, the Egyptians were\nkept completely at bay, for none seemed daring enough to trust himself\nwithin the sweep of the stranger\u2019s sword, or that of his new companion.\nBut it was only while they could keep their backs to the rocky wall that\nthey could hope to cope with their savage enemies, who, though they did\nnot come near enough to stab, surrounded them as nearly as they could,\nand yelled and shouted like so many disappointed fiends. There was\napparently no means of escape, though there might be of resistance, as\nthe moment they quitted the wall their backs would have been exposed to\nthe daggers of the infuriated assassins. Arthur perceived, too, to his\ndismay, that sure means were taken to render their length of sword\nunavailing. Several women were clambering up the rock behind them\ncarrying large blankets and other cloths, clearly for the purpose of\nthrowing over their swords and themselves, and thus yielding them up a\nfettered prey to these ruffians. All hope of escape died in his bosom as\nhe discovered the well-laid design, and he was about to rush on the\nsavages, and at least sell his life dearly, when he observed the women\nwho carried the blankets pause and look upwards. He too looked up, and\nsaw, with a consternation that for a moment unmanned him, an immense\nfragment of loose rock in the very act of being removed from its\nimmemorial resting-place, and precipitated on their heads.\n\n\u201cHoly Virgin! help us, or we are lost!\u201d exclaimed the youth; and the\nprayer had hardly left his lips ere the threatened engine of their\ndestruction was converted into the means of their immediate escape. The\nponderous stone dropped so far directly on its fatal errand, that Arthur\ninstinctively crouched beneath the apparently inevitable blow; but\nencountering a few feet only above his head a projecting piece of rock,\nit rebounded from the side of the cave in a slanting direction, and,\nfalling clear of its intended victims, smote to the earth the hoary head\nof the patriarch. He fell beneath the huge fragment, which hid from\ntheir sight the face and neck of the Egyptian; but the convulsive\nwrithings of the unhappy man, which for a moment contorted his frame,\nonly to leave it in utter stillness, told plainly that his long career\nhad ceased, and that the man of blood had become the victim of his own\npitiless design.\n\nThe Egyptians, panic-struck by this sudden death-blow, set up a loud and\nstunning wail, as they crowded round the body of their chief; but the\nstranger and Arthur stayed not to observe their farther demeanour, and,\ntaking advantage of the opening among their enemies, which was now\nafforded them, sprang out of the cave, and ascended at the top of their\nspeed to the brow of the eminence behind it.\n\nThey continued their rapid walk for some time in silence, induced, no\ndoubt, by the tumultuous nature of their feelings, and the violence of\ntheir present exertion. At length, having entered a few yards into a\nwood, which then decorated the place, though soon after to be converted\ninto keel and timbers for the \u201cGreat Michael,\u201d the stranger halted, and,\ntaking Arthur by the hand, said breathlessly,\u2014\n\n\u201cBy Saint Andrew, young sir, you have done us this day good service. I\nnever thought to have been so indebted to a pint-stoup, trow me.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut what sorrow tempted you, man,\u201d replied Arthur, rather crossly, \u201cto\nplay the fool with the old villain\u2019s dearie in yon wild sort of fashion;\nand, above all, what induced you to flourish your well-filled purse in\nthe eyes of those who love gold better than anything else save blood?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhim\u2014chance\u2014_fate_\u2014I thought at one time. It is long since cunning men\nhave told me that I shall die for a woman, and, by the Bruce\u2019s soul! I\nthought the hour had come. As for my Jacobuses, I rejoice I saved them\nfrom the filching crew, as they will serve for an earnest\u2014a poor one, to\nbe sure\u2014of my thankfulness to my brave deliverer;\u201d and so saying, he\ndrew from his bosom the purse which had excited the fatal cupidity of\nthe Egyptians, and gracefully proffered it to the youth.\n\nArthur had all along suspected\u2014nay, felt assured\u2014that his companion was\nof a rank superior to his appearance; and, had it not been so, his\npresent conduct would have convinced him.\n\n\u201cWhoever you are, sir,\u201d said he, \u201cthat in this lowly guise speak the\nlanguage and the sentiments of a noble-born, your own heart will, I\nknow, convince you that I dare not accept your gold. The service I\nrendered you I would have rendered to the poorest carle in Fife, but\nwere it ten times greater than it was, it must not be repaid with coin.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll are not carles who wear hodden gray and blue bonnets with you, I\nfind,\u201d replied the stranger, smiling approvingly. \u201cBut come, if gold\ncannot repay the service you have done me, tell me what can.\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing in your power to perform,\u201d replied Arthur, calmly.\n\n\u201cTry,\u201d continued the stranger; \u201cI bear with me a talisman which can\ncommand all objects which men in general desire. Choose, then\u2014wealth,\nworship, or a fair wife!\u201d\n\nThere was something so frank, open, yet condescending, in the tone and\nappearance of this extraordinary stranger, that Arthur could not resist\ntheir fascinating influence, and although he could not imagine that any\ninterference on the part of his new friend would produce the slightest\nchange in the stern sentence of Walter Colville, he communicated to him\na general outline of his present situation.\n\nThe stranger listened attentively to the detail\u2014then demanded how far\ndistant the dwelling of Colville was; and, on being informed of its near\nvicinity to the spot on which they then stood, declared his intention of\nimmediately proceeding thither and using his influence in Arthur\u2019s\nbehalf.\n\nThe latter opposed this resolution but faintly; for, though he was, as\nwe have said, utterly at a loss to conceive how his cause was to be\nbenefited by the proffered kindness of the stranger, yet a vague and\nalmost latent hope of still obtaining Edith never entirely forsook him.\n\nHe conducted the stranger through the wood, therefore, by the path which\nled most directly to the house of Balmeny. On reaching the skirt of the\nforest, it was agreed that the former should proceed alone to the\ndwelling of Colville, and that Arthur should remain where he was, and\nawait the result.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\nThe stranger set out on his voluntary mission at a rapid pace, and soon\narrived at the house. The door stood open, and he entered with the\ncareless sauntering air of one entirely indifferent as to the welcome he\nmight be greeted with. He found Colville seated apparently in no very\npleasant humour, and his daughter, bustling about among the\nservant-maidens, wearing on her flushed cheek and suffused eye undoubted\nsymptoms of the sorrow with which the morning\u2019s adventure had afflicted\nher.\n\n\u201cGive you good-e\u2019en, gudeman of Balmeny,\u201d said the stranger, seating\nhimself, without waiting an invitation, on the bench opposite Colville.\n\n\u201cThe same to you, neebour,\u201d said the landlord, in a tone that had little\nof welcome in it.\n\nA few moments\u2019 silence now ensued, Colville evidently waiting with some\nimpatience for the tidings which the other seemed in no haste to\ncommunicate to him. But this could not last.\n\n\u201cHave you anything to tell, ask, or deliver, friend?\u201d at last said\nColville.\n\n\u201cThis bright-e\u2019ed maiden is the bonny lass of Balmeny, I\u2019m thinking,\u201d\nwas the unreplying answer.\n\n\u201cThat is my daughter, truly,\u201d said the landlord, becoming more and more\nimpatient; \u201cdoes your coming concern her?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat it does,\u201d replied the stranger. \u201cThere\u2019s an auld bye word, that\n\u2018foul fish and fair daughters are nae keeping ware.\u2019 This fair May is\nthe object of my visit; in short, gudeman, I come awooing.\u201d\n\nAt the sound of this magnetic word, a universal commotion arose in the\ndwelling of Colville. The maiden, who was its object, surveyed the\nstranger with indignation and surprise; the servants whispered and\ntittered among each other; and Colville seemed for a moment about to\ngive vent to the feelings of his anger, when the current of his feelings\nsuddenly changed, and, directing a look of malicious joy to his\ndaughter, he addressed the stranger\u2014\n\n\u201cWelcome, wooer\u2014welcome. Come, lasses, set meat and drink before this\ngentle here; as the auld Earl of Douglas said, \u2018It\u2019s ill arguing between\na fu\u2019 man and a fasting.\u2019\u201d\n\nThe order was obeyed with great readiness by the serving maidens, who\nset before the stranger the household bread and cheese, and a bicker of\nno scanty dimensions, containing the reaming ale for which Scotland has\nbeen so long famous. There was a malicious merriment twinkling from\nevery eye as the scene went on; for all knew well that the over-strained\nkindness of the host was soon to be converted into outrageous and\noverwhelming abuse of the guest. The stranger, however, seemed either\nnot to notice or to slight these indications. He partook heartily of the\ngood cheer set before him, and amused himself by returning with\ngood-humoured smiles the stolen looks of the simpering maidens. He\nlooked in vain, however, for Edith, who had retired from the place.\n\n\u201cAnd now,\u201d said Colville, who began to think the stranger somewhat more\nat ease than he could have wished, \u201cYour name, wooer?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy name?\u201d said the stranger, somewhat embarrassed.\n\n\u201cAy, your name\u2014all men have a name. _Knaves_ [laying an emphasis on the\nword] many.\u201d\n\n\u201cTrue, gudeman, true. My name, then, is Stuart\u2014James Stuart. I hope it\npleases you?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe name is the best in the land,\u201d said the old man, touching his\nbonnet. \u201cAs to the wearer\u2014hem!\u2014\u2018a Stuarts are no sib to the king\u2019, ye\nken. What countryman are you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI was born at Stirling,\u201d said the stranger.\n\n\u201cAy, ay, it may be, it may be,\u201d replied Walter Colville; \u201cbut, to bring\nthe matter to a point, what lands and living hae ye, friend?\u201d\n\n\u201cSometimes less, sometimes more,\u201d replied the stranger, \u201cas I happen to\nbe in the giving or the taking humour. At the lowest ebb, however, I\nthink they are at least worth all that ever called a Colville master.\u201d\n\n\u201cFaith, and that\u2019s a bauld word, neebour,\u201d cried Colville, bitterly\u2014\u201cand\none that, I\u2019m jalousing, you\u2019ll find it difficult to make gude.\u201d\n\n\u201cAt your own time it shall be proved, gudeman; but it is not for myself\nI come to woo the bonny lass of Balmeny. I am, thanks to a wise old man\nwho sits in Windsor, wived already.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd who, in Beelzebub\u2019s name, may you be blackfit for?\u201d demanded\nColville, rising in wrath.\n\n\u201cGive your daughter to the youth I shall name, and I will, on her\nwedding-day, fill you up one lippie with the red gold, and five running\no\u2019er with silver.\u201d\n\n\u201cGive her! To whom?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo one who loves her dearly; and, what is more, is dearly loved in\nreturn, old man.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho is he?\u201d reiterated Colville.\n\n\u201cOne who is worthy already of the hand of the best ae daughter of any\nlaird in Fife; and who, ere to-morrow\u2019s sun sets, will be wealthier than\nyourself.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho\u2014who\u2014who is he?\u201d cried the old man, stamping in a paroxysm of rage.\n\n\u201cArthur Winton!\u201d said the stranger.\n\nThe anger of Colville, when this unpleasing name was uttered, almost\noverwhelmed him.\n\n\u201cOut of my doors, you rascally impostor,\u201d at length he was able to\nexclaim; \u201cout of my doors! Swith away to the minion who sent you here,\nan you would wish not to taste the discipline of the whip, or to escape\nbeing worried by the tykes.\u201d\n\nTo the stranger, the anger of the old man, instead of fear, seemed only\nto occasion merriment. He laughed so heartily at the violence into which\nthe rage of his host seduced him, that the tears actually stood in his\neyes\u2014conduct that naturally increased the passion which it fed on. The\nservants stood looking on in silent wonder; and Edith, startled by the\nnoise of the discordant sounds, returned to the place in wonder and\nalarm.\n\nAn unexpected termination was suddenly put to the scene by the entrance\nof Arthur Winton. His cheek was flushed with haste; and he was so\nbreathless that he could hardly exclaim,\u2014\n\n\u201cSave yourself, sir stranger, by instant flight; the Egyptians have\ntracked our path hither, and are pursuing us here with numbers ten times\nexceeding those we encountered in the cave.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet them come,\u201d said the stranger, with a smile; \u201cEgyptians though they\nbe, they cannot eat through stone walls or oaken doors. We will carouse\nwithin while they howl without, and drink the _dirige_ of their chief.\u201d\n\nArthur said nothing, but looked doubtingly at Colville.\n\n\u201cAnd do you really imagine, worthy youth, and no less worthy blackfit,\nthat I am to have my house sieged, my cattle stolen, and my corn carried\noff, to shield you from the consequences of your drunken brawls? Not I,\nby the cat of the blessed Bride. Out of my doors, ye caitiffs,\u2014they can\nbut slay you, and the whittle has crossed the craig of mony a better\nfellow than any of ye twasome is likely to prove. Begone, I say.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, my dear father,\u201d said Edith, imploringly, \u201cdo not drive them forth\nnow; the Egyptians are approaching the house\u2014they cannot escape.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd they shall not stay here,\u201d replied the old man, harshly, the tone\nof agony in which Edith\u2019s entreaties were uttered recalling all the\nbitterness of his feelings against Arthur.\n\n\u201cAt least, Walter Colville,\u201d said Arthur, \u201csave this stranger. He cannot\nhave offended you. It was on my errand he came hither. I will go forth\nalone. Perhaps one victim may suffice.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, brave youth,\u201d said the stranger, \u201cwe go together. Farewell, old\nman. You are a Scot, and yet have betrayed your guest. You are a\nColville, and the first of the line that ever turned his back upon a\nStuart at his utmost need.\u201d\n\nThe tone and sentiment of these words had a powerful effect on Walter\nColville. A momentary confusion rested on his countenance, and then,\nwith a smile ill put on, he said,\u2014\n\n\u201cCome, come, sirs; I but joked wi\u2019 ye. Did you really think that Walter\nColville would abandon to his enemy any who have bitten his bannock, and\nkissed his cup as you have done? Na, na; here you are safe while the\nauld wa\u2019s stand. Sit down. I\u2019ll go above and look out for the\nlandloupers.\u201d\n\nThe old man left the place accordingly, and Arthur, seizing the\nopportunity, retired to one corner with Edith, where the nature of their\nconversation could be only guessed from the animated looks and gestures\nof the affectionate pair.\n\nThe stranger in the meantime strode up and down the place, regardless of\nthe affrighted servants, singing to himself\u2014\n\n \u201cO whaur will I get a bonny boy,\n That will win hose and shoon;\n That will rin to Lord Barnard\u2019s yett,\n And bid his ladye come?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat say you, my little man?\u201d he continued, addressing a boy of twelve\nor thirteen years, who sat before the fire, sharing, with a shaggy\ncollie, the contents of an ample cog, altogether unheeding the agitation\nwhich reigned around him; \u201cwill you run to Wemyss Castle with a message\nto Sir David?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019 the noo!\u201d said the boy, looking up with an air expressive of the\nsense of the unparalleled oppression proposed in interrupting him during\nthe sacred ceremony of supper.\n\nThe stranger laughed, and drawing from his bosom the purse we have so\noften spoken of, he displayed a Jacobus, and offered it to the boy. \u201cNa,\nI\u2019ll no gang for the yellow bawbee,\u201d said the urchin; \u201cbut if ye\u2019ll gie\nme the braw whittle, I\u2019ll rin.\u201d The stranger immediately put into his\nhand the dagger he coveted, and drawing him aside, conveyed to him in\nwhispers the message he was to deliver.\n\nWalter Colville now re-entered, and informed them that he had\nreconnoitred the Egyptians, who, including women and children, seemed to\namount to above a hundred.\n\n\u201cCould I but get this younker beyond their clutches,\u201d said the stranger,\n\u201ca short half hour would disperse them like the leaves in autumn.\u201d\n\nColville stared at this avowal, but was silent. The conviction of\nArthur, that the speaker was not what he seemed, now seized on his mind\nalso, but it appeared to inspire him with no pleasant feeling; on the\ncontrary, anxiety deepened on his countenance the more and more he gazed\non the handsome features of his guest, and the wild shouts of the\nEgyptians, which he had previously heard with comparative indifference,\nnow evidently inspired him with the deepest terror.\n\nIt was agreed at length that the boy should make the attempt. To get him\nout of the house, without endangering the inmates, was comparatively\neasy, as the Egyptians as yet stood at some distance from the door. Once\nout, they had only his own ready wit and speed of foot to trust to.\nWhile Colville and Arthur therefore undid with due caution the massive\nbars and bolts which protected the oaken door, the stranger, anxious to\nwitness the success of his messenger, ascended to the upper storey, and\nstood at the open casement. He was immediately observed by the\nEgyptians, who set up a yell of savage impatience at the sight, the men\nbrandishing their weapons, and the women waving their arms, as if\nthreatening vengeance against him.\n\nTheir attention was now, however, directed from him to the youthful\nmessenger, who approached towards them undauntedly. They went forward to\nmeet him.\n\n\u201cThe master sent me to see what ye\u2019re a\u2019 here for,\u201d said the boy.\n\n\u201cTell him,\u201d said one of the Egyptians harshly, \u201cwe are come to demand\nthe two strangers who have just entered his dwelling. Let him give them\nto our vengeance, and we will depart peaceably\u2014not a feather or a rag of\nhis shall be scathed by us.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what if he shouldna just agree to this?\u201d said the boy, edging\ntowards the west, covering the man\u0153uvre, as if retiring towards the\nhouse.\n\n\u201cIf he refuse us, woe unto him. We will leave him neither corn nor\ncattle, kith nor kin; burn his house with fire, and his own red blood\nshall lapper on his cold hearth-stone.\u201d\n\n\u201cHaith, carle, you maun tell him that yoursel,\u201d said the boy, as with\none wild bound he sprung from the group, and, with the speed of a\ngrayhound, made for the wood.\n\nThere was a cry of disappointment burst forth from the Egyptians as they\nperceived his intention, and many set out in pursuit. The chase was\nviewed with deep interest by the inmates of the house\u2014for Colville,\nEdith, and Arthur Winton had now joined the stranger. The wood was not\nfar distant; the boy was famous for his swiftness of foot; and they\ncould see that his pursuers were falling fast behind. To their dismay,\nhowever, they perceived at length that there was a powerful dog among\nthe number, who continued the chase after all his human competitors had\nabandoned it in despair. He gained fast upon the boy. \u201cHe is lost!\u201d said\nEdith, piteously; \u201cthat villanous dog will tear him to pieces.\u201d But the\nevent belied the maiden\u2019s fear. Just as the ferocious animal seemed\nabout to seize him, the boy was seen to turn upon his pursuer. The dog\ngave a loud howl, and fell to the ground, and the stranger could\nperceive his own dagger gleaming in the stripling\u2019s hand, as he waved it\nin triumph o\u2019er his head ere he disappeared among the trees.\n\n\u201cI could stake an earldom,\u201d said the stranger exultingly, \u201con that boy\u2019s\nproving a noble soldier! By the soul of Bruce, he can both fight and\nflee.\u201d\n\nColville\u2019s terror, as he listened to these words, fairly mastered the\ncomposure which he had hitherto affected. He took off his bonnet, and\nbending lowly to the stranger, said in a tremulous voice\u2014\n\n\u201cIn Heaven\u2019s name, say, oh! say, sir, you are not the king!\u201d\n\n\u201cEven so, good Walter, James of Scotland stands before you. Are you\nsorry to see me? By Saint Andrew, I had hoped I should be welcome to\nevery honest house,\u2014ay, and every honest heart, in my dominions.\u201d\n\nWalter had dropped on his knee as the truth, which he had for some time\nsuspected, was confirmed to him, and, looking up to his royal guest,\nwhile tears stood in his eyes\u2014\u201cWelcome, my noble prince; what is it of\nWalter Colville\u2019s, from the bodle in his purse to the last drop of his\nheart\u2019s blood, that the king\u2019s not welcome to? I and mine, my liege,\nhave fought, and bled, and died for the royal house. But to see your\ngrace here in peril, surrounded by so many villains, and this old arm\nalone left to assist you! Oh! for the six braw fellows that I have seen\nprancing on yonder lea,\u2014they would have cleared a way for your highness\nthrough them all!\u201d\n\n\u201cNever fear for me, Walter Colville; I am not doomed to fall by a brawl\nof this kind, or in mine own land;\u2014so runs the rede.\u201d\n\nThe king now turned round, and perceived Arthur and Edith, who had\nretired to a little distance. When they saw they were observed, they\nadvanced and would have kneeled; but the prince prevented this. He took\nthem both by the hand, and imprinted on the lips of Edith a kiss,\nsavouring as much of warm affection as of kingly courtesy.\n\nTheir attention was now directed to the operations of the Egyptians.\nThey perceived, with some surprise, that a considerable number of them\nleft the rest, and made for the wood, and that those who remained ceased\nthe yelling manifestations of sorrow and revenge which had so affrighted\nEdith.\n\n\u201cThey are meditating a retreat, methinks,\u201d said the king.\n\n\u201cI fear, my liege,\u201d said Colville, \u201cthey are rather planning some mode\nof successful assault;\u201d and the return of the Egyptians too soon\nverified the apprehension. They bore with them the trunk of a fallen\ntree, and the besieged at once saw the use for which this powerful\nengine was intended.\n\n\u201cMy door can never withstand the shock of a ram like this,\u201d cried\nWalter; \u201cthey will force a passage, and out and alas! your highness will\nbe murdered\u2014murdered in the house of Balmeny!\u201d\n\nJames was proverbially brave, but it cannot be denied that he looked a\nlittle grave as he perceived the ponderous engine borne along, which in\nall probability would, in a few minutes, lay open the passage to a band\nof miscreants thirsting for his blood, and against whose rage the\nbravery of himself and his friends seemed a poor defence.\n\n\u201cLet the worst come to the worst,\u201d said he at length, \u201cwe three will\nmake good this staircase for a stricken hour at least; before then the\nrescue must arrive.\u201d\n\nThe king, Colville, and Arthur now sought the floor below; Edith, with\nthe serving-maidens, being stationed above, to be, in case of the\nEgyptians forcing an entry, still within the defence of the stair.\n\nThe door was of massive oak, studded with iron nails, and supported by\nthree iron bolts of considerable thickness. An additional defence was\nnow added in the shape of planks placed diagonally under these bolts,\nand for a few moments the besieged imagined it might withstand the\nefforts of the assailants. But a few strokes of the tree soon showed the\nfallacy of this hope. The door shook under the first blow, and ere a\nscore had been given, the yielding hinges showed that the Egyptians had\nwell calculated the force of their instrument.\n\n\u201cIt must be cold steel that saves us after all,\u201d said the king,\nretreating to the staircase.\n\n\u201cOh, that I and all my kin were stark dead on this floor, and your\nhighness safe on Falkland green!\u201d exclaimed Colville, wringing his\nwrinkled hands, and following.\n\nThey had scarcely gained their intended position at the upper landing of\nthe staircase, when, yielding to a desperate stroke, the door flew open,\nand the infuriated Egyptians, shouting, made their way to the interior.\nNot finding those they sought below, they next proceeded to ascend the\nstair. This, however, was an ascent fatal to all who attempted it.\nCorpse after corpse fell backward among the enraged ruffians under the\nblows of the king and Arthur, until no one could be found daring enough\nto attempt the passage.\n\n\u201cLet us smeek them in their hive,\u201d at length cried a hoarse voice, \u201cand\nso let them either roast or come forth.\u201d\n\nA shout of approbation followed this advice, and, while a chosen few\nremained to guard the stair, the remainder roamed about the house\ncollecting together everything which could assist their diabolical\ndesign.\n\nThe king\u2019s heart, and that of his brave companions, sunk as they heard\nthis resistless plan of destruction proposed and set about. It was for a\nmoment only, however, for suddenly they heard the clear sweet voice of\nEdith exclaiming, \u201cWe are saved, we are saved! yonder comes the Lord of\nWemyss and his gallant followers!\u201d and immediately after the maiden\nherself appeared to reiterate the tidings.\n\n\u201cAre you sure of what you say, Edith?\u201d asked the king eagerly. \u201cHow do\nthe horsemen ride?\u201d\n\n\u201cAs if their coursers were winged,\u201d replied Edith, \u201call of them; but one\nwho backs a gray steed of surpassing power, is far before the rest, and\never and anon turns round, as if upbraidingly, to his followers.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy trusty David!\u201d exclaimed the king, with emotion, \u201cwell wert thou\nworthy of the gallant gray!\u201d\n\nThere was now heard a peculiar shout from among the Egyptians without,\nwhich was rightly interpreted as a signal of retreat; for it was\nimmediately followed by the evacuation of the house; and so speedy and\nsimultaneous was their flight, that the king could only perceive the\nlatest of the tribe as they made for the wood, leaving to Wemyss and his\ncompanions a deserted field and an open entrance.\n\n\u201cThanks, David, for this timely rescue,\u201d said the king, as the knight\nbended the knee before him. \u201cBy my crown, the spurs were well bestowed\non one who can so fairly use them!\u201d\n\nJames, followed by Sir David, Walter, Arthur, and the rest, now led the\nway to the upper chamber where the immoderate joy and hospitality of the\nold man displayed itself in the most substantial form. When they had\ncaroused for some time, the king, turning to Colville, said,\u2014\n\n\u201cMine host, did I hear rightly when you said there was nothing beneath\nthis roof-tree to which I was not welcome?\u201d\n\n\u201cYour highness heard rightly.\u201d\n\n\u201cGive me then this fair maiden. We kings, you know, seldom choose the\nleast valuable of our subjects\u2019 chattels.\u201d\n\n\u201cYour grace may command me,\u201d said Colville, though somewhat\nhesitatingly, for he saw the turn which things were taking.\n\n\u201cAnd you too, sweet Edith?\u201d said the king, again saluting the blushing\ngirl; and then, without waiting for an answer, continued, \u201cthat you may\nall know, my lieges, that we accept your benevolences merely for your\nown benefits, I give away this treasure, tempting as it is, to one who\nhas well deserved the favour at our hand. Take her, Arthur, and confess\nthat I have found a way to repay the debt I owed you. Receive his hand,\nfair maiden, and if it will add anything to its value in your eyes, know\nthat it has this day saved a king\u2019s life.\u201d\n\nThe old man\u2019s sentiments in regard to Arthur Winton had been undergoing\na change imperceptible even to himself, from the moment he had perceived\nhim the companion and probable favourite of the king; but the revolution\nwas completed when he was made acquainted with the particulars of his\ninterference in the royal behalf,\u2014a merit which in his eyes would have\noutweighed a thousand faults in his intended son-in-law.\n\nKing James shortly afterwards left the house of Balmeny amid the\nblessings of its inmates; and to close our tale, we have only to add,\nthat the gift of the monarch was shortly after confirmed at the altar,\nwhere Edith became the happy bride of Arthur Winton; and that the royal\ngratitude flowed freely on the wedded pair, as any who chooses to pursue\nthe time-worn records of the Great Seal may satisfy himself.\n\n\n\n\n HELEN WATERS:\n _A TRADITIONARY TALE OF THE ORKNEYS_.\n\n BY JOHN MALCOLM.\n\n The lost, the castaway on desert isles,\n Or rocks of ocean, where no human aid\n Can reach them more.\n\n\nThe mountains of Hoy, the highest of the Orkney Islands, rise abruptly\nout of the ocean to an elevation of fifteen hundred feet, and terminate\non one side in a cliff, sheer and stupendous, as if the mountain had\nbeen cut down through the middle, and the severed portion of it buried\nin the sea. Immediately on the landward side of this precipice lies a\nsoft green valley, embosomed among huge black cliffs, where the sound of\nthe human voice, or the report of a gun, is reverberated among the\nrocks, where it gradually dies away into faint and fainter echoes.\n\nThe hills are intersected by deep and dreary glens, where the hum of the\nworld is never heard, and the only voices of life are the bleat of the\nlamb and the shriek of the eagle;\u2014even the sounds of inanimate nature\nare of the most doleful kind. The breeze wafts not on its wings the\nwhisper of the woodland; for there are no trees in the island, and the\nroar of the torrent-stream and the sea\u2019s eternal moan for ever sadden\nthese solitudes of the world.\n\nThe ascent of the mountains is in some parts almost perpendicular, and\nin all exceedingly steep; but the admirer of nature in her grandest and\nmost striking aspects will be amply compensated for his toil, upon\nreaching their summits, by the magnificent prospect which they afford.\nTowards the north and east, the vast expanse of ocean, and the islands,\nwith their dark heath-clad hills, their green vales, and gigantic\ncliffs, expand below as far as the eye can reach. The view towards the\nsouth is bounded by the lofty mountains of Scarabin and Morven, and by\nthe wild hills of Strathnaver and Cape Wrath, stretching towards the\nwest. In the direction of the latter, and far away in mid-ocean, may be\nseen, during clear weather, a barren rock, called Sule Skerry, which\nsuperstition in former days had peopled with mermaids and monsters of\nthe deep. This solitary spot had been long known to the Orcadians as the\nhaunt of seafowl and seals, and was the scene of their frequent shooting\nexcursions, though such perilous adventures have been long since\nabandoned. It is associated in my mind with a wild tale, which I have\nheard in my youth, though I am uncertain whether or not the\ncircumstances which it narrates are yet in the memory of living men.\n\nOn the opposite side of the mountainous island of which I speak, and\ndivided from it by a frith of several miles in breadth, lie the flat\nserpentine shores of the principal island or mainland, where, upon a\ngentle slope, at a short distance from the sea-beach, may still be\ntraced the site of a cottage, once the dwelling of a humble couple of\nthe name of Waters, belonging to that class of small proprietors which\nforms the connecting link betwixt the gentry and the peasantry.\n\nTheir only child Helen, at the time to which my narrative refers, was\njust budding into womanhood; and though uninitiated into what would now\nbe considered the indispensable requisites of female education, was yet\nnot altogether unaccomplished for the simple times in which she lived;\nand, though a child of nature, had a grace beyond the reach of art,\nuntaught and unteachable. There was a softness and delicacy in her whole\ndemeanour, never looked for and seldom found in the humble sphere of\nlife to which she belonged. Yet her beauty did not startle or surprise,\nbut stole over the heart almost insensibly, like the gentle fall of the\nsummer evenings of her own native isles, and, like that, produced in the\nbeholder an emotion almost allied to sadness.\n\nSuch a being was not likely to be appreciated by the rude and\ncommonplace minds by whom she was surrounded, and with whom a rosy cheek\nand a laughing eye constitute the _beau-ideal_ of woman; but she\nawakened a world of romance in one young heart, with which her own\ngentle bosom shared the feelings she inspired.\n\nHenry Graham, the lover of Helen Waters, was the son of a small\nproprietor in the neighbourhood; and being of the same humble rank with\nherself, and, though not rich, removed from poverty, their views were\nundisturbed by the dotage of avarice or the fears of want, and the\nsmiles of approving friends seemed to await their approaching union.\n\nThe days of courtship were drawing towards a close, and the period of\ntheir marriage was at last condescended upon by the bride. Among the\nmiddling and lower classes of society in the Orkneys, it is customary\nfor the bridegroom to invite the wedding-guests in person; for which\npurpose, a few days previous to the marriage, young Graham, accompanied\nby his friend, took a boat and proceeded to the island of Hoy, to\nrequest the attendance of a family residing there; which done, on the\nfollowing day they joined a party of young men upon a shooting excursion\nto Rackwick, a village romantically situated on the opposite side of the\nisland. They left the house of their friends on a bright, calm, autumnal\nmorning, and began to traverse the wild and savage glens which intersect\nthe hills, where their progress might be guessed at by the reports of\ntheir guns, which gradually became faint and fainter among the\nmountains, and at last died away altogether in the distance.\n\nThat night and the following day passed, and they did not return to the\nhouse of their friends; but the weather being extremely fine, it was\nsupposed they had extended their excursion to the opposite coast of\nCaithness, or to some of the neighbouring islands, so that their absence\ncreated no alarm whatever.\n\nThe same conjectures also quieted the anxieties of the bride, until the\nmorning previous to that of the marriage, when her alarm could no longer\nbe suppressed. A boat was manned in all haste, and dispatched to Hoy in\nquest of them, but did not return during that day nor the succeeding\nnight.\n\nThe morning of the wedding-day dawned at last, bright and beautiful, but\nstill no intelligence arrived of the bridegroom and his party; and the\nhope which lingered to the last, that they would still make their\nappearance in time, had prevented the invitations from being postponed,\nso that the marriage party began to assemble about mid-day.\n\nWhile the friends were all in amazement, and the bride in a most\npitiable state, a boat was seen crossing from Hoy, and hope once more\nbegan to revive; but, upon landing her passengers, they turned out to be\nthe members of the family invited from that island, whose surprise at\nfinding how matters stood was equal to that of the other friends.\n\nMeantime all parties united in their endeavours to cheer the poor bride;\nfor which purpose it was agreed that the company should remain, and that\nthe festivities should go on,\u2014an arrangement to which the guests the\nmore willingly consented, from a lingering hope that the absentees would\nstill make their appearance, and partly with a view to divert in some\nmeasure the intense and painful attention of the bride from the untoward\ncircumstance; while she, on the other hand, from feelings of\nhospitality, exerted herself, though with a heavy heart, to make her\nguests as comfortable as possible; and, by the very endeavour to put on\nan appearance of tranquillity, acquired so much of the reality as to\nprevent her from sinking altogether under the weight of her fears.\n\nMeantime the day advanced, the festivities went on, and the glass began\nto circulate so freely, that the absence of the principal actor of the\nscene was so far forgotten, that at length the music struck up, and\ndancing commenced with all the animation which that exercise inspires\namong the natives of Scotland.\n\nThings were going on in this way, when, towards night, and during one of\nthe pauses of the dance, a loud rap was heard at the door, and a gleam\nof hope was seen to lighten every face, when there entered, not the\nbridegroom and his party, but a wandering lunatic, named Annie Fae, well\nknown and not a little feared in all that country-side. Her garments\nwere little else than a collection of fantastic and party-coloured rags,\nbound close around her waist with a girdle of straw, and her head had no\nother covering than the dark tangled locks that hung, snake-like, over\nher wild and weather-beaten face, from which peered forth her small,\ndeep-sunk eyes, gleaming with the baleful light of insanity.\n\nBefore the surprise and dismay excited by her sudden and unwelcome\nappearance had subsided, she addressed the company in the following wild\nand incoherent manner:\u2014\n\n\u201cHech, sirs, but here\u2019s a merry meeting indeed,\u2014a fine company, by my\nfaith; plenty o\u2019 gude meat and drink here, and nae expense spared!\nAweel, it\u2019s no a\u2019 lost neither; this blithe bridal will mak a braw\nburial, and the same feast will do for baith. But what\u2019s the folk a\u2019\nglowering at? I\u2019se warrant now ye\u2019re cursing Annie Fae for spoiling your\nsport. But ye ken I maun just say my say, and that being done, I\u2019ll no\ndetain you langer, but jog on my journey; only I wad just hint, that,\nfor decency\u2019s sake, ye suld stop that fine fiddling and dancing; for ye\nmay weel believe that thae kind o\u2019 things gie nae great pleasure to the\ndead!\u201d\n\nHaving thus delivered herself, she made a low curtsey, and brushed out\nof the house, leaving the company in that state of painful excitement\nwhich, in such circumstances, even the ravings of a poor deranged\nwanderer could not fail to produce.\n\nIn this state we, too, will leave them for the present, and proceed with\nthe party who set off on the preceding day in search of the bridegroom\nand his friends. The latter were traced to Rackwick; but there no\nintelligence could be gained, except that, some days previous, a boat,\nhaving on board several sportsmen, had been seen putting off from the\nshore, and sailing away in the direction of Sule Skerry.\n\nThe weather continuing fine, the searching party hired a large boat, and\nproceeded to that remote and solitary rock, upon which, as they neared\nit, they could discover nothing, except swarms of seals, which\nimmediately began to flounder towards the water-edge. Upon landing, a\nlarge flock of sea-fowl arose from the centre of the rock with a\ndeafening scream; and upon approaching the spot, they beheld, with dumb\namazement and horror, the dead bodies of the party of whom they had come\nin search, but so mangled and disfigured by the seals and sea-fowl, that\nthey could barely be recognised.\n\nIt appeared that these unfortunates, upon landing, had forgot their guns\nin the boat, which had slipt from her fastenings, and left them upon the\nrock, where they had at last perished of cold and hunger.\n\nFancy can but feebly conceive, and still less can words describe, the\nfeelings with which the lost men must have beheld their bark drifting\naway over the face of the waters, and found themselves abandoned in the\nvast solitude of the ocean. Their sensations must have resembled his who\nwakens in the grave from a death-like trance, to find himself buried\nalive!\n\nWith what agony must they have gazed upon the distant sails, gliding\naway over the deep, but keeping far aloof from the rock of desolation,\nand have heard the shrieks which they sent over the flood, in the vain\nhope of their reaching some distant ship, mocked by the doleful scream\nof the sea-fowl! How must their horrors have been aggravated by the\nfar-off view of their native hills, lifting their lonely peaks above the\nwave, and awakening the dreadful consciousness that they were still\nwithin the grasp of humanity, yet no arm stretched forth to save them;\nwhile the sun was riding high in the heavens, and the sea basking in his\nbeams below, and nature looking with reckless smiles upon their dying\nagonies!\n\nAs soon as the stupor of horror and amazement had subsided, the party\nplaced the dead bodies in their boat, and, crowding all sail, stood for\nthe Orkneys. They landed at night upon the beach, immediately below the\nhouse where the wedding guests were assembled; and there, while they\nwere debating in what manner to proceed, were overheard by the insane\nwanderer, the result of whose visit has already been described.\n\nShe had scarcely left the house, when a low sound of voices was heard\napproaching. An exclamation of joy broke from the bride. She rushed out\nof the house with outstretched arms to embrace her lover, and the next\nmoment, with a fearful shriek, fell upon his corpse! With that shriek\nreason and memory passed away for ever. She was carried to bed\ndelirious, and died towards morning. The bridal was changed into a\nburial, and Helen Waters and her lover slept in the same grave!\n\n\n\n\n LEGEND OF THE LARGE MOUTH.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\n \u201cHere\u2019s a large mouth indeed!\u201d\n SHAKSPEARE\u2014_King John_.\n\nArriving one evening at an inn in Glasgow, I was shown into a room which\nalready contained a promiscuous assemblage of travellers. Amongst these\ngentlemen\u2014_commercial_ gentlemen chiefly\u2014there was one whose features\nstruck me as being the most ill-favoured I had ever beheld. He was a\nlarge, pursy old man, with a forehead \u201cvillanous low,\u201d hair like\nbell-ropes, eyes the smallest and most porkish of all possible eyes, and\na nose which showed no more prominence in a side-view than that of the\nmoon, as exhibited in her first quarter upon a freemason\u2019s apron. All\nthese monstrosities were, however, as beauties, as absolute perfections,\ncompared with the mouth\u2014the enormous mouth, which, grinning beneath,\nformed a sort of rustic basement to the whole superstructure of his\nfacial horrors. This mouth\u2014if mouth it could be called, which bore so\nlittle resemblance to the mouths of mankind in general\u2014turned full upon\nme as I entered, and happening at the moment to be employed in a yawn,\nactually seemed as if it would have willingly received me into its\nprodigious crater, and consigned me to the fate of Empedocles, without\nso much as a shoe being left to tell the tale.\n\nThe company of a traveller\u2019s room is generally very stiff, every man\nsitting by his own table in his own corner, with his back turned upon\nthe rest. It was not so, however, on the present occasion. The most of\nthe present company seemed to have been so long together in the hotel as\nto have become very gracious with each other; while any recent comers,\nfinding themselves plumped into a society already thawed and commingled,\nhad naturally entered into the spirit of the rest. Soon discovering how\nmatters stood, I joined in the conversation, and speedily found that the\nman with the large mouth was one of the most polite and agreeable of\nmankind. He was one of those old, experienced gentlemen of the road, who\nknow everything that is necessary to be known, and are never at a loss\nabout anything. His jokes, his anecdotes, his remarks, were all\nexcellent, and kept the rest bound, as it were, in a chain. The best of\nhim was, that he seemed quite at ease on the subject of his mouth.\n\nNo doubt he was conscious of his preternatural ugliness\u2014for whatever may\nbe said about the blinding effect of self-love, and so forth, I hold\nthat the most of people know pretty nearly how they stand as to personal\nattractions; but he had none of that boggling, unsteady, uncomplacent\ndeportment, so remarkable in the generality of ill-looking people. On\nthe contrary, there was an air of perfect self-satisfaction about him,\nwhich told that he either was so familiar with the dreadful fact as to\nmind it not, or that he was a thorough man of the world, above\nconsidering so trivial a particular, or that he was rich, and could\nafford to be detested. It was curious, however, that even while he\nalmost convulsed the rest with his jokes, he never laughed in the least\nhimself. He evidently dared not; the guffaw of such a man must have\nproduced consequences not to be calmly contemplated. Part, indeed, of\nthe humorous effect of his conversation arose from the cautious way in\nwhich he managed his mouth. A small aperture at one side, bearing the\nsame proportion to the whole that the wicket of a carriage-gate does to\nthe whole gate itself, served for the emission of his words. Anything\nelse would have been a mere waste of lip.\n\nOn my ordering refreshment, I was informed by the company, that in\nconsideration of this being the anniversary of a distinguished\nhistorical event, they had agreed to sup together in a rather more\nformal way than usual, and that they would be happy if I would join\nthem. Having assented to the proposal, I began to reflect with some\nanxiety upon the probable conduct of the Mouth at table. How so\nextraordinary a feature would behave, what it would ask for, after what\nmanner it would masticate, and, above all, how much it would devour,\nwere to me subjects of the most interesting speculation. The wicket\nwon\u2019t do there (thought I to myself), or I\u2019m much mistaken. Yet\nagain,\u2014so ran my thoughts,\u2014many large men have been known to eat very\nlittle, while your true devourers are found to be lean, shrivelled\ncreatures, who do not seem to be ever the better of it. \u201cA large mouth,\u201d\nsays the Scottish proverb, \u201chas always a good luck for its meat.\u201d That\nmay be, thought I, and yet the large mouth may be quite indifferent to\nwhat it is so sure of getting. All kinds of ideas connected with this\nsubject ran through my mind; but in the end I found it all a riddle. The\nMouth might prove either gluttonous or abstemious, without exciting more\nsurprise by the one event than by the other.\n\nBy-and-by some one asked a waiter if supper was nearly ready, and on an\nanswer in the affirmative being given, I observed the Mouth suddenly\nbustle up, and assume an air of eager promptitude that almost seemed to\ndecide the question. The man rose, and, going to a corner of the room\nwhere his greatcoat was hanging, brought forth a small package, which he\nproceeded to untie at a side-table. The only article it contained was a\nspoon, which he immediately brought forward and laid upon the table,\naccompanying the action with an air that might have befitted a surgeon\nin arranging his instruments for an operation. I had no longer any doubt\nas to the gastronomical character of the Mouth, for here was an article\nthat might have served in the nursery of Glumdalclitch. It was an\nantique silver implement, with a short handle, and a rim about four\ninches in diameter, like an ordinary saucer. Observing the curiosity of\nthe company to be strongly excited, the old man showed it round with\ngood-natured politeness, telling us that he had been so long accustomed\nat home to the use of this goodly article, that he could now hardly\ndiscuss either soup or dessert without it, and therefore made a point of\ncarrying it along with him in his travels.\n\n\u201cBut, indeed, gentlemen,\u201d said he, \u201cwhy should I make this a matter of\ndelicacy with you? The truth is, the spoon has a history, and my\nmouth\u2014none of the least, you see\u2014has also a history. If you feel any\ncuriosity upon these points, I will give you a biographical account of\nthe one, and an autobiographical account of the other, to amuse you till\nsupper is ready.\u201d\n\nTo this frank proposal we all cordially agreed, and the old man, sitting\ndown with the spoon in his hand, commenced a narrative which I shall\nhere give in the third person.\n\nHis mouth was the chieftain and representative of a long ancestral line\nof illustrious and most extensive mouths, which had flourished for\ncenturies at a place called Tullibody. According to tradition, the mouth\ncame into the family by marriage. An ancestor of the speaker wooed, and\nwas about to wed, a lady of great personal attractions, but no fortune,\nwhen his father interfered, and induced him, by the threat of\ndisinheritation on the one hand, and the temptation of great wealth on\nthe other, to marry another dame, the heiress of a large fortune and\nlarge mouth, both bequeathed to her by her grandfather, one of the\ncelebrated \u201ckail-suppers of Fife.\u201d When his resolution was communicated\nto the tocherless lady, she was naturally very much enraged, and wished\nthat the mouth of her rival might descend, in all its latitude, to the\nlatest generation of her faithless swain\u2019s posterity; after which she\ntook her bed\u2014and married another lover, her _second-best_, next week, by\nway of revenge.\n\nThe country people, who pay great attention to the sayings of ladies\ncondemned to wear the willow, waited anxiously for the fulfilment of her\nmalediction, and accordingly shook their heads and had their own\nthoughts, when the kail-supper\u2019s descendant brought forth a son whose\nmouth, even in his swaddling-clothes, reflected back credit on her own.\nThe triumph of the ill-wisher was considered complete, when the second,\nthe third, and all the other children, were found to be distinguished by\nthis feature; and what gave the triumph still more poignancy was, that\nthe daughters were found to be no more exempted than the sons from the\nfamily doom. In the second generation, moreover, instead of being\nsoftened or diluted away, the mouth rather increased, and so it had done\nin every successive generation since that time. The race having been\nvery prolific, it was now spread so much that there was scarcely a face\nin Tullibody or the neighbourhood altogether free of the contagion; so\nthat the person addressing us, who had his permanent residence there,\ncould look round him upon several hundreds of kindred mouths, with all\nthe patriarchal feelings of the chief of a large Highland clan.\n\nIf there had been any disposition in the family to treat their fate\nill-humouredly, it would have been neutralised by the luck which\nevidently accompanied the introduction and transmission of this singular\nfeature. So far, however, from entertaining any grudge or regret upon\nthe subject, it had been the habit of the family to treat it as a\ncapital joke, and to be always the first to laugh at it themselves. So\nmuch was this the case, that a wealthy representative of the family,\nabout a century ago, founded, not an hospital or a school, but a\n_spoon_, which should be handed down from mouth to mouth as a practical\nand traditionary jest upon the family feature, and, though not entailed,\nbe regarded, he hoped, as a thing never to be parted with for any\nconsideration, unless fate should capriciously contract the mouths of\nhis descendants to such a degree as to render its use inconvenient. This\nelegant symbol, after passing through the hands of a long train of\npersons, who had each been more able than another to use it effectively,\ncame at length into the possession of the individual now addressing us\u2014a\nperson evidently qualified to do full justice to the intentions of his\nancestor.\n\nIt was, therefore, with the apprehension of something awful, that after\nthe conclusion of the story, and the introduction of supper, I took a\nplace at the well-spread board. In sitting down, I cast a look at the\nMouth. It was hovering, like a prodigious rainbow, over the horizon of\nthe table, uncertain where to pitch itself. There was an air of terrible\nresolution about it, which made me almost tremble for what was to ensue.\nIt was evident that we were to have \u201ca scene.\u201d\n\nThe Mouth\u2014for so it might be termed _par excellence_\u2014was preferred by\nacclamation to the head of the table,\u2014a distinction awarded, as I\nafterwards understood, not so much on account of its superior greatness,\nas in consideration of its seniority, though I am sure it deserved the\n_pas_ on both accounts. The inferior and junior mouths all sat down at\ndifferent distances from the great Mouth, like satellites round a mighty\nplanet. It uttered a short, gentleman-like grace, and then began to ask\nits neighbours what they would have. Some asked for one thing, some for\nanother, and in a short time all were served except itself. For its own\npart it complained of weak appetite, and expressed a fear that it should\nnot be able to take anything at all. I could scarcely credit the\ndeclaration. It added, in a singularly prim tone of voice, that, for its\npart, it admired the taste of Beau Tibbs in Goldsmith\u2014\u201cSomething nice,\nand a little will do. I hate your immense loads of meat; that\u2019s country\nall over.\u201d Hereupon, I plucked up courage, and ventured to look at it\nagain. It was still terrible, though placid. Its expression was that of\na fresh and strong warrior, who hesitates a moment to consider into what\npart of a thick battle he shall plunge himself, or what foes he shall\nselect as worthy of particular attack. Its look belied its word; but\nagain I was thrown back by its words belying its look. It said to a\nneighbour of mine, that it thought it might perhaps manage the half of\nthe tail of one of the herrings at his elbow, if he would be so kind as\ncarve. Was there ever such a puzzling mouth! I was obliged again to give\ncredit to words; yet again was I disappointed. My neighbour thinking it\nabsurd to mince such a matter as a \u201cGlasgow magistrate,\u201d handed up a\nwhole one to the chairman. The Mouth received it with a torrent of\nrefusals and remonstrances, in the midst of which it began to eat, and I\nheard it continue to mumble forth expostulations, in a fainter and\nfainter tone, at the intervals of bites, for a few seconds; till,\nbehold, the whole corporate substance of the burghal dignitary had\nmelted away to a long meagre skeleton! When done, its remonstrances\nchanged into a wonder how it should have got through so plump a fish; it\nwas perfectly astonishing; it had never eaten a whole herring in its\nlife before; it was an unaccountable miracle.\n\nI did not hear the latter sentences of its wonderments; but, towards the\nconclusion, heard the word \u201cfowl\u201d distinctly pronounced. The fowls lying\nto my hand, I found myself under the necessity of entering into\nconference with it, though I felt a mortal disinclination to look it in\nthe mouth, lest I should betray some symptom of emotion inconsistent\nwith good manners. Drawing down my features into a resolute pucker, and\nmentally vowing I would speak to it though it should blast me, I cast my\neyes slowly and cautiously towards it, and made inquiry as to its choice\nof bits. In return for my interrogation, I received a polite convulsion,\nintended for a smile, and a request, out of which I only caught the\nimportant words, \u201cbreast\u201d and \u201cwing.\u201d I made haste to execute the order;\nand, on handing away the desired viands, received from the mouth another\ngrateful convulsion, and then, to my great relief, all was over!\n\nWell, thought I, at this juncture, a herring and a fragment of fowl are\nno such great matters; perhaps the Mouth will prove quite a natural\nmouth after all. In brief space, however, the chairman\u2019s plate was\nannounced as again empty; and I heard it receive, discuss, and answer\nvarious proposals of replenishment made to it by its more immediate\nneighbours. I thought I should escape; but no\u2014the fowl was really so\ngood that it thought it would trouble me for another breast, if I would\nbe so kind, &c. I was of course obliged to look at it again, in order to\nreceive its request in proper form; when neglecting this time my former\npreparations of face, I had nearly committed myself by looking it full\nin the mouth with my eyes wide open, and without having screwed my\nfacial muscles into their former resolute astringency. However,\ninstantly apprehending the amount of its demands, my glance at the Mouth\nfortunately required to be only momentary, and I found immediate relief\nfrom all danger in the ensuing business of carving. Yet even that glance\nwas in itself a dreadful trial\u2014it sufficed to inform me that the Mouth\nwas now more terrible than before\u2014that there was a fearful vivacity\nabout it, a promptitude, an alacrity, and energy, which it did not\nformerly exhibit. Should this increase, thought I, it will soon be truly\ndreadful. I handed up a whole fowl to it, in a sort of desperation. It\nmade no remonstrances, as in the case of the herring, at the abundance\nof my offering. So far from that, it seemed to forgive my disobedience\nwith the utmost goodwill; received the fowl, dispatched it with silence\nand celerity, and then began to look abroad for further prey. Indeed, it\nnow began to crack jokes upon itself\u2014a sportive species of suicide. It\nspoke of the spoon; lamented that, after all, there should be no soups\nat table whereon it might have exhibited itself; and finally vowed that\nit would visit the deficiencies of the supper upon the dessert, even\nunto the third and fourth dish of _blancmange_.\n\nThe proprietor of the mouth then laid down the spoon upon the table,\nthere to lie in readiness till such time as he should find knives and\nforks of no farther service\u2014as the Scottish soldiery in former times\nused to lay their shields upon the ground while making use of their\nspears. I now gave up all hopes of the Mouth observing any propriety in\nits future transactions. Having finished my own supper, I resolved to\nset myself down to observe all its sayings and doings. Its placidity was\nnow gone\u2014its air of self-possession lost. New powers seemed to be every\nmoment developing themselves throughout its vast form\u2014new and more\nterrible powers. It was beginning to have a _wild look_! It was evident\nthat it was now _fleshed_\u2014that its naturally savage disposition,\nformerly dormant for want of excitement, was now rising tumultuously\nwithin it\u2014that it would soon perform such deeds as would scare us all!\n\nIt had engaged itself, before I commenced my observations, upon a roast\ngigot of mutton, which happened to lie near it. This it soon nearly\nfinished. It then cast a look of fearful omen at a piece of cold beef,\nwhich lay immediately beyond, and which, being placed within reach by\nsome kind neighbour, it immediately commenced to, with as much\nfierceness as it had just exemplified in the case of the mutton. The\nbeef also was soon laid waste, and another look of extermination was\nforthwith cast at a broken pigeon-pie, which lay still farther off.\nHereupon the eye had scarcely alighted, when the man nearest it, with\nlaudable promptitude, handed it upwards. Scarcely was it laid on the\naltar of destruction, when it disappeared too, and a fourth, and a\nfifth, and a sixth look, were successively cast at other dishes, which\nthe different members of the party as promptly sent away, and which the\nMouth as promptly dispatched.\n\nBy this time all the rest of the party were lying upon their oars,\nobserving with leisurely astonishment the progress of the surviving,\nand, as it appeared to them, endless feeder. He went on, rejoicing in\nhis strength, unheeding their idleness and wonder, his very soul\napparently engrossed in the grand business of devouring. They seemed to\nenter into a sort of tacit compact, or agreement, to indulge and\nfacilitate him in his progress, by making themselves, as it were, his\nservitors. Whatever dish he looked at, therefore, over the wide expanse\nof the table, immediately disappeared from its place. One after another,\nthey trooped off towards the head of the table, like the successive\nbrigades which Wellington dispatched, at Waterloo, against a particular\nfield of French artillery; and still, dish after dish, like said\nbrigades, came successively away, broken, diminished, annihilated. Fish,\nflesh, and fowl disappeared at the glance of that awful eye, as the\nRoman fleet withered and vanished before the grand burning-glass of\nArchimedes. The end of all things seemed at hand. The Mouth was arrived\nat a perfect transport of voracity! It seemed no more capable of\nrestraining itself than some great engine, full of tremendous machinery,\nwhich cannot stop of itself. It had no self-will. It was an\nunaccountable being. It was a separate creature, independent of the\nsoul. It was not a human thing at all. It was everything that was\nsuperhuman\u2014everything that was immense\u2014inconceivably enormous! All\nobjects seemed reeling and toppling on towards it, like the foam-bells\nupon a mighty current, floating silently on towards the orifice of some\nprodigious sea-cave. It was like the whirlpool of Ma\u00eblstrom, everything\nthat comes within the vortex of which, for miles around, is sure of\nbeing caught, inextricably involved, whirled round and round and round,\nand then down that monstrous gulph\u2014that mouth of the mighty ocean, the\nlips of which are overwhelming waves, whose teeth are prodigious rocks,\nand whose belly is the great abyss!\n\nHere I grew dizzy, fainted, and\u2014I never saw the Mouth again.\n\n\n\n\n RICHARD SINCLAIR;\n _OR, THE POOR PRODIGAL IN THE AISLE_.\n\n BY THOMAS AIRD.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n\nWith many noble qualities\u2014firmness, piety, integrity, and a thorough\naffection for his family\u2014the father of the poor prodigal, Richard\nSinclair, had many of the hard points of the Scottish character; a want\nof liberality in his estimate of others, particularly of their religious\nqualities; a jealousy about his family prerogative, when it was needless\nto assert it; and a liking for discipline, or, as he styled it, nurture,\nwithout tact to modify its applications. Towards his eldest son\u2014a shy\nand affectionate youth\u2014his behaviour, indeed, seemed distinctly opposite\nto what we may characterise as its usual expression\u2014overbearing gravity.\nWithout this son\u2019s advice, he never ventured on any speculation that\nseemed doubtful. He was softly amenable to the mild wisdom of the lad,\nand paid it a quiet deference, of which, indeed, he sometimes appeared\nto be ashamed, as a degree of weakness in himself. But the youth had\nnever disobeyed his parents\u2019 will in any one particular; he was grave\nand gentle; and his father, who had been brought up amidst a large and\nrugged family, and was thus accustomed to rather stormy usages, was now\nat a loss, in matters of rebuke, how to meet this new species of\nwarfare, which lay in mild and quiet habits, and eventually became\nafraid of the censure which was felt in the affectionate silence of his\neldest son.\n\nThis superiority might have offended old Sinclair\u2019s self-love; but the\nyouth, as already stated, made ample amends, by paying in his turn a\nscrupulous and entire deference to his parent, whom he thus virtually\ncontrolled, as a good wife knows to rule her husband, by not seeming to\nrule at all. From this subdued tone of his favourite prerogative in the\nfather before us there was a reaction\u2014something like a compensation to\nthe parental authority\u2014which began to press too hard upon his second son\nRichard, who, being of a bolder character than his brother, was less\nscrupulously dealt with; besides that the froward temperament of this\nyounger boy frequently offended against what his father honestly deemed\npropriety and good rule.\n\nHe lost no opportunity, when Richard had done anything in the slightest\ndegree wrong, of checking him with disproportioned censure, and of\nreminding him of what he owed to his parents; and this was repeated,\ntill bearing blame in the boy became a substitute for gratitude\u2014till the\nsense of obligation, instead of being a special call to love, was\ndistinctly felt to be an intolerable burden. From all these\ncircumstances there naturally grew up a shyness betwixt father and son,\nwhich was unintentionally aggravated by Richard\u2019s mother, who, aware of\nher husband\u2019s severe temper, tried to qualify it by her own soft words\nand deeds of love. This only brought out the evil more distinctly in its\nhard outline; and the very circumstance that she constantly tried to\nexplain into good his father\u2019s austerity became her own refutation, and\nstamped that austerity as a great degree of tyranny.\n\nHome thus became associated with disagreeable feelings to young Richard\nSinclair; who, being a boy of a giddy character, and naturally\nself-willed, could not cling to the good, despite of the admixture of\nevil. He neglected his books, fell into gross irregularities; and the\nadmonitions of his father, rendered useless from the above miserable\nsystem of discipline, were now, when most needed, thoroughly despised.\nThe death of his elder brother, by which he was left an only son,\nsoftened for a while the harsh intercourse which subsisted between\nRichard and his father, and checked the youth for a little in his bad\nhabits. But vice overcame him anew; and, growing daily worse, he at\nlength completed the character of the prodigal, by running off to sea,\nhardening his heart against his father\u2019s worth, and heedless of the soft\naffection of his mother.\n\nThe hardships of a sea-faring life, heightened by a series of peculiar\nmisfortunes, still farther aggravated by a long course of bad health,\ngradually subdued the young prodigal\u2019s heart; and after the lapse of\nseveral years we find him on his way returning to his native village,\nclad in the meanest attire, slow and irregular in his step; his\ncountenance, besides being of a dead yellow hue from late jaundice, thin\nand worn to the bone; yet improved in his moral nature, caring not for\npride, ready to forgive, and anxious to be forgiven; and, above all,\nyearning to confess his crimes and sorrows to a mother\u2019s unchanging\nlove.\n\nAbout the noon of an October day, he reached the churchyard of his\nnative parish, his heart impelling him first to visit the burying-ground\nof his family, under the fear, not the less striking because altogether\nvague, that he might there see a recent grave; for he had heard nothing\nof his parents since his first departure to sea. As he entered the\ngraveyard by a small postern, he saw a funeral coming in by the main\ngate on the opposite side; and wishing not to be observed, he turned\ninto a small plantation of poplars and silver firs, which hid the place\nof graves from the view of the clergyman\u2019s manse windows. Onward came\nthe sable group slowly to the middle of the churchyard, where lay,\nindicating the deep parallel grave beside it, the heap of fat, clammy\nearth, from which two or three ragged boys were taking handfuls, to see,\nfrom its restless crumbling, whether it was the dust of the wicked,\nwhich, according to a popular belief, never lies still for a moment. The\ndark crowd took their places round the grave; a little bustle was heard\nas the coffin was uncovered; it was lowered by the creaking cords, and\nagain the heads of the company were all narrowly bent over it for a\nmoment. Not a sound was heard in the air, save the flitting wing of some\nlittle bird among the boughs; the ruffling of another, as, with bill\nengulfed in its feathers, it picked the insects from its skin; and the\nmelancholy cry of a single chaffinch, which foretold the coming rain.\n\nIn natural accordance with the solemnity of the mourners before him, our\nyouth, as he stood in the plantation, raised his hat; and when the crowd\ndrew back to give room to the sexton and his associates to dash in the\nearth, he leant upon the wall, looking earnestly over it, to recognise,\nif possible, the prime mourner. At the head of the grave, more forward a\nlittle than the others, and apart in his sad privilege, stood a man,\napparently about sixty years of age, of a strong frame,\u2014in which yet\nthere was trembling,\u2014and a fine open bald forehead; and, notwithstanding\nthat the face of the mourner was compressed with the lines of unusual\naffliction, and bowed down over his hat, which with both hands was\npressed upon his mouth, Richard saw him and knew him but too well\u2014Oh,\nGod! his own father! And wildly the youth\u2019s eyes rambled around the\nthrong, to penetrate the mystery of his own loss, till on his dim\neyeballs reeled the whole group, now scattered and melted to mist, now\ngathered and compressed into one black, shapeless heap.\n\nBut now the thick air began to twinkle, as it still darkened; and the\nrain, which to the surprise of all had been kept up so long, began to\nfall out in steep-down streams from the low-hung clouds, driving the\nblack train from the half-finished grave, to mix with a throng of other\npeople, apparently assembling for public worship, who ran along the\nsides of the church in haste to reach the doors. The bell began to toll,\nbut ceased almost in a minute; the clergyman hurried by in his white\nbands; and before Richard could leave the plantation and advance into\nthe churchyard,\u2014perhaps for the purpose of inquiring who was the person\njust entombed,\u2014every one was in save that bareheaded man\u2014God bless\nhim!\u2014who, heedless of the rain, still stood by the sexton, whose spade\nwas now beating round the wet turf of the compacted grave. The young\nprodigal had not the heart, under a most awful sense of his own errors,\nwhich now overcame him, to advance to his afflicted father. On the\ncontrary, to avoid his observation, he slunk away behind the church, and\nby a door, which likewise admitted to an old staircase leading to a\nfamily division of the gallery, he got into a back aisle, thickly\npeopled with spectral marbles, which, through two or three small panes,\nadmitted a view of the interior of the church. \u201cHave I lived not to\nknow,\u201d said he to himself, \u201cwhen comes God\u2019s most holy Sabbath-day?\nAssuredly, this loss of reckoning, this confusion of heart, is of very\nhell itself. But hold\u2014to-day is Monday; then it must be the day after a\nsolemn commemoration, in this place, of Christ\u2019s bleeding sacrifice for\nmen. I shall sit me down on this slab a while, and see if there may be\nany good thing for me\u2014any gleam of the glorious shield that wards off\nevil thoughts and the fears of the soul\u2014any strong preparation of faith\nto take me up by the hand, and lead me through my difficulties. At all\nevents, I shall try to pray with the good for the mourners, that claim\nfrom me a thousand prayers: and God rest that dead one!\u201d\n\nOwing to the unusual darkness in the church, the twenty-third psalm was\nchosen by the clergyman, as one that could be sung by most of the\ncongregation without referring to the book; and its beautiful pastoral\ndevotion suited well with the solemn dedication which yesterday had been\nmade of a little flock to the care of the Great Shepherd, and with their\nhopes of His needful aid. And the sweet voices of the young, who in\nearly piety had vowed themselves to God, seemed to have caught the\nassured and thrilling song of the redeemed; and their white robes, as\nthey rose to pray, twinkled like glimpses of angels\u2019 parting wings,\nbringing home more deeply to the heart of the poor youth in the aisle a\nsense of his misery as an alien and an outcast from the ordinances of\nsalvation.\n\nRichard made an effort to attend to the instructions of the clergyman;\nbut his heart was soon borne away from attention; and so anxious did he\nbecome in the new calculation, which of his father\u2019s family it might be\nwhom he had just seen interred, that he could not refrain from going out\nbefore the church windows and looking at the new grave. Heedless of\nbeing seen, he measured it by stepping, and was convinced, from its\nlength, that either his mother or his sister Mary must be below. \u201cGod\nforbid!\u201d he ejaculated, \u201cthat it should be my poor mother\u2019s grave! that\nshe should be gone for ever, ere I have testified my sense of all her\nlove!\u201d It struck him, with a new thought of remorse, that he was wishing\nthe other alternative, that it might be his sister Mary\u2019s. And then he\nthought upon early days, when she who was his first playmate led him\nwith her little hand abroad in summer days to the green meadows, and\ntaught him to weave the white-fingered rushes, and introduced him,\nbecause she was his elder, to new sports and playfellows; whose heart,\nhe knew, would brook to lie beneath the cold flowers of the spring\nsooner than give up its love for him, prodigal though he was; and how\nwas the alternative much better, if it was she whom he had lost! As he\nmade these reflections, he was again sauntering into the aisle, where,\nsitting down in his former seat, the sad apprehension that his mother\nwas dead laid siege to his heart. Her mild image, in sainted white, rose\nto his mind\u2019s eye; and she seemed to bend over him, and to say to him,\n\u201cCome, my care-worn boy, and tell me how it has fared with you in the\nhard world?\u201d This vision soon gave place to severe realities; and in\nbitter sadness he thought of her who came each night to his bedside when\nhe was a little child, to kiss him, and arrange the clothes around him\nthat his little body might be warm.\n\nWith a reeling unsteadiness of mind which, from very earnestness, could\nnot be stayed upon its object, he tried to remember his last interview\nwith her, and the tenor of his last letter to her, to find out what kind\nexpressions he had used, till, painfully conscious that he could muster\nlittle to make up an argument of his love, he was again left to guess\nhis mother\u2019s anguish of soul in her last hour over his neglect, and to\ngrapple with the conviction that his own folly had brought her down\nprematurely to the grave. At length his heart, becoming passive amidst\nthe very multitude and activity of reflections that were tugging at it\nfrom all sides, yielded to the weariness which the day\u2019s fatigue, acting\nupon his frame, worn by late fever, had induced, and he fell into a deep\nsleep. When he awoke, the voice of the clergyman had ceased, and all was\nsilence in the church; the interior of which as he looked through the\nsmall pane, he saw had been darkened by the shutting of the\nwindow-boards. Next moment he glanced at the aisle door and saw it\nclosed upon him. Then looking round all over the place, with that\ncalmness which signifies a desperate fear at hand, \u201cHere I am, then!\u201d he\nexclaimed; \u201cif that door be locked upon me, as I dread it is!\u201d\nCautiously he went to it, as if afraid of being resolved in his dreadful\napprehension; and, after first feeling with his hand that the bolt was\ndrawn upon him, he tried to open it, and was made distinctly aware of\nhis horrid captivity. Sharply he turned aghast, as if to address some\none behind him; then turning again to the door, he shook it with all his\nstrength, in the hope that some one might yet be lingering in the\nchurchyard, and so might hear him. No one, however, came to his\nassistance; and now the reflection burst full and black upon him, that\nhere he might remain unheard till he died of hunger. His heart and\ncountenance fell, when he remembered how remote the churchyard was from\nthe village, and from the public way, and how long it was till next\nSunday should come round. From boyhood recollection he remembered well\nthis same aisle door; that it was black on the outside, with here and\nthere large white commas to represent tears; and that it was very thick,\nand yet farther strengthened by being studded with a great number of\nlarge iron nails.\n\n\u201cYet I must try to the very utmost,\u201d he said, \u201ceither to break it or\nmake myself be heard by the inmates of the manse, which is my best\nchance of release.\u201d Accordingly he borrowed as much impetus as the\nbreadth of the vault allowed him, and flung himself upon the door in a\nseries of attacks, shouting at the same time with all his might. But the\ndoor stood firm as a rock despite of him; nor could he distinguish, as\nhe listened from time to time, the slightest symptoms of his having been\nheard by any one. He went to the small grated window which lighted this\nhouse of death, and after watching at it for some time, he saw an old\nwoman pass along a footpath beyond the graveyard, with a bundle of\nsticks upon her head; but she never seemed to hear him when he called\nupon her. A little afterwards he saw two boys sauntering near the gate\nof the burying-ground; but though they heard him when he cried, it only\nmade them scamper off, to all appearance mightily terrified.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\nWith the calmness almost of despair, when the closing eve took away his\nchance of seeing any more stray passengers that day, the poor youth\ngroped his way to his marble slab, and again sat down with a strange\nvacuity of heart, as if it would refuse further thought of his dismal\nsituation. A new fear came over him, however, when daylight thickened at\nthe grated window of his low room, and the white marbles grew dark\naround him. And not without creeping horror did he remember that from\nthis very aisle it was that old Johnny Hogg, a former sexton, was said\nto have seen a strange vile animal issue forth one moonlight night, run\nto a neighbouring stream, and after lapping a little, hurry back,\ntrotting over the blue graves, and slinking through beneath the table\nstones, as if afraid of being shut out from its dull, fat haunt.\nHurriedly, yet with keen inspection, was young Sinclair fascinated to\nlook around him over the dim floor; and while the horrid apprehension\ncame over him, that he was just on the point of seeing the two eyes of\nthe gloating beast, white and muddy from its unhallowed surfeits, he\ndrew up his feet on the slab on which he sat, lest it should crawl over\nthem. A thousand tales\u2014true to boyish impressions\u2014crowded on his mind;\nand by this rapid movement of sympathetic associations, enough of\nitself, while it lasts, to make the stoutest heart nervous, and from the\nirritation of his body from other causes, so much was his mind startled\nfrom its propriety that he thought he heard the devil ranging through\nthe empty pews of the church; and there seemed to flash before his eyes\na thousand hurrying shapes, condemned and fretted ghosts of malignant\naspect, that cannot rest in their wormy graves, and milky-curdled babes\nof untimely birth, that are buried in twilights, never to see the sun.\n\nSoon, however, these silly fears went off, and the tangible evil of his\nsituation again stood forth, and drove him to renew his cries for\nassistance, and his attacks upon the door, ere he should be quite\nenfeebled by hunger and disease. Again he had to sit down, after\nspending his strength in vain.\n\nBy degrees, he fell into a stupor of sleep, peopled with strange dreams,\nin all of which, from natural accordance with his waking conviction that\nhe had that day seen his mother\u2019s burial, her image was the central\nfigure. In danger she was with him\u2014in weariness\u2014in captivity; and when\nhe seemed to be struggling for life, under delirious fever, then, too,\nshe was with him, with her soft assuaging kiss, which was pressed upon\nhis throbbing brow, till his frenzy was cooled away, and he lay becalmed\nin body and in spirit beneath her love. Under the last modification of\nhis dream, he stood by confused waters, and saw his mother drowning in\nthe floods. He heard her faintly call upon his name; her arms were\noutstretched to him for help, as she was borne fast away into the dim\nand wasteful ocean; and, unable to resist this appeal, he stripped off\nhis clothes and plunged in to attempt her rescue. So vivid was this last\npart of his vision, that in actual correspondence with the impulse of\nhis dream, the poor prodigal in the aisle threw off his clothes to the\nshirt to prepare himself for swimming to her deliverance. One or two\ncold ropy drops, which at this moment fell from the vaulted roof upon\nhis neck, woke him distinctly, and recalled him to a recollection of his\nsituation as a captive. But being unable to account for his being naked,\nhe thought that he had lost, or was about to lose, his reason; and,\nweeping aloud like a little child, he threw himself upon his knees, and\ncried to God to keep fast his heart and mind from that dismal\nalienation. He was yet prostrate when he heard feet walking on the\nechoing pavement of the church; and at the same time a light shone round\nabout him, filling the whole aisle, and showing distinctly the black\nletters on the white tombstones.\n\nHis first almost insane thought was that a miraculous answer was given\nto his prayer, and that, like the two apostles of old, he had won an\nangel from heaven to release him from his midnight prison. But the\nfootsteps went away again by the door, and ceased entirely; whilst at\nthe same time the light was withdrawn, leaving him to curse his folly,\nwhich, under an absurd hope, had lost an opportunity of immediate\ndisenthralment. He was about to call aloud, to provoke a return of the\nvisitation, when, through the grated window of the aisle, he observed a\nlight among the graves, which he set himself to reconnoitre. It was one\nof those raw, unwholesome nights, choked up with mists to the very\nthroat, which thicken the breath of old men with asthma, and fill\ngraveyards with gross and rotten beings; and, though probably not more\nthan twenty yards distant, Sinclair could not guess what the light was,\nso tangled and bedimmed was it with the spongy vapours.\n\nAt length he heard human voices, and was glad to perceive the light\napproaching his window. When the men, whom he now saw were two in\nnumber, had got within a few yards of him, he called out,\u2014\n\n\u201cI pray you, good people, be not alarmed; I have been locked up in this\naisle to-day, and must die of hunger in it if you do not get me out. You\ncan get into the church, and I doubt not you will find the key of this\naisle-door in the sexton\u2019s closet. Now, I hope you have enough of\nmanhood not to let me remain in this horrid place from any silly fears\non your part.\u201d\n\nInstead of answering to this demand, the fellows took instantly to their\nheels, followed by the vehement reproaches of our hero, whose heart at\nthe same time was smitten by the bitter reflection, that every chance of\nattracting attention to his captivity was likely to be neutralized by\nthe superstitious fears of such as might hear him from his vault. In a\nfew minutes the light again approached, and after much whispering\nbetwixt themselves, one of the men demanded who and what the prisoner\nwas.\n\n\u201cI can only tell you farther,\u201d replied Sinclair, \u201cthat I fell asleep in\nthis place during the sermon,\u2014no very creditable confession, you will\nobserve,\u2014and that, when I awoke, I found myself fairly entrapped.\u201d\n\nThe men retired round the church, and with joy Richard heard next minute\nthe rattling of the keys as they were taken from the sexton\u2019s closet. In\nanother minute he heard the door of his dungeon tried; it opened\nreadily; and with a start, as if they thought it best at once to rush\nupon their danger, his two deliverers, whom he recognised to be of his\nnative village, advanced a little into the aisle, the foremost bearing\nthe light, which he held forward and aloft, looking below it into the\ninterior, to be aware for what sort of captive they had opened. No\nsooner did Sinclair stand disclosed to them, naked as he was to the\nshirt\u2014for he had not yet got on his clothes\u2014than the sternmost man, with\nsomething between a yell and a groan, bended on his knees, whilst his\nhair bristled in the extremity of his terror, and catching hold of his\ncompanion\u2019s limbs, he looked through betwixt them upon the naked spirit\nof the aisle. The foremost man lowered the light by inches, and cried\naloud,\u2014\n\n\u201cFear-fa\u2019 me! take haud o\u2019 me, Geordie Heart! It\u2019s the yellow dead\nrising from their graves. Eh! there\u2019s the lightning! and is yon no an\nauld crooked man i\u2019 the corner?\u201d\n\n\u201cWill Balmer! Will Balmer! whaur are ye?\u201d cried the other, from between\nWill\u2019s very knees, which, knocking upon the prostrate man\u2019s cheeks, made\nhim chatter and quiver in his wild outcry.\n\n\u201cOh! there\u2019s the lightning again! Gin we could but meet wife and bairns\nance mair!\u201d ejaculated the foremost man.\n\n\u201cLord have mercy on my widow and sma\u2019 family!\u201d echoed the sternmost.\n\n\u201cTout! it\u2019s but the laird\u2019s drucken mulatto after a\u2019!\u201d said the former,\ngathering a little confidence.\n\n\u201cOh, if it were! or but a man wi\u2019 the jaundice, our days might be\nlengthened,\u201d cried the latter.\n\nRichard advanced to explain; but at that moment the dull firmament in\nthe east, which had been lightning from time to time (as often happens\npreviously to very rainy weather), opened with another sheeted blaze of\nwhite fire, the reflection of which on Richard\u2019s yellow face, as he came\nforward, seemed to the terrified rustics a peculiar attribute of his\nnature. With a groan, he in the van tried a backward retreat; but being\nstraitened in the legs, he tumbled over his squatted companion. Leaving\nhis neighbour, however, to sit still upon his knees, he that was the\nforemost man gathered himself up so well, that he crept away on his\nhands and feet, till, getting right below the bell-rope at the end of\nthe church, he ventured to rise and begin to jow it, making the bell\ntoll at an unusual rate. The inmates of the manse were immediately\nalarmed; and first came the minister\u2019s man, who demanded the meaning of\nsuch ill-timed, ringing.\n\n\u201cOh! Tam Jaffray! Tam Jaffray! sic a night\u2019s in this kirkyard! If sae be\nit\u2019s ordeened that I may ring an\u2019 live, I\u2019ll haud to the tow. Oh! Tam\nJaffray! Tam Jaffray! what\u2019s become o\u2019 puir Geordie Heart? If the\nWandering Jew o\u2019 Jerusalem, or the Yellow Fever frae Jamaica, is no\ndancing mother-naked in the aisle, then it behoves to be the dead rising\nfrae their graves. I trust we\u2019ll a\u2019 be found prepared! Rin for a\nlantern, Tam.\u2014Eh! look to that lightning!\u201d\n\nA light was soon brought from the manse; and a number of people from the\nvillage having joined the original alarmists, a considerable muster\nadvanced to the aisle door just as Sinclair was stepping from it. Taking\nthe light from one of the countrymen, he returned to the relief of the\npoor villager, who was still upon his knees, and who, with great\ndifficulty, was brought to comprehend an explanation of the whole\naffair. The crowd made way as Sinclair proceeded to leave the graveyard;\nbut whether it was that they were indignant because the neighbourhood\nhad been so much disturbed, or whether they considered that proper game\nwas afoot for sportive insolence, they began to follow and shout after\nhim\u2014\n\n\u201cCome back, ye yellow neegur! we\u2019ll no send ye!\u2014stop him! Come back, ye\nsquiff, and we\u2019ll gie ye a dead subject!\u2014Stop the resurrectionist!\u2014After\nhim, gie him a paik, and see if he\u2019s but a batch o\u2019 badger skins dyed\nyellow\u2014hurrah!\u201d\n\nSinclair wishing, for several reasons, to be clear at once of the mob,\nwas in the act of springing over the dyke into the plantation already\nmentioned, when he was struck by a stick on the head, which brought him\nback senseless to the ground. The crowd was instantly around the\nprostrate youth, and in the caprice or better pity of human nature,\nbegan to be sorry for his pale condition.\n\n\u201cIt was a pity to strike the puir lad that gate,\u201d said one. \u201cSome folk\nshouldna been sae rash the day, I think,\u201d remarked another. \u201cStand\nback,\u201d cried Tam Jaffray, pushing from right to left; \u201cstand back, and\ngie the puir fallow air. Back, Jamieson, wi\u2019 your shauchled shins; it\nwas you that cried first that he was a resurrectionist.\u201d\n\nThe clergyman now advanced and asked what was the matter.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s only a yellow yorlin we\u2019ve catched in the aisle,\u201d cried an\ninsolent clown, who aspired to be the prime wit of the village; \u201che was\na bare gorblin a few minutes syne, and now he\u2019s full feathered.\u201d This\nprovoked a laugh from groundlings of the same stamp, and the fellow,\ngrinning himself, was tempted to try another bolt,\u2014\u201cAnd he\u2019s gayan weel\ntamed by this time.\u201d\n\n\u201cPeace, fellow,\u201d said the minister, who had now seen what was wrong;\n\u201cpeace, sir, and do not insult the unfortunate. I am ashamed of all\nthis.\u201d\n\nBy the directions of the clergyman, the poor prodigal was carried into\nthe manse, where he soon recovered from the immediate stunning effects\nof the blow he had received.\n\n\u201cHow is all this?\u201d was his first question of surprise, addressed to his\nhost. \u201cMay I request to know, sir, why I am here?\u201d\n\n\u201cIn virtue of a rash blow, which we all regret,\u201d answered the minister.\n\n\u201cI crave your pardon, sir,\u201d returned the youth. \u201cI can now guess that I\nam much indebted to your kindness.\u201d\n\n\u201cMay we ask you, young man,\u201d said the clergyman, \u201chow it has happened\nthat you have so alarmed our peaceful neighbourhood?\u201d\n\nThe poor prodigal succinctly stated the way of his imprisonment in the\naisle; and with this explanation the charitable old clergyman seemed\nperfectly satisfied. Not so, however, was his ruling elder, who, deeming\nhis presence and authority indispensable in any matter for which the\nparish bell could be rung, had early rushed to the scene of alarm, and\nwas now in the manse, at the head of a number of the villagers. He, on\nthe contrary, saw it necessary to remark (glancing at his superior for\napprobation),\u2014\n\n\u201cSae, mind, young man, in times future, what comes of sleeping in the\ntime of two peeous and yedifying discoorses.\u201d\n\n\u201cA good caution, John,\u201d said the mild old minister; \u201cbut we must make\nallowances.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas it you that struck me down?\u201d said Richard eagerly to an old man,\nwho, with evident sorrow working in his hard muscular face, stood\nwatching this scene with intense interest, and who, indeed, was his own\nfather.\n\nSmitten to the heart by this sudden question of the youth, ashamed of\nhis own violent spirit on such a night, and grieved, after the\nexplanation given, for the condition of the poor lad before him, old\nSinclair groaned, turned quickly half round, shifted his feet in the\nagony of avowal,\u2014then seizing his unknown prodigal boy by the hand, he\nwrung it eagerly, and said,\u2014\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s my hand, young man, in the first place; and now, it was me\nindeed that struck you down, but I thought\u2014\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! my prophetic conscience!\u201d interrupted the poor prodigal, whilst he\nlooked his father ruefully in the face, and returned fervently the\nsqueeze of his hand. \u201cMake no apologies to me, thou good old man; thy\nblow was given under a most just dispensation.\u201d\n\n\u201cI sent two neighbours,\u201d said the old man, still anxious to explain, \u201cto\nsee that all was right about the grave. I heard the alarm, and came off\nwi\u2019 my stick in my hand. I heard them crying to stop ye, for ye were a\nresurrectionist. I saw ye jumping suspiciously into the planting. Ye\nmaun forgie me the rest, young man, for I thought ye had been violating\nthe grave of a beloved wife.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy own poor mother!\u201d sobbed forth the prodigal.\n\nOld Sinclair started\u2014his strong chest heaved\u2014the recollection of his\nrash blow, together with the circumstance that it had been dispensed on\nsuch a solemn night, and near the new grave of one whose gentle spirit\nhad been but too much troubled by the harshness and waywardness of both\nhusband and son, came over his heart with the sudden conviction that his\nboy and himself were justly punished by the same blow, for their mutual\ndisrespect in former years. Yearning pity over that son\u2019s unhappy\nappearance, and the natural flow of a father\u2019s heart, long subdued on\nbehalf of his poor lost prodigal, were mingled in the old man\u2019s deep\nemotion; and he sought relief by throwing himself in his boy\u2019s arms, and\nweeping on his neck.\n\nHis sturdy nature soon recovered itself a little; yet the bitter spray\nwas winked from his compressed eyes as he shook his head; and the lower\npart of his face quivered with unusual affliction, as he said in a\nhoarse whisper\u2014\n\n\u201cMy own Richard!\u2014my man, has your father lived to strike you to the\nground like a brute beast, and you sae ill?\u2014on the very day, too, o\u2019\nyour mother\u2019s burial, that loved ye aye sae weel! But come away wi\u2019 me\nto your father\u2019s house, for ye are sick as death, and the auld man that\nused ye ower ill is sair humbled the night, Richard!\u201d\n\nThe prodigal\u2019s heart could not stand this confession of a father. His\nyoung bosom heaved as if about to be rent to pieces; the _mother_, and\n_hysterica passio_ of old Lear, rose in his straitened throat,\novermastering the struggling respiration, and he fell back in a violent\nfit. His agonized parent ran to the door, as if seeking assistance, he\nknew not what or where; then checking himself in a moment, and hastening\nback, yet without looking on his son, he grasped the clergyman strongly\nby the hand, crying out, \u201cIs he gone?\u2014is my callant dead?\u201d\n\nOrdering the people to withdraw from around the prostrate youth, whose\nhead was now supported by the clergyman\u2019s beautiful and compassionate\ndaughter, the kind old pastor led forward the agonised father, and\npointing to his reviving son, told him that all would soon be well\nagain. With head depressed upon his bosom, his hard hands slowly\nwringing each other, while they were wetted with the tears which rained\nfrom his glazed eyes, old Sinclair stood looking down upon the ghastly\nboy, whose eye was severely swollen, whilst his cheek was stained with\nthe clotted blood which had flowed from the wound above the temples,\ninflicted by his own father.\n\nAfter standing a while in this position, the old man drew a white napkin\nfrom his pocket, and, as if himself unable for the task, he gave it to\none of his neighbours, and pointed to the blood on the face of his\nprodigal boy, signifying that he wished it wiped away. This was done\naccordingly; and, in a few moments more, Richard rose, recovered from\nhis fit, and modestly thanking the clergyman and his beautiful daughter\nfor their attentions to him, he signified his resolve to go home\nimmediately with his father. The kind old minister would fain have kept\nhim all night, alleging the danger of exposing himself in such a state\nto the night air; but the youth was determined in his purpose; and old\nSinclair cut short the matter by shaking the hand of his pastor, whilst,\nwithout saying a word, he looked him kindly in the face to express his\nthanks, and then by leading his son away by the arm.\n\nThe villagers, who had crowded into the manse, judging this one of those\nlevelling occasions when they might intrude into the best parlour,\nallowed the father and son to depart without attempting immediately to\nfollow\u2014nature teaching them that they had no right to intermeddle with\nthe sacred communings of the son and father\u2019s repentance and\nforgiveness, or with the sorrow of their common bereavement. Yet the\nrude throng glanced at the minister, as if surprised and disappointed\nthat the thing had ended so simply; then slunk out of the room,\napprehensive, probably, of some rebuke from him. The ruling elder,\nhowever, remained behind, and wherefore not?\n\n\n\n\n THE BARLEY FEVER\u2014AND REBUKE.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR (\u201cDELTA\u201d).\n\n Sages their solemn een may steek,\n And raise a philosophic reek,\n And, physically, causes seek\n In clime and season;\n But tell me _Whisky\u2019s_ name in Greek,\n I\u2019ll tell the reason.\u2014_Burns._\n\n\nOn the morning after the business of the playhouse happened,[13] I had\nto take my breakfast in my bed,\u2014a thing very uncommon for me, being\ngenerally up by cock-craw, except on Sunday mornings whiles, when ilka\nane, according to the bidding of the Fourth Commandment, has a license\nto do as he likes,\u2014having a desperate sore head, and a squeamishness at\nthe stomach, occasioned, I jalouse, in a great measure from what Mr Glen\nand me had discussed at Widow Grassie\u2019s, in the shape of warm toddy,\nover our cracks concerning what is called the agricultural and the\nmanufacturing interests. So our wife, puir body, pat a thimbleful of\nbrandy\u2014Thomas Mixem\u2019s real\u2014into my first cup of tea, which had a\nwonderful virtue in putting all things to rights; so that I was up and\nhad shapit a pair of leddy\u2019s corsets (an article in which I sometimes\ndealt) before ten o\u2019clock, though, the morning being gey cauld, I didna\ndispense with my Kilmarnock.\n\nFootnote 13:\n\n See _ante_, \u201cMy First and Last Play,\u201d p. 394.\n\nAt eleven in the forenoon, or thereabouts,\u2014maybe five minutes before or\nafter, but nae matter,\u2014in comes my crony Maister Glen, rather dazed-like\nabout the een, and wi\u2019 a large piece of white sticking-plaister, about\nhalf-a-nail wide, across one of his cheeks, and over the brig o\u2019 his\nnose; giving him a wauff, outlandish, and rather blackguard sort of\nappearance, so that I was a thocht uneasy at what neebours might\nsurmeese concerning our intimacy; but the honest man accounted for the\nthing in a very feasible manner, from the falling down on that side of\nhis head of one of the brass candlesticks, while he was lying on his\nbraidside, before ane of the furms in the stramash.\n\nHis purpose of calling was to tell me that he couldna leave the town\nwithout looking in upon me to bid me fareweel; mair betoken, as he\nintended sending in his son Mungo wi\u2019 the carrier for a trial, to see\nhow the line of life pleased him, and how I thocht he wad answer\u2014a thing\nwhich I was glad came from his side of the house, being likely to be in\nthe upshot the best for both parties. Yet I thocht he wad find our way\nof doing so canny and comfortable, that it wasna very likely he could\never start objections; and I must confess, that I lookit forrit with nae\nsma\u2019 degree of pride, seeing the probability of my sune having the son\nof a Lammermuir farmer sitting cross-leggit, cheek for jowl wi\u2019 me, on\nthe board, and bound to serve me at all lawful times, by night and day,\nby a regular indenture of five years. Maister Glen insisted on the\nladdie having a three months\u2019 trial; and then, after a wee show of\nstanding out, just to make him aware that I could be elsewhere fitted if\nI had a mind, I agreed that the request was reasonable, and that I had\nnae yearthly objections to conforming wi\u2019t. So, after giein\u2019 him his\nmeridian, and a bit of shortbread, we shook hands, and parted in the\nunderstanding, that his son would arrive on the tap of limping Jamie the\ncarrier\u2019s cart, in the course, say, of a fortnight.\n\nThrough the hale course of the forepart of the day, I remained geyan\nqueerish, as if something was working about my inwards, and a droll pain\natween my een. The wife saw the case I was in, and advised me, for the\nsake of the fresh air, to take a step into the bit garden, and try a\nhand at the spade, the smell of the fresh earth being likely to operate\nas a cordial; but na\u2014it wadna do; and whan I came in at ane o\u2019clock to\nmy dinner, the steam of the fresh broth, instead of making me feel as\nusual as hungry as a hawk, was like to turn my stamach, while the sight\nof the sheep\u2019s-head, ane o\u2019 the primest anes I had seen the hale season,\nmade me as sick as a dog; so I could dae naething but take a turn out\nagain, and swig awa\u2019 at the sma\u2019 beer that never seemed able to slocken\nmy drouth. At lang and last, I mindit having heard Andrew Redbeak, the\nexcise-offisher, say, that naething ever pat him right after a debosh,\nexcept something they ca\u2019 a bottle of soda-water; so my wife dispatched\nBenjie to the place where he kent it could be found, and he returned in\na jiffie with a thing like a blacking-bottle below his daidly, as he was\nbidden. There being a wire ower the cork, for some purpose or ither, or\nmaybe just to look neat, we had some fight to get it torn away, but at\nlast we succeeded. I had turned about for a jug, and the wife was\nrummaging for a screw, while Benjie was fiddling away wi\u2019 his fingers at\nthe cork\u2014sauf us! a\u2019 at ance it gaed a thud like thunder, driving the\ncork ower puir Benjie\u2019s head, while it spouted up in his een like a\nfire-engine, and I had only just time to throw down the jug, and up with\nthe bottle to my mouth. Luckily, for the sixpence it cost, there was a\ndrap o\u2019t left, which tasted by all the world just like brisk\ndish-washings; but, for a\u2019 that, it had a wonderful power of setting me\nto rights; and my noddle in a while began to clear up, like a March-day\nafter a heavy shower.\n\nI mind very weel too, on the afternoon of the dividual day, that my\ndoorneebour, Thomas Burlings, pappit in; and, in our twa-handit crack\nower the counter, after asking me in a dry, curious way, if I had come\nby nae skaith in the business of the play, he said, the thing had now\nspread far and wide, and was making a great noise in the world. I thocht\nthe body a thocht sharp in his observes; so I pretended to take it quite\nlightly, proceeding in my shaping-out a pair of buckskin-breeches, which\nI was making for ane of the duke\u2019s huntsmen; so, seeing he was aff the\nscent, he said in a mair jocose way\u2014\u201cWeel, speaking about buckskins,\nI\u2019ll tell ye a gude story about that.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us hear\u2019t,\u201d said I; for I was in that sort of queerish way, that I\ndidna care muckle about being very busy.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019se get it as I heard it,\u201d quo\u2019 Thomas; \u201cand it\u2019s no less worth\ntelling, that it bears a gude moral application in its tail, after the\nsame fashion that a blister does gude by sucking away the vicious\nhumours of the body, thereby making the very pain it gies precious.\u201d And\nhere\u2014though maybe it was just my thocht\u2014the body strokit his chin, and\ngied me a kind of half glee, as muckle as saying, \u201ctake that to ye,\nneebour.\u201d But I deserved it all, and couldna take it ill aff his hand,\nbeing, like mysel, ane of the elders of our kirk, and an honest enough,\npreceese-speaking man.\n\n\u201cYe see, ye ken,\u201d said Thomas, \u201cthat the Breadalbane Fencibles, a wheen\nHighland birkies, were put into camp on Fisherraw links, maybe for the\nbenefit of their douking, on account of the fiddle[14]\u2014or maybe in case\nthe French should land at the water-mouth\u2014or maybe to gie the regiment\nthe benefit of the sea air\u2014or maybe to make their bare houghs hardier,\nfor it was the winter time, frost and snaw being as plenty as ye like,\nand no sae scarce as pantaloons among the core, or for some ither\nreason, gude, bad, or indifferent, which disna muckle matter. But, ye\nsee, the lang and the short o\u2019 the story is, that there they were\nencamped, man and mother\u2019s son of them, going through their dreels by\nday, and sleeping by night\u2014the privates in their tents, and the\noffishers in their markees; living in the course of nature on their\nusual rations of beef and tammies, and sae on. So, ye understand me,\nthere was nae such smart orderings of things in the army in thae days,\nthe men not having the beef served out to them by a butcher, supplying\neach company or companies by a written contract, drawn up between him\nand the paymaster before sponsible witnesses; but ilka ane bringing what\npleased him, either tripe, trotters, steaks, cow\u2019s-cheek, pluck, hough,\nspar-rib, jiggot, or so forth.\u201d\n\nFootnote 14:\n\n _See_ Dr Jamieson\u2019s \u201cScottish Dictionary.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od!\u201d said I, \u201cThomas, ye crack like a minister. Where did ye happen to\npick up all that knowledge?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere should I have got it? but from an auld half-pay sergeant-major,\nthat lived in our spare room, and had been out in the American war,\nhaving seen a power of service, and been twice wounded,\u2014ance in the aff\ncuit, and the ither time in the cuff of the neck.\u201d\n\n\u201cI thocht as muckle,\u201d said I; \u201cbut say on, man; it\u2019s unco entertaining.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel,\u201d continued he, \u201clet me see where I was at when ye stoppit me; for\nmaybe I\u2019ll hae to begin at the beginning again. For gif ye yenterrupt\nme, or edge in a word, or put me out by asking questions, I lose the\nthread of my discourse, and canna proceed.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, let me see,\u201d said I, \u201cye was about the contract concerning the\nbeef.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreceesely,\u201d quo\u2019 Thomas, stretching out his forefinger; \u201cye\u2019ve said it\nto a hair. At that time, as I was observing, the butcher didna supply a\ncompany or companies, according to the terms of a contract, drawn up\nbefore sponsible witnesses, between him and the paymaster; but the\nsoldiers got beef-money along with their pay; with which said money,\ngiven them, ye observe, for said purpose, they were bound and obligated,\nin terms of the statute, to buy, purchase, and provide the said beef,\ntwice a week or oftener, as it might happen; an orderly offisher making\ninspection of the camp-kettles regularly every forenoon at ane o\u2019clock\nor thereabouts.\n\n\u201cSo, as ye\u2019ll pay attention to observe, there was a private in Captain\nM\u2018Tavish\u2019s company, the second to the left of the centre, of the name of\nDuncan MacAlpine, a wee, hardy, blackavised, in-knee\u2019d creature,\nremarkable for naething that ever I heard tell of, except being reported\nto have shotten a gauger in Badenoch, or thereabouts; and for having a\ndesperate red nose, the effects, ye observe, I daursay,\u2014the effects of\ndrinking malt speerits.\n\n\u201cWeel, week after week passed ower, and better passed ower, and Duncan\nplayed aff his tricks, like anither Herman Boaz, the slight-o\u2019-hand\njuggler\u2014him that\u2019s suspecket to be in league and paction with the deil.\nBut ye\u2019ll hear.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, it\u2019s diverting, Thomas,\u201d said I to him; \u201cgang on, man.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, ye see, as I was observing. Let me see, where was I at? Ou ay,\nhaving a paction wi\u2019 the deil. So, when all were watching beside the\ncamp-kettles, some stirring them wi\u2019 spurtles, or parritch-sticks, or\nforks, or whatever was necessary, the orderly offisher made a point and\npractice of regularly coming by, about the chap of ane past meridian, as\nI observed to ye before, to make inspection of what ilka ane had wared\nhis pay on; and what he had got simmering in the het water for his\ndinner.\n\n\u201cSo, on the day concerning which I am about to speak, it fell out, as\nusual, that he happened to be making his rounds, halting a moment\u2014or\ntwa, maybe\u2014before ilka pat; the man that had the charge thereof, by the\nway of stirring like, clapping down his lang fork, and bringing up the\npiece of meat, or whatever he happened to be making kail of, to let the\ninspector see whether it was lamb, pork, beef, mutton, or veal. For, ye\nobserve,\u201d continued Thomas, gieing me, as I took it to mysel, anither\nqueer side look, \u201cthe purpose of the offisher making the inspection, was\nto see that they laid out their pay-money conform to military\nregulation; and no to filling their stamicks, and ruining baith soul and\nbody, by throwing it away on whisky, as but ower mony, that aiblins\nshould hae kent better, have dune but ower aften.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Tis but too true,\u201d said I till him; \u201cbut the best will fa\u2019 intil a\nfaut sometimes. We have a\u2019 our failings, Thomas.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust so,\u201d answered Thomas; \u201cbut where was I at? Ou, about the whisky.\nWeel, speaking about the whisky: ye see, the offisher, Lovetenant\nTodrick, I b\u2019lief they called him, had made an observe about Duncan\u2019s\nkettle; so, when he cam to him, Duncan was sitting in the lown side of a\ndyke, with his red nose, and a pipe in his cheek, on a big stane,\nglowering frae him anither way; and, as I was saying, when he cam to him\nhe said, \u2018Weel, Duncan MacAlpine, what have ye in your kettle the day,\nman?\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd Duncan, rinning down his lang fork, answered in his ain Highland\nbrogue way\u2014\u2018Please your honour, just my auld fav\u2019rite, tripe.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed, Duncan,\u201d said Lovetenant Todrick, or whatever they ca\u2019d him, \u201cit\nis an auld fav\u2019rite, surely, for I have never seen ye have onything else\nfor your denner, man.\u201d\n\n\u201cEvery man to his taste, please your honour,\u201d answered Duncan MacAlpine;\n\u201clet ilka ane please her nainsel,\u201d\u2014hauling up a screed half a yard lang;\n\u201cilka man to his taste, please your honour, Lovetenant Todrick.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, man,\u201d said I to him; \u201c\u2019od, man, ye\u2019re a deacon at telling a story.\nYe\u2019re a queer hand. Weel, what cam next?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat think ye should come next?\u201d quo\u2019 Thomas, drily.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m sure I dinna ken,\u201d answered I.\n\n\u201cWeel,\u201d said he, \u201cI\u2019ll tell; but where was I at?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, at the observe of Lovetenant Todrick, or what they ca\u2019ed him, about\nthe tripe; and the answer of Duncan MacAlpine on that head, that \u2018ilka\nman had his ain taste.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Vera true,\u2019 said Lovetenant Todrick; \u2018but lift it out a\u2019thegither on\nthat dish, till I get my specs on; for never since I was born, did I\never see before boiled tripe with buttons and button-holes intil\u2019t.\u2019\u201d\n\nAt this I set up a loud laughing, which I couldna help, though it was\nlike to split my sides; but Thomas Burlings bade me whisht till I heard\nhim out.\n\n\u201c\u2018Buttons and button-holes!\u2019 quo\u2019 Duncan MacAlpine. \u2018Look again, wi\u2019 yer\nspecs; for ye\u2019re surely wrang, Lovetenant Todrick.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cButtons and button-holes! and \u2019deed I am surely right, Duncan,\u2019\nanswered Lovetenant Todrick, taking his specs deliberately aff the brig\no\u2019 his nose, and faulding them thegither, as he put them, first into his\nmorocco case, and syne into his pocket. \u2018Howsomever, Duncan MacAlpine,\nI\u2019ll pass ye ower for this time, gif ye take my warning, and for the\nfuture ware yer paymoney on wholesome butcher\u2019s meat, like a Christian,\nand no be trying to delude your ain stamick, and your offisher\u2019s een, by\nhaddin\u2019 up, on a fork, such a heathenish make-up for a dish, as the leg\nof a pair o\u2019 buckskin breeches!\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cBuckskin breeches!\u201d said I; \u201cand did he really and actually boil siccan\ntrash to his dinner?\u201d\n\n\u201cNae sae far south as that yet, friend,\u201d answered Thomas. \u201cDuncan wasna\nsae bowed in the intellect as ye imagine, and had some spice of\ncleverality about his queer man\u0153uvres.\u2014Eat siccan trash to his dinner!\nNae mair, Mansie, than ye intend to eat that iron guse ye\u2019re rinning\nalang that piece claith; but he wantit to make his offishers believe\nthat his pay gaed the right way\u2014like the Pharisees of old that keepit\npraying, in ell-lang faces, about the corners of the streets, and gaed\nhame wi\u2019 hearts full of wickedness and a\u2019 manner of cheatrie.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what way did his pay gang then?\u201d askit I; \u201cand hoo did he live?\u201d\n\n\u201cI telled ye before, frien,\u201d answered Thomas, \u201cthat he was a deboshed\ncreature; and, like ower mony in the warld, likit weel what didna do him\nony good. It\u2019s a wearyfu\u2019 thing that whisky. I wish it could be banished\nto Botany Bay.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is that,\u201d said I. \u201cMuckle and nae little sin does it breed and\nproduce in this world.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m glad,\u201d quo\u2019 Thomas, stroking down his chin in a slee way. \u201cI\u2019m glad\nthe guilty should see the folly o\u2019 their ain ways: it\u2019s the first step,\nye ken, till amendment;\u2014and indeed I tell\u2019t Maister Wiggie, when he sent\nme here, that I could almost become gude for yer being mair wary o\u2019 yer\nconduct for the future time to come.\u201d\n\nThis was like a thunder-clap to me, and I didna ken, for a jiffy, what\nto feel, think, or do, mair than perceiving that it was a piece of\ndevilish cruelty on their pairts, taking things on this strict. As for\nmyself, I could freely take sacred oath on the Book, that I hadna had a\ndram in my head for four months before; the knowledge of which made my\ncorruption rise like lightning, as a man is aye brave when he is\ninnocent; so, giein\u2019 my pow a bit scart, I said briskly, \u201cSo ye\u2019re after\nsome session business in this veesit, are ye?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ve just guessed it,\u201d answered Thomas Burlings, sleeking down his\nfront hair with his fingers, in a sober way; \u201cwe had a meeting this\nforenoon; and it was resolved ye should stand a public rebuke in the\nmeeting-house, on Sunday next.\u201d\n\n\u201cHang me, if I do!\u201d answered I, thumping my nieve down with all my might\non the counter, and throwing back my cowl behind me, into a corner.\n\n\u201cNo, man!\u201d added I, snapping with great pith my finger and thumb in\nThomas\u2019s een; \u201cno for all the ministers and elders that ever were\ncleckit. They may do their best; and ye may tell them sae if ye like. I\nwas born a free man; I live in a free country; I am the subject of a\nfree king and constitution; and I\u2019ll be shot before I submit to such\nrank diabolical papistry.\u201d\n\n\u201cHooly and fairly,\u201d quo\u2019 Thomas, staring a wee astonished like, and not\na little surprised to see my birse up in this manner; for, when he\nthought upon shearing a lamb, he fund he had catched a tartar; so,\ncalming down as fast as ye like, he said\u2014\u201cHooly and fairly, Mansie\u201d (or\nMaister Wauch, I believe, he did me the honour to ca\u2019 me), \u201cthey\u2019ll\nmaybe no be sae hard as they threaten. But ye ken, my friend, I\u2019m\nspeaking to ye as a brither; it was an unco-like business for an elder,\nnot only to gang till a play, which is ane of the deevil\u2019s rendezvouses,\nbut to gang there in a state of liquor; making yoursel a warld\u2019s\nwonder\u2014and you an elder of our kirk!\u2014I put the question to yourself\nsoberly?\u201d\n\nHis threatening I could despise, and could have fought, cuffed, and\nkickit, wi\u2019 a\u2019 the ministers and elders of the General Assembly, to say\nnaething of the Relief Synod, and the Burgher Union, before I wad\ndemeaned mysel to yield to what my inward speerit plainly telled me to\nbe rank cruelty and injustice; but ah! his calm, britherly, flattering\nway I couldna thole wi\u2019, and the tears came rapping into my een faster\nthan it cared my manhood to let be seen; so I said till him, \u201cWeel,\nweel, Thomas, I ken I have dune wrang; and I am sorry for\u2019t\u2014they\u2019ll\nnever find me in siccan a scrape again.\u201d\n\nThomas Burlings then cam forrit in a friendly way, and shook hands wi\u2019\nme; telling that he wad go back and plead afore them in my behalf. He\nsaid this ower again, as we pairted, at my shop door; and, to do him\njustice, surely he hadna been waur than his word, for I have aye\nattended the kirk as usual, standing, whan it came to my rotation, at\nthe plate, and naebody, gentle nor semple, ever spoke to me on the\nsubject of the playhouse, or minted the matter of the rebuke from that\nday to this.\n\n\n\n\n ELPHIN IRVING, THE FAIRIES\u2019 CUPBEARER.\n\n BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nThe romantic vale of Corriewater, in Annandale, is regarded by the\ninhabitants, a pastoral and unmingled people, as the last border refuge\nof those beautiful and capricious beings, the fairies. Many old people,\nyet living, imagine they have had intercourse of good words and good\ndeeds with the \u201cgude folk;\u201d and continue to tell that in the ancient\ndays the fairies danced on the hill, and revelled in the glen, and\nshowed themselves, like the mysterious children of the Deity of old,\namong the sons and daughters of men. Their visits to the earth were\nperiods of joy and mirth to mankind, rather than of sorrow and\napprehension. They played on musical instruments of wonderful sweetness\nand variety of note, spread unexpected feasts, the supernatural flavour\nof which overpowered on many occasions the religious scruples of the\nPresbyterian shepherds, performed wonderful deeds of horsemanship, and\nmarched in midnight processions, when the sound of their elfin\nminstrelsy charmed youths and maidens into love for their persons and\npursuits; and more than one family of Corriewater have the fame of\naugmenting the numbers of the elfin chivalry. Faces of friends and\nrelatives, long since doomed to the battle trench, or the deep sea, have\nbeen recognised by those who dared to gaze on the fairy march. The maid\nhas seen her lost lover, and the mother her stolen child; and the\ncourage to plan and achieve their deliverance has been possessed by, at\nleast, one border maiden. In the legends of the people of Corrievale,\nthere is a singular mixture of elfin and human adventure, and the\ntraditional story of the Cupbearer to the Queen of the Fairies appeals\nalike to our domestic feelings and imagination.\n\nIn one of the little green loops or bends, on the banks of Corriewater,\nmouldered walls, and a few stunted wild plum-trees and vagrant roses,\nstill point out the site of a cottage and garden. A well of pure\nspring-water leaps out from an old tree-root before the door; and here\nthe shepherds, shading themselves in summer from the influence of the\nsun, tell to their children the wild tale of Elphin Irving and his\nsister Phemie; and, singular as the story seems, it has gained full\ncredence among the people where the scene is laid.\n\n\u201cI ken the tale and the place weel,\u201d interrupted an old woman, who, from\nthe predominance of scarlet in her apparel, seemed to have been a\nfollower of the camp; \u201cI ken them weel, and the tale\u2019s as true as a\nbullet to its aim, and a spark to powder. Oh, bonnie Corriewater! a\nthousand times have I pu\u2019ed gowans on its banks wi\u2019 ane that lies stiff\nand stark on a foreign shore in a bloody grave:\u201d and sobbing audibly,\nshe drew the remains of a military cloak over her face, and allowed the\nstory to proceed.\n\nWhen Elphin Irving and his sister Phemie were in their sixteenth year\n(for tradition says they were twins), their father was drowned in\nCorriewater, attempting to save his sheep from a sudden swell, to which\nall mountain streams are liable; and their mother, on the day of her\nhusband\u2019s burial, laid down her head on the pillow, from which, on the\nseventh day, it was lifted to be dressed for the same grave. The\ninheritance left to the orphans may be briefly described: seventeen\nacres of plough and pasture land, seven milk cows, and seven pet sheep\n(many old people take delight in odd numbers); and to this may be added\nseven bonnet pieces of Scottish gold, and a broadsword and spear, which\ntheir ancestor had wielded with such strength and courage in the battle\nof Dryfe-sands, that the minstrel who sang of that deed of arms ranked\nhim only second to the Scotts and the Johnstones.\n\nThe youth and his sister grew in stature and in beauty. The brent bright\nbrow, the clear blue eye, and frank and blithe deportment of the former,\ngave him some influence among the young women of the valley; while the\nlatter was no less the admiration of the young men, and at fair and\ndance, and at bridal, happy was he who touched but her hand, or received\nthe benediction of her eye. Like all other Scottish beauties, she was\nthe theme of many a song; and while tradition is yet busy with the\nsingular history of her brother, song has taken all the care that rustic\nminstrelsy can of the gentleness of her spirit, and the charms of her\nperson.\n\n\u201cNow I vow,\u201d exclaimed a wandering piper, \u201cby mine own honoured\ninstrument, and by all other instruments that ever yielded music for the\njoy and delight of mankind, that there are more bonnie songs made about\nfair Phemie Irving than about all the other maidens of Annandale, and\nmany of them are both high and bonnie. A proud lass maun she be, if her\nspirit hears; and men say the dust lies not insensible of beautiful\nverse; for her charms are breathed through a thousand sweet lips, and no\nfarther gone than yestermorn, I heard a lass singing on a green hillside\nwhat I shall not readily forget. If ye like to listen, ye shall judge;\nand it will not stay the story long nor mar it much, for it is short,\nand about Phemie Irving.\u201d And accordingly he chanted the following rude\nverses, not unaccompanied by his honoured instrument, as he called his\npipe, which chimed in with great effect, and gave richness to a voice\nwhich felt better than it could express:\u2014\n\nFAIR PHEMIE IRVING.\n\n I.\n\n Gay is thy glen, Corrie,\n With all thy groves flowering:\n Green is thy glen, Corrie,\n When July is showering;\n And sweet is yon wood, where\n The small birds are bowering,\n And there dwells the sweet one\n Whom I am adoring.\n\n II.\n\n Her round neck is whiter\n Than winter when snowing;\n Her meek voice is milder\n Than Ae in its flowing;\n The glad ground yields music\n Where she goes by the river;\n One kind glance would charm me\n For ever and ever.\n\n III.\n\n The proud and the wealthy\n To Phemie are bowing;\n No looks of love win they\n With sighing or suing;\n Far away maun I stand\n With my rude wooing,\n She\u2019s a flow\u2019ret too lovely\n To bloom for my pu\u2019ing\u2014\n\n IV.\n\n O were I yon violet\n On which she is walking;\n O were I yon small bird\n To which she is talking;\n Or yon rose in her hand,\n With its ripe ruddy blossom;\n Or some pure gentle thought,\n To be blest with her bosom!\n\nThis minstrel interruption, while it established Phemie Irving\u2019s claim\nto grace and to beauty, gave me additional confidence to pursue the\nstory.\n\nBut minstrel skill and true love tale seemed to want their usual\ninfluence, when they sought to win her attention; she was only observed\nto pay most respect to those youths who were most beloved by her\nbrother; and the same hour that brought these twins to the world, seemed\nto have breathed through them a sweetness and an affection of heart and\nmind, which nothing could divide. If, like the virgin queen of the\nimmortal poet, she walked \u201cin maiden meditation fancy free,\u201d her brother\nElphin seemed alike untouched with the charms of the fairest virgins in\nCorrie. He ploughed his field, he reaped his grain, he leaped, he ran\nand wrestled, and danced and sang, with more skill and life and grace\nthan all other youths of the district; but he had no twilight and stolen\ninterviews. When all other young men had their loves by their side, he\nwas single, though not unsought; and his joy seemed never perfect save\nwhen his sister was near him. If he loved to share his time with her,\nshe loved to share her time with him alone, or with the beasts of the\nfield, or the birds of the air. She watched her little flock late, and\nshe tended it early; not for the sordid love of the fleece, unless it\nwas to make mantles for her brother, but with the look of one who had\njoy in its company. The very wild creatures, the deer and the hares,\nseldom sought to shun her approach, and the bird forsook not its nest,\nnor stinted its song, when she drew nigh; such is the confidence which\nmaiden innocence and beauty inspire.\n\nIt happened one summer, about three years after they became orphans,\nthat rain had been for a while withheld from the earth; the hillsides\nbegan to parch, the grass in the vales to wither, and the stream of\nCorrie was diminished between its banks to the size of an ordinary rill.\nThe shepherds drove their flocks to moorlands, and marsh and tarn had\ntheir reeds invaded by the scythe, to supply the cattle with food. The\nsheep of his sister were Elphin\u2019s constant care; he drove them to the\nmoistest pastures during the day, and he often watched them at midnight,\nwhen flocks, tempted by the sweet dewy grass, are known to browse\neagerly, that he might guard them from the fox, and lead them to the\nchoicest herbage. In these nocturnal watchings he sometimes drove his\nlittle flock over the water of Corrie, for the fords were hardly\nankle-deep; or permitted his sheep to cool themselves in the stream, and\ntaste the grass which grew along the brink. All this time not a drop of\nrain fell, nor did a cloud appear in the sky.\n\nOne evening during her brother\u2019s absence with the flock, Phemie sat at\nher cottage door, listening to the bleatings of the distant folds, and\nthe lessened murmur of the water of Corrie, now scarcely audible beyond\nits banks. Her eyes, weary with watching along the accustomed line of\nroad for the return of Elphin, were turned on the pool beside her, in\nwhich the stars were glimmering fitful and faint. As she looked, she\nimagined the water grew brighter and brighter; a wild illumination\npresently shone upon the pool, and leaped from bank to bank, and,\nsuddenly changing into a human form, ascended the margin, and passing\nher, glided swiftly into the cottage. The visionary form was so like her\nbrother in shape and air, that, starting up, she flew into the house,\nwith the hope of finding him in his customary seat. She found him not;\nand impressed with the terror which a wraith or apparition seldom fails\nto inspire, she uttered a shriek so loud and so piercing as to be heard\nat Johnstonebank, on the other side of the vale of Corrie.\n\nAn old woman now rose suddenly from her seat in the window-sill, the\nliving dread of shepherds, for she travelled the country with a\nbrilliant reputation for witchcraft, and thus she broke in upon the\nnarrative: \u201cI vow, young man, ye tell us the truth upset and downthrust;\nI heard my douce grandmother say that on the night when Elphin Irving,\ndisappeared\u2014disappeared, I shall call it, for the bairn can but be gone\nfor a season, to return to us in his own appointed time,\u2014she was seated\nat the fireside at Johnstonebank; the laird had laid aside his bonnet to\ntake the Book, when a shriek mair loud, believe me, than a mere woman\u2019s\nshriek,\u2014and they can shriek loud enough, else they\u2019re sair wranged,\u2014came\nover the water of Corrie, so sharp and shrilling, that the pewter plates\ndinnelled on the wall; such a shriek, my douce grandmother said, as rang\nin her ear till the hour of her death, and she lived till she was aughty\nand aught, forty full ripe years after the event. But there is another\nmatter, which, doubtless, I cannot compel ye to believe; it was the\ncommon rumour that Elphin Irving came not into the world like the other\nsinful creatures of the earth, but was one of the Kane-bairns of the\nfairies, whilk they had to pay to the enemy of man\u2019s salvation every\nseventh year. The poor lady-fairy,\u2014a mother\u2019s aye a mother, be she elf\u2019s\nflesh or Eve\u2019s flesh,\u2014hid her elf son beside the christened flesh in\nMarion Irving\u2019s cradle, and the auld enemy lost his prey for a time. Now\nhasten on with your story, which is not a bodle the waur for me. The\nmaiden saw the shape of her brother, fell into a faint or a trance, and\nthe neighbours came flocking in. Gang on wi\u2019 your tale, young man, and\ndinna be affronted because an auld woman helped ye wi\u2019 it.\u201d\n\nIt is hardly known, I resumed, how long Phemie Irving continued in a\nstate of insensibility. The morning was far advanced, when a\nneighbouring maiden found her seated in an old chair, as white as\nmonumental marble; her hair, about which she had always been solicitous,\nloosened from its curls, and hanging disordered over her neck and bosom,\nher hands and forehead. The maiden touched the one and kissed the other;\nthey were as cold as snow; and her eyes, wide open, were fixed on her\nbrother\u2019s empty chair, with the intensity of gaze of one who had\nwitnessed the appearance of a spirit. She seemed insensible of any one\u2019s\npresence, and sat fixed, and still, and motionless. The maiden, alarmed\nat her looks, thus addressed her: \u201cPhemie, lass, Phemie Irving! Dear me,\nbut this is awful! I have come to tell ye that seven o\u2019 yer pet sheep\nhave escaped drowning in the water; for Corrie, sae quiet and sae gentle\nyestreen, is rolling and dashing frae bank to bank this morning. Dear\nme, woman, dinna let the loss o\u2019 the world\u2019s gear bereave ye of your\nsenses. I would rather make ye a present of a dozen mug-ewes of the\nTinwald brood mysel; and now I think on\u2019t, if ye\u2019ll send ower Elphin, I\nwill help him hame with them in the gloaming mysel. So Phemie, woman, be\ncomforted.\u201d\n\nAt the mention of her brother\u2019s name, she cried out, \u201cWhere is he? oh,\nwhere is he?\u201d\u2014gazed wildly round, and, shuddering from head to foot,\nfell senseless on the floor. Other inhabitants of the valley, alarmed by\nthe sudden swell of the river, which had augmented to a torrent deep and\nimpassable, now came in to inquire if any loss had been sustained, for\nnumbers of sheep and teds of hay had been observed floating down about\nthe dawn of the morning. They assisted in reclaiming the unhappy maiden\nfrom her swoon; but insensibility was joy compared to the sorrow to\nwhich she awakened.\n\n\u201cThey have ta\u2019en him away, they have ta\u2019en him away;\u201d she chanted in a\ntone of delirious pathos; \u201chim that was whiter and fairer than the lily\non Lyddal-lee. They have long sought, and they have long sued, and they\nhad the power to prevail against my prayers at last. They have ta\u2019en him\naway; the flower is plucked from among the weeds, and the dove is slain\namid a flock of ravens. They came with shout, and they came with song,\nand they spread the charm, and they placed the spell, and the baptised\nbrow has been bowed down to the unbaptised hand. They have ta\u2019en him\naway, they have ta\u2019en him away; he was too lovely, and too good, and too\nnoble, to bless us with his continuance on earth; for what are the sons\nof men compared to him?\u2014the light of the moonbeam to the morning sun;\nthe glow-worm to the eastern star. They have ta\u2019en him away, the\ninvisible dwellers of the earth. I saw them come on him, with shouting\nand with singing, and they charmed him where he sat, and away they bore\nhim; and the horse he rode was never shod with iron, nor owned before\nthe mastery of human hand. They have ta\u2019en him away, over the water, and\nover the wood, and over the hill. I got but ae look o\u2019 his bonnie blue\nee, but ae look. But as I have endured what never maiden endured, so\nwill I undertake what never maiden undertook,\u2014I will win him from them\nall. I know the invisible ones of the earth; I have heard their wild and\nwondrous music in the wild woods, and there shall a christened maiden\nseek him and achieve his deliverance.\u201d\n\nShe paused, and glancing round a circle of condoling faces, down which\nthe tears were dropping like rain, said, in a calm, but still delirious\ntone,\u2014\n\n\u201cWhy do you weep, Mary Halliday? and why do you weep, John Graeme? Ye\nthink that Elphin Irving,\u2014oh, it\u2019s a bonnie, bonnie name, and dear to\nmany a maiden\u2019s heart as well as mine,\u2014ye think that he is drowned in\nCorrie, and ye will seek in the deep, deep pools for the bonnie, bonnie\ncorse, that ye may weep over it, as it lies in its last linen, and lay\nit, amid weeping and wailing, in the dowie kirkyard. Ye may seek, but ye\nshall never find; so leave me to trim up my hair, and prepare my\ndwelling, and make myself ready to watch for the hour of his return to\nupper earth.\u201d\n\nAnd she resumed her household labours with an alacrity which lessened\nnot the sorrow of her friends.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\nMeanwhile, the rumour flew over the vale that Elphin Irving was drowned\nin Corriewater. Matron and maid, old man and young, collected suddenly\nalong the banks of the river, which now began to subside to its natural\nsummer limits, and commenced their search; interrupted every now and\nthen by calling from side to side, and from pool to pool, and by\nexclamations of sorrow for this misfortune. The search was fruitless:\nfive sheep, pertaining to the flock which he conducted to pasture, were\nfound drowned in one of the deep eddies; but the river was still too\nbrown, from the soil of its moorland sources, to enable them to see what\nits deep shelves, its pools, and its overhanging and hazelly banks\nconcealed. They remitted further search till the stream should become\npure; and old man taking old man aside, began to whisper about the\nmystery of the youth\u2019s disappearance: old women laid their lips to the\nears of their coevals, and talked of Elphin Irving\u2019s fairy parentage,\nand his having been dropped by an unearthly hand into a Christian\ncradle. The young men and maids conversed on other themes; they grieved\nfor the loss of the friend and the lover, and while the former thought\nthat a heart so kind and true was not left in the vale, the latter\nthought, as maidens will, on his handsome person, gentle manners, and\nmerry blue eye, and speculated with a sigh on the time when they might\nhave hoped a return for their love. They were soon joined by others who\nhad heard the wild and delirious language of his sister: the old belief\nwas added to the new assurance, and both again commented upon by minds\nfull of superstitious feeling, and hearts full of supernatural fears,\ntill the youths and maidens of Corrievale held no more love trysts for\nseven days and nights, lest, like Elphin Irving, they should be carried\naway to augment the ranks of the unchristened chivalry.\n\nIt was curious to listen to the speculations of the peasantry. \u201cFor my\npart,\u201d said a youth, \u201cif I were sure that poor Elphin escaped from that\nperilous water, I would not give the fairies a pound of hiplock wool for\ntheir chance of him. There has not been a fairy seen in the land since\nDonald Cargill, the Cameronian, conjured them into the Solway for\nplaying on their pipes during one of his nocturnal preachings on the hip\nof the Burnswark hill.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreserve me, bairn,\u201d said an old woman, justly exasperated at the\nincredulity of her nephew, \u201cif ye winna believe what I both heard and\nsaw at the moonlight end of Craigyburnwood on a summer night, rank after\nrank of the fairy folk, ye\u2019ll at least believe a douce man and a ghostly\nprofessor, even the late minister of Tinwaldkirk; his only son (I mind\nthe lad weel, with his long yellow locks and his bonnie blue eyes, when\nI was but a gilpie of a lassie), _he_ was stolen away from off the horse\nat his father\u2019s elbow, as they crossed that false and fearsome water,\neven Locherbriggflow, on the night of the Midsummer Fair of Dumfries.\nAy, ay, who can doubt the truth of that? Have not the godly inhabitants\nof Almsfieldtown and Timwaldkirk seen the sweet youth riding at\nmidnight, in the midst of the unhallowed troop, to the sound of flute\nand of dulcimer; and though meikle they prayed, naebody tried to achieve\nhis deliverance?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have heard it said, by douce folk and sponsible,\u201d interrupted\nanother, \u201cthat every seven years the elves and fairies pay kane, or make\nan offering of one of their children to the grand enemy of salvation,\nand that they are permitted to purloin one of the children of men to\npresent to the fiend; a more acceptable offering, I\u2019ll warrant, than one\nof their own infernal brood, that are Satan\u2019s sib allies, and drink a\ndrop of the deil\u2019s blood every May morning. And touching this lost lad,\nye all ken his mother was a hawk of an uncannie nest, a second cousin of\nKate Kimmer, of Barfloshan, as rank a witch as ever rode on ragwort. Ay,\nsirs, what\u2019s bred in the bone is ill to come out o\u2019 the flesh.\u201d\n\nOn these and similar topics, which a peasantry full of ancient tradition\nand enthusiasm and superstition, readily associate with the commonest\noccurrences of life, the people of Corrievale continued to converse till\nthe fall of evening; when each seeking their home, renewed again the\nwondrous subject, and illustrated it with all that popular belief and\npoetic imagination could so abundantly supply.\n\nThe night which followed this melancholy day was wild with wind and\nrain; the river came down broader and deeper than before, and the\nlightning, flashing by fits over the green woods of Corrie, showed the\nungovernable and perilous flood sweeping above its banks. It happened\nthat a farmer, returning from one of the border fairs, encountered the\nfull swing of the storm; but, mounted on an excellent horse, and mantled\nfrom chin to heel in a good gray plaid, beneath which he had the farther\nsecurity of a thick great-coat, he sat dry in his saddle, and proceeded\nin the anticipated joy of a subsided tempest, and a glowing morning sun.\nAs he entered the long grove, or rather remains of the old Galwegian\nforest, which lines for some space the banks of the Corriewater, the\nstorm began to abate, the wind sighed milder and milder among the trees;\nand here and there a star, twinkling momentarily through the sudden rack\nof the clouds, showed the river raging from bank to brae. As he shook\nthe moisture from his clothes, he was not without a wish that the day\nwould dawn, and that he might be preserved on a road which his\nimagination beset with greater perils than the raging river; for his\nsuperstitious feeling let loose upon his path elf and goblin, and the\ncurrent traditions of the district supplied very largely to his\napprehension the ready materials of fear.\n\nJust as he emerged from the wood, where a fine sloping bank, covered\nwith short green sward, skirts the limit of the forest, his horse made a\nfull pause, snorted, trembled, and started from side to side, stooped\nhis head, erected his ears, and seemed to scrutinize every tree and\nbush. The rider, too, it may be imagined, gazed round and round, and\npeered warily into every suspicious-looking place. His dread of a\nsupernatural visitation was not much allayed, when he observed a female\nshape seated on the ground at the root of a huge old oak tree, which\nstood in the centre of one of those patches of verdant sward, known by\nthe name of \u201cfairy rings,\u201d and avoided by all peasants who wish to\nprosper. A long thin gleam of eastern daylight enabled him to examine\naccurately the being who, in this wild place and unusual hour, gave\nadditional terror to this haunted spot. She was dressed in white from\nthe neck to the knees; her arms, long, and round, and white, were\nperfectly bare; her head, uncovered, allowed her long hair to descend in\nringlet succeeding ringlet, till the half of her person was nearly\nconcealed in the fleece. Amidst the whole, her hands were constantly\nbusy in shedding aside the tresses which interposed between her steady\nand uninterrupted gaze, down a line of old road which winded among the\nhills to an ancient burial-ground.\n\nAs the traveller continued to gaze, the figure suddenly rose, and\nwringing the rain from her long locks, paced round and round the tree,\nchanting in a wild and melancholy manner an equally wild and delirious\nsong:\u2014\n\nTHE FAIRY OAK OF CORRIEWATER.\n\nI.\n\n The small bird\u2019s head is under its wing,\n The deer sleeps on the grass;\n The moon comes out, and the stars shine down,\n The dew gleams like the glass:\n There is no sound in the world so wide,\n Save the sound of the smitten brass,\n With the merry cittern and the pipe\n Of the fairies as they pass.\u2014\n But oh! the fire maun burn and burn,\n And the hour is gone, and will never return.\n\n II.\n\n The green hill cleaves, and forth, with a bound,\n Come elf and elfin steed;\n The moon dives down in a golden cloud,\n The stars grow dim with dread;\n But a light is running along the earth,\n So of heaven\u2019s they have no need:\n O\u2019er moor and moss with a shout they pass,\n And the word is, spur and speed.\u2014\n But the fire maun burn, and I maun quake,\n And the hour is gone that will never come back.\n\n III.\n\n And when they come to Craigyburn wood,\n The Queen of the Fairies spoke:\u2014\n \u201cCome, bind your steeds to the rushes so green,\n And dance by the haunted oak:\n I found the acorn on Heshbon-hill,\n In the nook of a palmer\u2019s poke,\n A thousand years since; here it grows!\u201d\n And they danced till the greenwood shook.\u2014\n But oh! the fire, the burning fire,\n The longer it burns, it but blazes the higher.\n\n IV.\n\n \u201cI have won me a youth,\u201d the Elf-queen said,\n \u201cThe fairest that earth may see;\n This night I have won young Elph Irving,\n My cupbearer to be.\n His service lasts but for seven sweet years,\n And his wage is a kiss of me.\u201d\n And merrily, merrily laughed the wild elves,\n Round Corrie\u2019s greenwood tree.\u2014\n But oh! the fire it glows in my brain,\n And the hour is gone, and comes not again.\n\n V.\n\n The Queen she has whispered a secret word,\n \u201cCome hither, my Elphin sweet,\n And bring that cup of the charm\u00e8d wine,\n Thy lips and mine to weet.\u201d\n But a brown elf shouted a loud, loud shout,\n \u201cCome, leap on your coursers fleet,\n For here comes the smell of some baptized flesh,\n And the sounding of baptized feet.\u201d\u2014\n But oh! the fire that burns, and maun burn;\n For the time that is gone will never return.\n\n VI.\n\n On a steed as white as the new-milked milk,\n The Elf-queen leaped with a bound,\n And young Elphin a steed like December snow\n \u2019Neath him at the word he found.\n But a maiden came, and her christened arms\n She linked her brother around,\n And called on God, and the steed with a snort\n Sank into the gaping ground.\u2014\n But the fire maun burn, and I maun quake,\n And the time that is gone will no more come back.\n\n VII.\n\n And she held her brother, and lo! he grew\n A wild bull waked in ire;\n And she held her brother, and lo! he changed\n To a river roaring higher;\n And she held her brother, and he became\n A flood of the raging fire;\n She shrieked and sank, and the wild elves laughed,\n Till mountain rang and mire.\u2014\n But oh! the fire yet burns in my brain,\n And the hour is gone, and comes not again.\n\n VIII.\n\n \u201cOh, maiden, why waxed thy faith so faint,\n Thy spirit so slack and slaw?\n Thy courage kept good till the flame waxed wud,\n Then thy might began to thaw,\n Had ye kissed him with thy christened lip,\n Ye had won him frae \u2019mang us a\u2019.\n Now bless the fire, the elfin fire,\n That made thee faint and fa\u2019;\n Now bless the fire, the elfin fire,\n The longer it burns it blazes the higher.\u201d\n\nAt the close of this unusual strain, the figure sat down on the grass,\nand proceeded to bind up her long and disordered tresses, gazing along\nthe old and unfrequented road.\n\n\u201cNow God be my helper,\u201d said the traveller, who happened to be the Laird\nof Johnstonebank, \u201ccan this be a trick of the fiend, or can it be bonnie\nPhemie Irving, who chants this dolorous song? Something sad has\nbefallen, that makes her seek her seat in this eerie nook amid the\ndarkness and tempest: through might from abune, I will go on and see.\u201d\n\nAnd the horse, feeling something of the owner\u2019s reviving spirit in the\napplication of the spur-steel, bore him at once to the foot of the tree.\nThe poor delirious maiden uttered a piercing yell of joy as she beheld\nhim, and, with the swiftness of a creature winged, linked her arms round\nthe rider\u2019s waist, and shrieked till the woods rang.\n\n\u201cOh, I have ye now, Elphin, I have ye now!\u201d and she strained him to her\nbosom with a convulsive grasp.\n\n\u201cWhat ails ye, my bonnie lass?\u201d said the Laird of Johnstonebank, his\nfears of the supernatural vanishing when he beheld her sad and\nbewildered look.\n\nShe raised her eyes at the sound, and, seeing a strange face, her arms\nslipped their hold, and she dropped with a groan on the ground.\n\nThe morning had now fairly broken: the flocks shook the rain from their\nsides, the shepherds hastened to inspect their charges, and a thin blue\nsmoke began to stream from the cottages of the valley into the\nbrightening air. The laird carried Phemie Irving in his arms, till he\nobserved two shepherds ascending from one of the loops of Corriewater,\nbearing the lifeless body of her brother. They had found him whirling\nround and round in one of the numerous eddies, and his hands, clutched\nand filled with wool, showed that he had lost his life in attempting to\nsave the flock of his sister.\n\nA plaid was laid over the body, which, along with the unhappy maiden in\na half lifeless state, was carried into a cottage, and laid in that\napartment distinguished among the peasantry by the name of \u201cthe\nchamber.\u201d While the peasant\u2019s wife was left to take care of Phemie, old\nman, and matron, and maid had collected around the drowned youth, and\neach began to relate the circumstances of his death, when the door\nsuddenly opened, and his sister, advancing to the corpse with a look of\ndelirious serenity, broke out into a wild laugh, and said,\u2014\n\n\u201cO, it is wonderful, it\u2019s truly wonderful! that bare and death-cold\nbody, dragged from the darkest pool of Corrie, with its hands filled\nwith fine wool, wears the perfect similitude of my own Elphin! I\u2019ll tell\nye\u2014the spiritual dwellers of the earth, the fairyfolk of our evening\ntale, have stolen the living body, and fashioned this cold and inanimate\nclod to mislead your pursuit. In common eyes, this seems all that Elphin\nIrving would be, had he sunk in Corriewater; but so it seems not to me.\nYe have sought the living soul, and ye have found only its garment. But\noh, if ye had beheld him, as I beheld him to-night, riding among the\nelfin troop, the fairest of them all; had you clasped him in your arms,\nand wrestled for him with spirits and terrible shapes from the other\nworld, till your heart quailed and your flesh was subdued, then would ye\nyield no credit to the semblance which this cold and apparent flesh\nbears to my brother. But hearken\u2014on Hallowe\u2019en, when the spiritual\npeople are let loose on earth for a season, I will take my stand in the\nburial-ground of Corrie; and when my Elphin and his unchristened troop\ncome past with the sound of all their minstrelsy, I will leap on him and\nwin him, or perish for ever.\u201d\n\nAll gazed aghast on the delirious maiden, and many of her auditors gave\nmore credence to her distempered speech than to the visible evidence\nbefore them. As she turned to depart, she looked round, and suddenly\nsunk upon the body, with tears streaming from her eyes, and sobbed out,\n\u201cMy brother! oh, my brother!\u201d She was carried out insensible, and again\nrecovered; but relapsed into her ordinary delirium, in which she\ncontinued till the Hallow-eve after her brother\u2019s burial.\n\nShe was found seated in the ancient burial-ground, her back against a\nbroken grave-stone, her locks white with frost-rime, watching with\nintensity of look the road to the kirk-yard; but the spirit which gave\nlife to the fairest form of all the maids of Annandale was fled for\never.\n\n\nSuch is the singular story which the peasants know by the name of Elphin\nIrving, the Fairies\u2019 Cupbearer; and the title, in its fullest and most\nsupernatural sense, still obtains credence among the industrious and\nvirtuous dames of the romantic vale of Corrie.\n\n\n\n\n CHOOSING A MINISTER.\n\n BY JOHN GALT.\n\n\nThe Rev. Dr Swapkirk having had an apoplexy, the magistrates were\nobligated to get Mr Pittle to be his helper. Whether it was that, by our\nbeing used to Mr Pittle, we had ceased to have a right respect for his\nparts and talents, or that in reality he was but a weak brother, I\ncannot in conscience take it on me to say; but the certainty is, that\nwhen the Doctor departed this life, there was hardly one of the hearers\nwho thought Mr Pittle would ever be their placed minister, and it was as\nfar at first from the unanimous mind of the magistrates, who are the\npatrons of the parish, as anything could well be, for he was a man of no\nsmeddum in discourse. In verity, as Mrs Pawkie, my wife, said, his\nsermons in the warm summer afternoons were just a perfect hushabaa, that\nno mortal could hearken to without sleeping. Moreover, he had a sorning\nway with him, that the genteeler sort couldna abide, for he was for ever\ngoing from house to house about tea-time, to save his ain canister. As\nfor the young ladies, they couldna endure him at all, for he had aye the\nsough and sound of love in his mouth, and a round-about ceremonial of\njoking concerning the same, that was just a fasherie to them to hear.\nThe commonality, however, were his greatest adversaries; for he was,\nnotwithstanding the spareness of his abilities, a prideful creature,\ntaking no interest in their hamely affairs, and seldom visiting the aged\nor the sick among them.\n\nShortly, however, before the death of the Doctor, Mr Pittle had been\nvery attentive to my wife\u2019s full cousin, Miss Lizzie Pinkie,\u2014I\u2019ll no say\non account of the legacy of seven hundred pounds left her by an uncle,\nthat made his money in foreign parts, and died at Portsmouth of the\nliver complaint, when he was coming home to enjoy himself; and Mrs\nPawkie told me, that as soon as Mr Pittle could get a kirk, I needna be\nsurprised if I heard o\u2019 a marriage between him and Miss Lizzie.\n\nHad I been a sordid and interested man, this news could never have given\nme the satisfaction it did, for Miss Lizzie was very fond of my bairns,\nand it was thought that Peter would have been her heir; but so far from\nbeing concerned at what I heard, I rejoiced thereat, and resolved in\nsecret thought, whenever a vacancy happened (Dr Swapkirk being then fast\nwearing away), to exert the best of my ability to get the kirk for Mr\nPittle,\u2014not, however, unless he was previously married to Miss Lizzie;\nfor, to speak out, she was beginning to stand in need of a protector,\nand both me and Mrs Pawkie had our fears that she might outlive her\nincome, and in her old age become a cess upon us. And it couldna be said\nthat this was any groundless fear; for Miss Lizzie, living a lonely\nmaiden life by herself, with only a bit lassie to run her errands, and\nno being naturally of an active or eydent turn, aften wearied, and to\nkeep up her spirits, gaed, maybe, now and then, oftener to the gardevin\nthan was just necessar, by which, as we thought, she had a tavert look.\nHowsoever, as Mr Pittle had taken a notion of her, and she pleased his\nfancy, it was far from our hand to misliken one that was sib to us; on\nthe contrary, it was a duty laid on me by the ties of blood and\nrelationship to do all in my power to further their mutual affection\ninto matrimonial fruition; and what I did towards that end is the burden\nof this narrative.\n\nDr Swapkirk, in whom the spark of life was long fading, closed his eyes,\nand it went utterly out, as to this world, on a Saturday night, between\nthe hours of eleven and twelve. We had that afternoon got an inkling\nthat he was drawing near to his end. At the latest, Mrs Pawkie herself\nwent over to the manse, and stayed till she saw him die. \u201cIt was a\npleasant end,\u201d she said, for he was a godly, patient man; and we were\nboth sorely grieved, though it was a thing for which we had been long\nprepared, and, indeed, to his family and connections, except for the\nloss of the stipend, it was a very gentle dispensation, for he had been\nlong a heavy handful, having been for years but, as it were, a breathing\nlump of mortality, groosy and oozy, and doozy, his faculties being shut\nup and locked in by a dumb palsy.\n\nHaving had this early intimation of the Doctor\u2019s removal to a better\nworld, on the Sabbath morning when I went to join the magistrates in the\ncouncil-chamber, as the usage is, to go to the laft, with the\ntown-officers carrying their halberts before us, according to the\nancient custom of all royal burghs, my mind was in a degree prepared to\nspeak to them anent the successor. Little, however, passed at that time,\nand it so happened that, by some wonder of inspiration (there were,\nhowever, folk that said it was taken out of a book of sermons, by one\nBarrow, an English divine), Mr Pittle that forenoon preached a discourse\nthat made an impression, insomuch that, on our way back to the\ncouncil-chamber, I said to Provost Vintner that then was\u2014\n\n\u201cReally, Mr Pittle seems, if he would exert himself, to have a nerve. I\ncould not have thought it was in the power of his capacity to have given\nus such a sermon.\u201d\n\nThe provost thought as I did; so I replied\u2014\n\n\u201cWe canna, I think, do better than keep him among us. It would, indeed,\nprovost, no be doing justice to the young man to pass another over his\nhead.\u201d\n\nI could see that the provost wasna quite sure of what I had been saying;\nfor he replied, that it was a matter that needed consideration.\n\nWhen we separated at the council-chamber, I threw myself in the way of\nBailie Weezle, and walked home with him, our talk being on the subject\nof the vacancy; and I rehearsed to him what had passed between me and\nthe provost, saying, that the provost had made no objection to prefer Mr\nPittle, which was the truth.\n\nBailie Weezle was a man no overladen with worldly wisdom, and had been\nchosen into the council principally on account of being easily managed.\nIn his business, he was originally by trade a baker in Glasgow, where he\nmade a little money, and came to settle among us with his wife, who was\na native of the town, and had her relations here. Being, therefore, an\nidle man, living on his money, and of a soft and quiet nature, he was,\nfor the reason aforesaid, chosen into the council, where he always voted\non the provost\u2019s side; for in controverted questions every one is\nbeholden to take a part, and he thought it his duty to side with the\nchief magistrate.\n\nHaving convinced the bailie that Mr Pittle had already, as it were, a\nsort of infeoffment in the kirk, I called in the evening on my old\npredecessor in the guildry, Bailie M\u2018Lucre, who was not a hand to be so\neasily dealt with; but I knew his inclinations, and therefore I resolved\nto go roundly to work with him. So I asked him out to take a walk, and I\nled him towards the town-moor, conversing loosely about one thing and\nanother, and touching softly here and there on the vacancy.\n\nWhen we were well on into the middle of the moor, I stopped, and,\nlooking round me, said,\u2014\n\n\u201cBailie, surely it\u2019s a great neglec\u2019 of the magistrates and council to\nlet this braw broad piece of land, so near the town, lie in a state o\u2019\nnature, and giving pasturage to only twa-three of the poor folks\u2019 cows.\nI wonder you, that\u2019s now a rich man, and with een worth pearls and\ndiamonds,\u2014that ye dinna think of asking a tack of this land; ye might\nmake a great thing o\u2019t.\u201d\n\nThe fish nibbled, and told me that he had for some time entertained a\nthought on the subject; but he was afraid that I would be over\nextortionate.\n\n\u201cI wonder to hear you, bailie,\u201d said I; \u201cI trust and hope no one will\never find me out of the way of justice; and to convince you that I can\ndo a friendly turn, I\u2019ll no objec\u2019 to gie you a\u2019 my influence free\ngratis, if ye\u2019ll gie Mr Pittle a lift into the kirk; for, to be plain\nwith you, the worthy young man, who, as ye heard to-day, is no without\nan ability, has long been fond of Mrs Pawkie\u2019s cousin, Miss Lizzie\nPinkie; and I would fain do all that lies in my power to help on the\nmatch.\u201d\n\nThe bailie was well pleased with my frankness, and before returning\nhome, we came to a satisfactory understanding; so that the next thing I\nhad to do was to see Mr Pittle himself on the subject. Accordingly, in\nthe gloaming, I went over to where he stayed: it was with Miss Jenny\nKillfuddy, an elderly maiden lady, whose father was the minister of\nBraehill, and the same that is spoken of in the chronicle of Dalmailing,\nas having had his eye almost put out by a clash of glaur, at the stormy\nplacing of Mr Balwhidder.\n\n\u201cMr Pittle,\u201d said I, as soon as I was in, and the door closed, \u201cI\u2019m come\nto you as a friend. Both Mrs Pawkie and me have long discerned that ye\nhave had a look more than common towards our friend Miss Lizzie, and we\nthink it our duty to inquire your intents, before matters gang to\ngreater length.\u201d\n\nHe looked a little dumfoundered at this salutation, and was at a loss\nfor an answer; so I continued\u2014\n\n\u201cIf your designs be honourable, and no doubt they are, now\u2019s your\ntime;\u2014strike while the iron\u2019s hot. By the death of the Doctor, the\nkirk\u2019s vacant, the town-council have the patronage; and if ye marry Miss\nLizzie, my interest and influence shall not be slack in helping you into\nthe poopit.\u201d\n\nIn short, out of what passed that night, on the Monday following, Mr\nPittle and Miss Lizzie were married; and by my dexterity, together with\nthe able help I had in Bailie M\u2018Lucre, he was in due season placed and\nsettled in the parish; and the next year, more than fifty acres of the\ntown-moor were inclosed, on a nine hundred and ninety-nine years\u2019 tack,\nat an easy rate, between me and the bailie, he paying the half of the\nexpense of the ditching and rooting out of the whins; and it was\nacknowledged, by every one that saw it, that there had not been a\ngreater improvement for many years in all the country-side. But to the\nbest actions there will be adverse and discontented spirits; and, on\nthis occasion, there were not wanting persons naturally of a disloyal\nopposition temper, who complained of the inclosure as a usurpation of\nthe rights and property of the poorer burghers. Such revilings, however,\nare what all persons in authority must suffer; and they had only the\neffect of making me button my coat, and look out the crooser to the\nblast.\u2014\u201c_The Provost._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE MEAL MOB.\n\n\nDuring the winter of 18\u2014, there was a great scarcity of grain in the\nwestern districts of Scotland. The expediency of the corn laws was then\nhotly discussed, but the keen hunger of wives and children went further\nto embitter the spirits of the lower orders. The abstract question was\ngrasped at as a vent for ill-humour, or despairingly, as a last chance\nfor preservation. As usual, exaggerated reports were caught up and\ncirculated by the hungry operatives, of immense prices demanded by\ngrain-merchants and farmers, and of great stores of grain garnered up\nfor exportation. As a natural consequence of all these circumstances,\nserious disturbances took place in more than one burgh.\n\nThe town of \u2014\u2014, in which I then resided, had hitherto been spared, but a\nriot was, in the temper of the poor, daily to be expected. Numbers of\nspecial constables were sworn in. The commander of the military party\nthen in the barracks was warned to hold himself in readiness. Such\nmembers of the county yeomanry corps as resided in or near the town were\nrequested to lend their aid, if need should be.\n\nI was sitting comfortably by my fireside, one dark, cold evening,\nconversing with a friend over a tumbler of toddy, when we were both\nsummoned to officiate in our capacity of constables. The poor fellows\nwho fell at Waterloo sprang from their hard, curtainless beds with less\nreluctance. We lingered rather longer than decency allowed of, buttoning\nour greatcoats and adjusting our comforters. At last, casting a piteous\nlook at the fire, which was just beginning to burn up gloriously, we\npressed our hats deeper over our eyes, grasped our batons, and sallied\nforth.\n\nThe mischief had begun in the mills at the town-head, and as the parties\nemployed in the mob went to work with less reluctance than we had done,\nthe premises were fairly gutted, and the plunderers, (or, more properly\nspeaking, devastators) on their way to another scene of action, before a\nsufficient _posse_ of our body could be mustered. We encountered the\nhorde coming down the main street. The advanced guard consisted of an\nimmense swarm of little ragged boys, running scatteredly with stones in\ntheir hands and bonnets. These were flanked and followed by a number of\ndirty, draggle-tailed drabs, most of them with children in their arms.\nUpon them followed a dense mass of men of all ages, many of them in the\ngarb of sailors, for the tars had learned that the soldiery were likely\nto be employed against the people, and there is a standing feud between\nthe \u201csalt-waters\u201d and the \u201clobsters.\u201d There was also a vague and\nill-regulated sympathy for the suffering they saw around them, working\nat the bottom. All this array we half saw, half conjectured, by the dim\nlight of the dirty street lamps. The body was silent, but for the\nincessant pattering of their feet as they moved along.\n\nThe word was given to clear the street, and we advanced with right\nill-will upon them. The first ranks gave back, but there arose\nimmediately a universal and deafening hooting, groaning, yelling, and\nwhistling. The shrill and angry voices of women were heard above all,\nmingled with the wailing of their terrified babes. \u201cWe maun hae meat;\u201d\n\u201cFell the gentle boutchers;\u201d \u201cBelay there! spank him with your pole;\u201d\nresounded on every side, in the screaming tones of women, and the deep\nvoices of sailors, garnished and enforced with oaths too dreadful to\nmention. Nor was this all: a shower of stones came whizzing past our\nears from the boy-tirailleurs mentioned above, levelling some of our\ncompanions, jingling among the windows, and extinguishing the lamps.\nSome of the boldest of the men next attempted to wrest the batons from\nthe constables who stood near them. In this they were assisted by the\nwomen, who crushed into our ranks, and prevented us giving our cudgels\nfree play. The stones continued to fly in all directions, hitting the\nrioters as often as the preservers of the peace. The parties tugged and\npulled at each other most stubbornly, while the screams of pain and\nanger, the yell of triumph, and hoarse execrations, waxed momentarily\nlouder and more terrific.\n\nAt last the constables were driven back, with the loss of all their\nbatons and most of their best men. The mob rushed onward with a\ntriumphant hurrah, and turned down a side street leading to a granary,\nin which they believed a great quantity of grain was stored up. The\nproprietor\u2019s house stood beside it. A volley of stones was discharged\nagainst the latter, which shattered every window in the house, and the\nmissiles were followed by a thunder-growl of maledictions, which made\nthe hair of the innocent inmates stand on their heads, and their hearts\ndie within them. The crowd stood irresolute for a moment. A tall\nathletic sailor advanced to the door of the granary. \u201cHave you never a\nmarlin-spike to bouse open the hatchway here?\u201d A crowbar was handed to\nhim. \u201cA glim! a glim!\u201d cried voices from different parts of the crowd.\nIt was now for the first time discovered that some of the party had\nprovided themselves with torches, for after a few minutes\u2019 fumbling a\nlight was struck, and immediately the pitch brands cast a lurid light\nover the scene. The state of the corn merchant\u2019s family must now have\nbeen dreadful. The multitude stood hushed as death, or as the coming\nthunderstorm. All this time the sailor of whom I have spoken had been\nprising away with his bar at the granary door.\n\nAt this moment a heavy-measured tread was heard indistinctly in the\ndistance. It drew nearer, and became more distinct. Some respectable\nburghers, who had assembled, and stood aloof gazing on the scene, now\nedged closer to the crowd, and addressed the nearest women in a low\nvoice: \u201cYon\u2019s the sodgers.\u201d The hint was taken, for, one by one, the\nwomen gathered their infants closer in their arms, and dropped off.\nFirst one and then another pale-faced, consumptive-looking weaver\nfollowed their example in silence. The trampling now sounded close at\nhand, and its measured note was awful in the hush of the dark night. The\npanic now spread to the boys, who flew asunder on all sides\u2014like a\nparcel of carrion flies when disturbed by a passenger\u2014squalling, \u201cYon\u2019s\nthe sodgers!\u201d So effectual was the dispersion that ensued, that when the\nsoldiers defiled into the wider space before the granary, no one\nremained except the door-breaker, and one or two of the torch-holders.\n\nThe latter threw down their brands and scampered. The lights were\nsnatched up before they were extinguished, by some of the boldest\nconstables. Of all the rioters only one remained\u2014the tall sailor, who\nmay be termed their ringleader. The foremost rank of the soldiers was\nnearly up to him, and others were defiling from behind to intercept him\nshould he attempt to reach the side streets. He stood still, watchful as\na wild beast when surrounded by hunters, but with an easy roll of his\nbody, and a good-humoured smile upon his face. \u201cYield, Robert Jones,\u201d\ncried the provost, who feared he might meditate a desperate and\nunavailing resistance. But instead of answering, Robert sprung upon a\nsoldier who was forming into line at his right side, struck up the man\u2019s\nmusket, twisted off the bayonet, and making it shine through the air in\nthe torchlight like a rocket, tripped up his heels. \u201cNot yet, lobster!\u201d\nhe exclaimed, as the bayonet of the fallen hero\u2019s left-hand man glanced\ninnocuously past him, so saying, the sailor rapidly disappeared down a\ndark lane.\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Journal._\n\n\n\n\n THE FLITTING.\n\n\nIt was on the day before the flitting, or removal, that John Armour\u2019s\nfarm-stock, and indeed everything he had, excepting as much as might\nfurnish a small cottage, was to be rouped to meet his debts. No doubt it\nwas a heart-rending scene to all the family, though his wife considered\nall their losses light, when compared with her husband\u2019s peace of mind.\nThe great bustle of the sale, however, denied him the leisure which a\njust view of his condition made most to be dreaded; so that it was not\ntill late in the evening, when all was quiet again,\u2014his cherished\npossessions removed, and time allowed him to brood over his state,\u2014that\nthe deep feelings of vexation and despair laid hold of his spirit.\n\nThe evening was one of remarkable beauty; the birds never more\nrapturous, the grass never greener around the farm-house. The turf seat\non which old Hugh was wont to rest, in the corner of the little garden,\nwas white with gowans; the willows and honeysuckles that overarched it\nall full of life; the air was bland, the cushat\u2019s distant cooing very\nplaintive;\u2014all but the inhabitants of the humble dwelling was tranquil\nand delighted. But they were downcast; each one pursued some necessary\npreparation for tomorrow\u2019s great change, saying little, but deeply\noccupied with sad thoughts. Once the wife ejaculated\u2014\n\n\u201cOh, that the morn was ower!\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said her husband, \u201cthe morn, and every morn o\u2019 them!\u2014but I wish\nthis gloaming had been stormy.\u201d\n\nHe could not settle\u2014he could not eat\u2014he avoided conversation; and, with\nhis hat drawn over his brow, he traversed wearily the same paths, and\ndid over and over again the same things. It was near bedtime, when one\nof the children said to her mother\u2014\n\n\u201cMy faither\u2019s stan\u2019in\u2019 at the corner o\u2019 the stable, and didna speak to\nme when I spak to him;\u2014gang out, mother, and bring him in.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf he wad but speak to me!\u201d was the mother\u2019s answer. She went out,\u2014the\ncase had become extreme,\u2014and she ventured to argue with and reprove him.\n\n\u201cYe do wrang, John\u2014this is no like yoursel;\u2014the world\u2019s fu\u2019 of\naffliction\u2014ithers ken that as weel as you\u2014ye maunna hae a\u2019 things your\nain way: there\u2019s Ane abune us wha has said, \u2018In sorrow shalt thou eat\nthy bread all the days of thy life.\u2019 Ye canna expect to gang free; and I\nmaun say it wadna be gude for ony o\u2019 us. Maybe greater ills are yet to\nbefa\u2019 ye, and then ye\u2019ll rue sair that ye hae gien way at this time;\ncome in, John, wi\u2019 me; time will wear a\u2019 this out o\u2019 mind.\u201d\n\nHe struck his hand against his brow\u2014he grasped at his neckcloth\u2014and\nafter choking on a few syllables which he could not utter, tears gushed\nfrom his eyes, and he melted in a long heartrending fit of weeping. Oh,\nit is a sorrowful thing to see a strong hard-featured man shedding\ntears! His sobs are so heavy, his wail so full-toned! John Armour,\nperhaps for twenty years a stranger to weeping, had now to burst the\nsealed sluices of manhood\u2019s grief, which nothing but the resistless\nstruggle of agony could accomplish, ere relief could reach his labouring\nbreast. Now it was he sought the dearest sanctuary on earth\u2014he leaned\nupon his wife\u2019s bosom, and she lavished on him the riches of a woman\u2019s\nlove. At length he went to rest, gentler in spirit, and borne down by a\nless frightful woe than what had lately oppressed him.\n\nNext morning brought round the bustle of flitting. There is a deep\ninterest attending a scene of this kind, altogether separate from the\nfeelings of those who have to leave a favourite abode. Circumstances of\nantiquity\u2014of mystery\u2014belong to it. The demolition even of an old house\nhas something melancholy; the dismantling it of furniture is not less\naffecting. Some of the servants that had been at one time about the farm\nassisted on this occasion, and entered fully into the sentiments now\ndescribed.\n\n\u201cThat press has been there, I\u2019ll warran\u2019, this fifty years; it was his\nmother\u2019s, and cam on her blithe marriage-day; the like o\u2019t ye\u2019ll no see\nnow-a-days\u2014it\u2019s fresh yet. Few hae seen the back o\u2019 thee, I trow, these\ntwa days, but the wabsters and sclaters; they winna ken what to mak o\u2019\nthis wark; let me look into the back o\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wad be a wee eerie,\u201d said another, feeling the gloomy appearance of\nthe old empty dwelling suggest thoughts allied to superstition, \u201cabout\nganging into that toom house at night; I wad aye be thinkin\u2019 o\u2019 meeting\nwi\u2019 auld Hugh, honest man.\u201d\n\nThe flitting set off to a cottage about two miles distant; two cart\nloads of furniture, one milk cow, and the old watch-dog, were its\namount. John Armour lingered a little behind, as did his wife, for she\nwas unwilling to leave him there alone. He then proceeded to every part\nof the premises. The barn and stable kept him a few moments; the rest he\nhurried over, excepting the kitchen and spence. When he came to the\nkitchen (for it was the apartment he visited last), he leant his head\nfor an instant against the mantelpiece, and fixed his eyes on the\nhearthstone. A deep sigh escaped him, and his wife then took him by the\nhand to lead him away, which he resisted not, only saying,\u2014\n\n\u201cI hae mind o\u2019 mony a thing that happened here;\u201d\u2014then casting his eyes\nhastily round the desolate apartment,\u2014\u201cbut fareweel to thee for ever!\u201d\nIn a few minutes they overtook the flitting, nor did he once turn again\nhis head towards the desolate place which had so firm a hold of his\nheart.\u2014\u201c_My Grandfather\u2019s Farm._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n EWEN OF THE LITTLE HEAD:\n _A LEGEND OF THE WESTERN ISLES_.\n\n\nAbout three hundred years ago, Ewen Maclean of Lochbuy, in the island of\nMull, having been engaged in a quarrel with a neighbouring chief, a day\nwas fixed for determining the affair by the sword. Lochbuy, before the\nday arrived, consulted a celebrated witch as to the result of the feud.\nThe witch declared, that if Lochbuy\u2019s wife should on the morning of that\nday give him and his men food unasked, he would be victorious; but if\nnot, the result would be the reverse. This was a disheartening response\nfor the unhappy votary, his wife being a noted shrew.\n\nThe fatal morning arrived, and the hour for meeting the enemy\napproached; but there appeared no symptoms of refreshment for Lochbuy\nand his men. At length the unfortunate man was compelled to ask his wife\nto supply them with food. She set down before them curds, but without\nspoons. The men ate the curds as well as they could with their hands;\nbut Lochbuy himself ate none. After behaving with the greatest bravery\nin the bloody conflict which ensued, he fell covered with wounds,\nleaving his wife to the execration of his people.\n\nBut the miseries brought on the luckless chief by his sordid and\nshrewish spouse did not end with his life, for he died fasting; and his\nghost is frequently seen to this day riding the very horse on which he\nwas mounted when he was killed. It was a small, but very neat and active\npony, dun or mouse coloured, to which Lochbuy was much attached, and on\nwhich he had ridden for many years before his death. His appearance is\nas accurately described in the island of Mull as any steed is in\nNewmarket. The prints of his shoes are discerned by connoisseurs, and\nthe rattling of his curb is recognized in the darkest night. He is not\nparticular in regard to roads, for he goes up hill and down dale with\nequal velocity. His hard-fated rider still wears the same green cloak\nwhich covered him in his last battle; and he is particularly\ndistinguished by the small size of his head.\n\nIt is now above three hundred years since Ewen-a-Chin-Vig (_Anglice_,\n\u201cHugh of the Little Head\u201d) fell in the field of honour; but neither the\nvigour of the horse nor of the rider is yet diminished. His mournful\nduty has always been to attend the dying moments of every member of his\nown numerous tribe, and to escort the departed spirit on its long and\narduous journey.\n\nSome years ago, he accosted one of his own people (indeed, he has never\nbeen known to notice any other), and shaking him cordially by the hand,\nhe attempted to place him on the saddle behind himself, but the\nuncourteous dog declined the honour. Ewen struggled hard, but the clown\nwas a great strong, clumsy fellow, and stuck to the earth with all his\nmight. He candidly acknowledged, however, that his chief would have\nprevailed, had it not been for a birch tree which stood by, and which he\ngot within the fold of his left arm. The contest became then very warm\nindeed. At length, however, Ewen lost his seat for the first time; and\nthe instant the pony found he was his own master, he set off with the\nfleetness of lightning. Ewen immediately pursued his steed, and the\nwearied rustic sped his way homeward.\u2014_Lit. Gazette._\n\n\n\n\n BASIL ROLLAND.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n In May, quhen men yied everichone\n With Robene Hoid and Littil John,\n To bring in bowis and birken bobynis,\n Now all sic game is fastlings gone,\n Bot gif if be amangs clowin Robbynis.\u2014_A. Scott._\n\nThe period at which the circumstances recorded in the following\nnarrative happened was in the troubled year of 1639. At that time the\npoints in dispute betwixt Charles and his subjects were most violently\ncontested, and the partizans of each were in arms all over the country,\nendeavouring, by partial and solitary operations, to gain the ascendancy\nfor their faction. The first cause of these disturbances was the attempt\nof the monarch to establish Episcopacy over Scotland\u2014a form of worship\nwhich had always been disliked by the Scotch, as they considered it but\na single step removed from Popery. The intemperate zeal with which\nCharles prosecuted his views (occasioned by a misconception of the\nnational character of his subjects), and his averseness to compromise or\nconciliation, first gave rise to the combination called the Covenanters;\nweak at first, but in a short time too powerful to be shaken by the\nexertions of the High Churchmen.\n\nOne of the first and most politic steps taken by the Council of the\nCovenant, denominated \u201cthe Tables,\u201d was the framing of the celebrated\nBond or Covenant; the subscribers of which bound themselves to resist\nthe introduction of Popery and Prelacy, and to stand by each other in\ncase of innovations on the established worship. Charles seeing, at last,\nthe strength of this association, uttered, in his turn, a covenant\nrenouncing Popery; he also dispensed with the use of the Prayer Book,\nthe Five Articles of Perth, and other things connected with public\nworship which were obnoxious to the Covenanters.\n\nDuring this contention, the citizens of Aberdeen remained firmly\nattached to the royal interest, and appear to have come in with every\nresolution that was adopted by the government. In 1638, a deputation\nfrom \u201cthe Tables,\u201d among whom was the celebrated Andrew Cant (from whom\nthe mission was denominated \u201cCant\u2019s Visitation\u201d), arrived in the town,\nfor the purpose of inducing the inhabitants to subscribe the Covenant;\nbut as their representations entirely failed of success, they were\nobliged to desist. The Earl of Montrose arrived in Aberdeen in the\nspring of 1639, and, partly by the terror of his arms, partly by the\nrepresentations of the clergy that accompanied him, succeeded in\nimposing the Covenant on the townsmen. After his departure, a body of\nthe royalists, commanded by the Laird of Banff, having routed the forces\nof Frazer and Forbes, took possession of the town, and wreaked their\nvengeance on all who had subscribed the Covenant. They only remained\nfive days in the town, and, on their departure, it was occupied by the\nEarl of Marischal, who in turn harassed the royalists. As soon as\nMontrose heard of these occurrences, being doubtful of the fidelity of\nthe inhabitants, he marched to Aberdeen again, disarmed the citizens,\nand imposed a heavy fine upon them. The citizens, who had been\nimpoverished by these unjust exactions, were somewhat relieved, when\nMontrose, their greatest scourge, after another short visit, marched\ninto Angus and disbanded his army.\n\nIt was in the month of June that the citizens began to feel themselves\nelated by the prospect, if not of peace, of the seat of the war being\nremoved from their dwellings, on the disbanding of Montrose\u2019s forces,\nand at liberty to say anything about the Covenant that might seem good\nunto them. Those who had subscribed it under the influence of fear (and\nthey were not a small number) veered round to the king\u2019s party, and\nsounded the praises of the Viscount of Aboyne, who had landed at\nAberdeen on the part of his Majesty. Their former losses and sufferings\nwere all forgotten, and a general disposition for rejoicing was to be\nseen among them. Provost Leslie and his colleagues were inclined to\nencourage this, as it might lead those who had a hankering after the\nCovenant to turn to the loyal side, which allowed them greater latitude\nin their games and plays. It was therefore announced that, in the\nensuing week, the pastime of Robin Hood and Little John (which had not\nbeen celebrated in the beginning of May, the usual time, on account of\nthe disturbances) should be practised on the playfield, along with the\nusual helps to merriment.\n\nOf all the crowds that poured out from the town on that day to see the\nspectacle, it is our business only to take notice of a young man and\nmaiden that tripped along just as it was commencing. They appeared to be\nof the first order of the citizens. The maiden was a lively, interesting\nlittle girl, with blue eyes and a fine complexion; her limbs moulded\ninto the most exact symmetry, and her whole appearance in the utmost\ndegree fascinating. Her dress was white, with a sort of scarf or plaid\nwound round her person, and fastened by a loop and silver button on the\nleft shoulder. Her flaxen hair, except a few ringlets which strayed down\nher neck, was confined by a silken snood, which, even at that period,\nwas the badge of Scottish maidens. Her companion was above the middle\nsize, of rather a slender make and ruddy complexion, with expressive\ndark eyes, and coal black hair flowing down, according to the fashion of\nthe royalists, in large and glossy curls. He was about twenty years of\nage, and though his figure was somewhat boyish,\u2014or feminine if you\nwill,\u2014yet the fire of his eye, the intelligence of his countenance, and\nthe activity of his frame, confirmed his claims to manhood. Although the\nyoung man intended only to be a spectator of the revels, he was dressed\nin green, with bow and arrows, which was the dress of the actors of the\nplay.\n\nAs they approached the playfield, now called Gilcomston, the shouts of\nthe delighted populace were heard, mingled with the sounds of the pipe,\nfiddle, and trumpet, the songs of the minstrels, and the cries of the\njugglers. The Abbot and Prior of Bon-Accord (or, as they were called\nafter the Reformation, Robin Hood and Little John) had just arrived; and\nhaving been greeted by the populace, were forming a ring for the\ncelebration of the sports, which was guarded by a body of their archers.\nWe have no need to detail the performance; suffice it to say, that the\npiece was intended for a satire on the Covenanters, they being shown to\nthe lieges under the semblance of evil spirits, and the royalists of\nangels of light. Towards the close of it, the young man whom we have\nmentioned felt his sleeve pulled by a person behind him.\n\n\u201cThou art he whom I seek,\u201d said the person who thus forced himself on\nhis notice; \u201cand thy name is Basil Rolland.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is,\u201d returned he; \u201cdeclare your business.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot here. Thou seest we are surrounded by the multitude. Remove with me\nto a little distance, for I would hold some secret converse with thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat may not be. I came to squire this maiden to the revels, and may\nnot leave her alone.\u201d\n\n\u201cSuffer the damsel to tarry here for a short space, and follow me to a\nlittle distance.\u201d\n\n\u201cGo with the stranger, Basil,\u201d said she, \u201cand I will remain in the same\nspot till you return.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo so then, Mary,\u201d said Basil; \u201cI\u2019ll return anon.\u201d\n\nAs they retired to some distance from the crowd, Basil had leisure to\nnote the appearance of the stranger. From his dress little could be\nlearned; it was in the extremity of plainness. He had been a man of\nuncommon muscular strength, but it seemed much decayed, perhaps from the\nstruggles of an active life. His eyes were sunk, but retained their\nlustre; and premature furrows were on his brow. When he halted, Basil\naddressed him:\n\n\u201cWill it please you then, sir, to communicate your tidings?\u201d\n\n\u201cThen I ask thee, Basil Rolland, what dost thou here?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, grave sir, I\u2019ll answer thy question with another,\u201d said Basil,\nlaughing at this solemn opening of the conference: \u201cwhat dost _thou_\nhere?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy gray hairs, young man, are a testimony unto thee that I come not\nhere on any light matter.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy then, my foolish face may be a testimony to thee of the lightness\nof the cause that brought me hither. Marry! we have at last got rid of\nMontrose and his prickeared gang, wherefore we may be allowed to enjoy\nourselves on the prospect of peace.\u201d\n\n\u201cEnjoy thyself!\u201d said he. \u201cAnd what enjoyment canst thou gain from these\nabsurd and impious mummeries? They are a sacrifice to the evil one; a\nbloody engine of Prelacy to betray the unthinking soul. Peace! What have\nye to do with peace? Have not thy friends been treacherous as a snare,\nand unstable as water? Hath not the finger of Heaven written bitter\nthings against them for their guile and deceit? Have not their enemies\ntrampled them under foot, and they in whom they trusted been as a\nscourge and as a snare unto them? Have they not been lukewarm in the\ngood cause, regarding the favour of men more than the will of God? Are\nthey not even now triumphing at the hurt of Israel, and rejoicing that\nthe pure evangel has been withdrawn from them? Let them lean on those\nwhom they have chosen, and well shall it be for them if they can protect\nthem against the just wrath of the godly.\u201d\n\n\u201cYour words are dark and threatening, old man, but to me they appear as\nthe ravings of a feverish dreamer. You seem to tell me of some danger\nhanging over us; but our enemy\u2019s forces are disbanded, and in my\njudgment there is nothing to fear. The town is fortified: Aboyne, with a\nstrong army, possesses it. So away with these fancies; and if you have\naught to say that concerns me particularly, say on, for I must return to\nmy sister.\u201d\n\n\u201cThy sister? Well, Mary Leslie may deserve the name. I am thy friend,\nwherefore I am so thou shalt quickly know. Ponder well what I have said.\nRemember that the calm often precedes the storm, and that it is better\nto take part with the faithful, even in adversity, than to be the friend\nof covenant-breaking, soul-seducing prelatists. I will see thee\nto-morrow at the booth of Samuel Fairtext at eventide. Meet me there,\nand it shall be for thy good. Farewell, mayst thou be partaker of all\ncovenant blessings.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he walked off, and in a short time was lost among the crowd,\nleaving Basil at a loss what to make of his insinuations. When he came\nup with Mary Leslie, the Skinners, who represented the royalists, had\nsucceeded in driving the Litsters, who represented the Covenanters, into\na smoky den or booth, which, in a moment after, took fire, while the\nwhole angelic train joined in a song to the praise of the Viscount of\nAboyne.\n\nHe remarked, however, that the spectators were now very inattentive to\nthe sports. They were drawn together into small knots, all over the\nfield, in earnest conversation, which, as it became more general,\nentirely drowned the iron voices of the performing cherubs. The\nspectators began to leave the field in great numbers. Robin Hood\u2019s\nbody-guard even followed their example, and Little John, by the same\ninexplicable spirit of discontent, deserted his friend and leader. The\nwhisper (as it was at first) was not long in extending to the spot where\nBasil and Mary were standing. The cause of the disturbance may be\ngathered from the following conversation:\u2014\n\n\u201cNow, the like o\u2019 this I never saw,\u201d said Thomas Chalmers, deacon of the\nfleshers. \u201cThat deil\u2019s buckie Montrose is to the road again, an\u2019 comin\u2019\nwi\u2019 thousands upon thousands to the town. Fient a hoof mair will I get\nkilled till we be clear o\u2019 him.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, weel,\u201d said Jamie Jingle, the bellman, \u201cit\u2019s a gude thing it\u2019s\nnae waur. Come wha like, they\u2019ll aye need a bellman.\u201d\n\n\u201cNae waur, ye clappertongue!\u201d said another. \u201cI wad like to ken what waur\ncould come? Willna a\u2019 thing we hae be spulzied by thae rascals,\u2014black be\ntheir cast!\u2014an\u2019 wunna there be anither speel at the Covenant, whilk we\nhae a\u2019 ta\u2019en an\u2019 unta\u2019en about half-a-dozen o\u2019 times already?\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re vera right, Saunders,\u201d said the chief of the tanners; \u201cbut for a\u2019\nthat, Aboyne may gie him his kail through the reek; and, if the news be\ntrue, there will be a great demand for shoon and belts, whilk sud be a\nsource o\u2019 comfort, ye ken.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat hae I to do wi\u2019 your belts an\u2019 your brogues, Benjie Barkhide? What\nhae I to do wi\u2019 them, I say? A murrain on the Covenanters, say I, and a\u2019\nthat pertains to them.\u201d\n\n\u201cA curse on the Covenanters an\u2019 prelatemongers baith, conjunctly and\nseverally!\u201d said another citizen. \u201cI wish the deil would snite his nose\nwith the hale clanjamphry, though he sud get me to the bet o\u2019 the\nbargain, for wishing them sae.\u201d\n\n\u201cWha would hae thought o\u2019 this in the morning?\u201d said Barkhide. \u201cWeel,\nlads, I think we sud a gae hame, an\u2019 put as mony o\u2019 our bits o\u2019 things\nout o\u2019 the way as we can.\u201d\n\nThey departed, and this sentiment becoming general, in a short time the\nplay field was emptied of the revellers.\n\nAs Mary and Basil moved homewards with the rest, the latter evaded the\nquestions put to him concerning the stranger. He saw, however, a\ncoincidence between his darkly expressed hints and the events of the\nday; and while he resolved for the present to keep this secret, he\nanxiously wished for the promised interview.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n The red cross glares on Frazer\u2019s towers,\n My love, I dare not stay;\n The bugle peals through Lovat\u2019s bowers,\n My love, I must away.\u2014_Old Ballad._\n\nWe shall now conduct the reader to a shop in the Broadgate, over which\nappeared in ancient characters,\u2014\n\n =Patrick Leslie & Samuel Fairtext.=\n\nIt is not to be supposed that the street had the same appearance which\nit now exhibits; neither are the unsophisticated to imagine that the\nshops resembled those of our own times, with lofty roofs, gigantic\nwindows, mahogany counters, splendid chandeliers, and elegant gas\nburners. The windows were not much larger than the loop-holes of a\nmodern prison; the roof was low and covered with cobwebs, and the goods\nexposed for sale were all lying at sixes and sevens. The forepart of the\nshop extended about ten feet forward into the street, and was decorated\non the outside with swatches of the various commodities that were to be\nsold within. In the back shop, which was nearly as dark as midnight,\nwere deposited the whole of the goods, except the specimens just\nmentioned. In the inmost recess of these penetralia, was Provost Leslie,\nwith three or four stout fellows, removing, under his command, the goods\nin the back shop or warehouse.\n\n\u201cSaunders,\u201d said the provost, \u201cye\u2019ll tak awa yon silks an\u2019 velvets, and\nput them into the vault i\u2019 the dryest\u2014ay, that\u2019s anither flask broken,\nye careless gowk! I\u2019ll set ye about your business gin ye wunna tak mair\ntent. As soon\u2019s you get that barrel awa, ye\u2019ll tak down the Prayer-Books\nfrom that shelf, and put up twa or three dozen o\u2019 Confessions o\u2019 Faith.\nAn\u2019, my little man, ye\u2019ll run up to my lasses, and tell them to leave a\u2019\ntheir wark an\u2019 come down to grease the sword blades, for fear that they\nrust in the cellar, an\u2019 syne tell the same to Sammy Fairtext\u2019s maidens,\nan\u2019 bring them a\u2019 wi\u2019 you as fast\u2019s ye can.\u2014Ay, Basil, are ye there?\nTroth, gentle or semple, ye maun help\u2019s the day. You are a canny lad,\nsae try if ye can collect a\u2019 the trinkets and the siller cups and\nspoons, and take them up by to my chamber.\u2014Ye ne\u2019er-do-weel! ye haverel,\nSandie Hackit, what garred you spill the wine on that web? Ye needna\nmind it now, ye sorrow; it\u2019s nae worth puttin\u2019 out o\u2019 Montrose\u2019s way.\u201d\n\nWhen Basil Rolland returned from executing his commission, the stranger\nwhom he had seen on the former day was in the shop, engaged in\nconversation with Fairtext. The latter bade Basil conduct him to his\nhouse, whether he himself would follow when he had dispatched some\nnecessary business. When they were seated, the stranger began\u2014\n\n\u201cThou hast seen, youth, that the things which I hinted to thee are in\npart come to pass. The city is in confusion, the men of war are\ndiscouraged, so that they will assuredly be a prey, and a spoil, and a\nderision to their adversaries. What dost thou now intend?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat but to join the army of Aboyne, and do battle with my best blood\nagainst these murdering rebels.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what would be thy reward, young man? Thy good sense tells thee that\nit is wrong to deprive free-born men of liberty of conscience. You would\nfight for your own slavery. Charles is one who regardeth not covenants.\nHe will reward jugglers and lewd ones, rather than those who have shed\ntheir blood for his wicked house. But he already totters on his throne,\nand the day may not be distant when he himself shall cry for mercy from\nthose whose fathers, mothers, and children he hath slain. If you are\nvanquished in the approaching contest, all with you is lost; if\nsuccessful, you are nothing the better, except for upholding a\nPapistical hierarchy, the raw project of a godless debauchee. Thy\ngrandfather did battle on the wrong side, and, after his fall at the\nbattle of Pinkie, the family fell from its former power, which it has\nnever been able to regain.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet me ask what comfort or reward could I expect by deserting my\nfriends? The Covenanters have renounced their oath of allegiance, and\nhave imbrued their hands in their countrymen\u2019s blood. Good can never\nfollow an enterprise begun by perjury, and continued with carnage.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd did not Charles first deliberately break his oath and the covenant\nmade with the people? The paction was therefore nullified by him, and\ncould not bind the other party. If they have shed blood, their blood has\nbeen shed; and it was not till every attempt at pacification failed that\nthey took up the carnal weapon. And, for comfort, I have long supported\nthis cause, and I can look back with greater pleasure to my conduct in\nthis respect than thou canst on the picture of thy lady love which even\nnow is peeping from thy bosom.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is my mother\u2019s picture,\u201d said Basil, blushing to the eyes.\n\n\u201cThy mother\u2019s!\u201d said the stranger, while, with an emotion which he had\nnot yet exhibited, he caught at the picture with such violence as to\nbreak the silken riband with which it was suspended, and, unconscious of\nBasil\u2019s presence, riveted his eyes upon it, scanning the features with\nthe greatest eagerness.\n\n\u201cThe same, the same,\u201d said he to himself; \u201cthe arched brow and the\nfeeling eye, the smiling lips and the rosy cheek. But where is the\nprinciple that gave these their value? Where is the life, the soul?\u201d\ncontinued he, kissing the senseless painting. \u201cHow inferior was this\nonce to thy beauty, and how superior now to thy mouldering ashes! Didst\nthou appear as the ideal charmer of a flitting dream, or wert thou\nindeed the pride of my youth, the light of my eyes, and the mistress of\nmy heart? Thou wert! thou wert! my sorrows tell it.\u2014Preserve this\npicture, young man. Thou never, alas! knewest a mother\u2019s love\u2014or a\nfather\u2019s affection: the former flame was rudely quenched, the latter\nburned unknown to thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen you knew my mother?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, Basil, I knew her. We ran together in infancy, we danced together\non the braes of Don, and wove each other garlands of the wild-flowers\nthat grew on its banks. Then we thought this world was as heaven, while\nwe were as innocent as angels. As we grew up, the sun, the wood, the\nrock, was our temple, where we admired the beauteous novelty of this\nearth. All was love, and peace, and joy; but sorrow came, and those\nsweet dreams have vanished.\u201d\n\nDuring these unexpected communications, Basil felt himself strangely\nagitated. The old man seemed to know his history, and with a mixture of\ndoubt and anxiety he inquired if he knew his father.\n\n\u201c_I_ am thy father,\u201d said the stranger, weeping, and throwing himself\ninto his arms; \u201cI am thy parent, thy joyous, sorrowing parent. How often\nhave I wished for this day! It is now come, and thou art all that I\ncould wish\u2014except in one thing, and that is not thy fault. I have\nclaimed thee at a time when the boy must act the man, and take part\nboldly in the great struggle. We must depart from this place to-night.\nThe citizens, thou knowest, are summoned to join the royalists under\npain of death, so that we may be delayed if we tarry longer.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut whither, my father, shall we go?\u201d said Basil.\n\n\u201cWhere but to the persecuted remnant that are even now struggling for\nfreedom. We will fight under the banner of the Covenant.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have now found a father,\u201d said Basil, \u201cand his commands I must and\nwill obey; but you will not bid me lift the sword when every stroke must\nfall upon an acquaintance or a schoolmate?\u201d\n\nIsaac Rolland then began to mention to his son the reasons which induced\nhim to join this party. He had no more of enthusiasm than it becomes one\nto have who knows he is embarked in a good cause. He mentioned his own\nearly history, which we shall blend with that of his son. He had been\none of the mission, headed by Sir Thomas Menzies, that visited King\nJames in 1620 on civil business. About eighteen months before, he had\nlost a loving and beloved wife, with whom he had been acquainted from\nearly infancy. She died on the birth of Basil. After this affliction,\nIsaac Rolland could find no pleasure in the place of his nativity, where\neverything reminded him of some dear departed joy; wherefore, having\ninterest to obtain a situation at court, he left his only son Basil\nunder the guardianship of his friend Fairtext, and contented himself by\nhearing often about him, without ever visiting him till the time at\nwhich this story commences. Rolland was acquainted partially with the\ncircumstances of his birth. He knew that his mother died when she gave\nhim life; he knew also that his father existed, but nothing farther.\nIsaac laid before his son, in a clear and methodic manner, the reasons\nfor which the Covenanters took up arms, the reasonableness of their\ndemands, and the tyranny of their enemies. He neither palliated nor\ndenied the excesses of either party, but contended that these should\nteach all to use their superiority mercifully. The forcible point of\nview in which he set his arguments wrought instant conviction in Basil\u2019s\nmind, which his father observing,\u2014\n\n\u201cCome, then,\u201d said he, \u201cand let us prepare for this struggle. If we be\nsuccessful (and shall we not be so in such a cause?), we shall have the\nconsolation of having given peace and freedom to the land. I have a\nsufficiency of world\u2019s goods, and thou and thy Mary\u2014nay, start not, I\nknow all\u2014thou and thy Mary will be the support and comfort of my old\nage, and the subject of my last prayer, as ye have been of many, many in\nthe days bygone. Bid your friends farewell, and an hour hence we meet to\npart no more. Be cautious, however, my son, for these men of Belial have\nset a guard on the city, and death is the lot of all who seem about to\nleave it. Farewell! God bless thee, my dear son;\u201d and he again folded\nhim in his arms.\n\nWhen Basil was left to himself, it would have been difficult to say\nwhether he was more sorrowful or joyful. He had found his father, a fond\nand doting father; but his heart revolted at turning his back on the\nscenes of his youth and the smiling face of his Mary. The latter was the\nmore distressing. She had listened to his suit, and the good-natured\nprovost, when acquainted with it, had sworn that no other should marry\nhis Mary. His own father seemed to approve his passion; wherefore he\nresolved to bid her farewell, and moved accordingly to the provost\u2019s\nhouse.\n\nShe was alone, and received him with her usual smile of joy, but was\nstartled at the unusual expression of sorrow on his countenance. \u201cMary,\u201d\nsaid he; but his lips could articulate nothing farther.\n\nShe became alarmed. \u201cBasil, you are ill!\u201d said she.\n\nHe seized her hand. \u201cMary, I am come to bid you farewell\u2014perhaps a long\nfarewell.\u201d\n\nShe became pale in her turn, and asked him to explain himself. He\nresumed,\u2014\n\n\u201cWhen we were young, Mary, you were my only companion, and I yours. You\nwere unhappy when away from Basil Rolland, and I when absent from Mary\nLeslie. When, in the folly of play, I had girded myself with your\nfather\u2019s sword, you complained to him, while the tears ran down your\ncheeks, that brother Basil was leaving you to become a soldier. Such\nthings at the time are trifling; but how often are they the types of\nblessed love in riper years. I am now to leave you to mingle in scenes\nof strife: let me carry with me the consciousness of your continued\nlove; confirm to me the troth that you have plighted, and, come life or\ndeath, I shall be happy.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut why, O Basil, why are you leaving us? Have we not more need of thy\npresence than ever?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have found my father, and by his command I leave you this very\nnight.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis night!\u201d said she, while the tears coursed in torrents down her\npale cheek. Basil caught her in his arms, and they wept together who had\nnever known sorrow before.\n\n\u201cBe comforted, Mary,\u201d said Basil at length; \u201cwe shall meet again, and\nthe present sorrow will enhance the gladness of the meeting. My\nhappiness depends entirely on you, and my father looks fondly to our\nunion.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! when you are gone far from this, you will soon forget the vows that\nyou have made. I have no mother to guide me; oh, do not then deceive me,\nBasil.\u201d\n\n\u201cI swear that my heart never owned the influence of another, and that\nits last beat shall be true to you.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen,\u201d said she, throwing herself into his arms, \u201cI am happy!\u201d\n\nBasil hastily explained to her what he knew of his destination, and,\nwith a chaste kiss of mutual transport, they separated.\n\nHe acquainted no other person with his intention of departing, but\nreturned to make some preparations for his journey. These were soon\ncompleted; he was joined by his father, and leaving the town at sunset,\nthey walked leisurely to Stonehaven, where Montrose\u2019s army was encamped.\n\n\n Chapter III.\n\n See how he clears the points o\u2019 faith.\u2014_Burns._\n\n _Hamlet._ Hold you the watch to-night?\n _Horatio._ We do, my lord.\u2014_Shakspeare._\n\nDay was dawning as our travellers reached the camp of the Covenanters.\nThey rested for some time to partake of victuals, which their journey\nrendered necessary. Isaac Rolland then judged it proper to present his\nson to Montrose, and accordingly conducted him to Dunottar, where the\ngeneral then was. They were admitted to his presence.\n\n\u201cI expected you sooner, Rolland,\u201d said Montrose. \u201cWhat intelligence have\nyou gathered?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe enemy are preparing to take the field with a numerous and\nwell-appointed force, and I have gathered, from a sure source, that it\nis their intention to attack our forces as soon as some needful supplies\nare received from the north.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow do the citizens stand affected?\u201d\n\n\u201cAlmost to a man they have joined Aboyne. They have fortified the city\nand the bridge, and are determined to hold out to the last.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe ungrateful truce-breaking slaves!\u201d said Montrose. \u201cBut vengeance is\nat hand. Who is this young man whom thou hast brought with thee?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy son,\u201d said Isaac, \u201cwhom grace hath inclined to take part with us.\u201d\n\n\u201cA youth of gallant bearing! Young man, thy father\u2019s faithfulness is a\nwarrant for thine. Let thy fidelity equal thy reputed spirit, and thou\nshalt not lack the encouragement due to thy deserts. You may both retire\nto rest, and I will apprise you of the duties required of you.\u201d\n\nThey saluted the general, and retired.\n\nA foraging party returned with a report that Aboyne was already on his\nmarch. This was found to be incorrect by some scouts who had been\ndispatched that evening to gather what information they could about the\nenemy\u2019s motions. They brought the intelligence, however, that Aboyne\u2019s\nequipments were completed, and that it was the popular belief that he\nwould march immediately to meet the Covenanters. Preparations were\naccordingly made for immediate marching. Numerous foraging parties\nscoured the adjacent country for provisions, and horses for transporting\nthe baggage and ammunition. According to the custom of the Congregation,\nwhen about to engage in warfare, the next day was appointed for a\ngeneral fast throughout the host.\n\nThere perhaps never was assembled any body for the purposes of religious\nworship that exhibited such an appearance of romantic sublimity as the\nCovenanters did on such occasions. At the present time they were\nassembled under the blue canopy of heaven, in a hollow valley betwixt\ntwo mountains, the summits of which were planted with sentinels, to give\nnotice to the main body of any interruption. Upon the declivity of one\nof the mountains was erected a wooden pulpit, before which was assembled\nthe army, to the number of about 2000 men. A dead stillness prevailed\namong them, while the preacher, a man richly endowed with that nervous\nand fiery eloquence which was the most effectual with men in their\nsituation, explained to them a passage from the fifteenth chapter of\nSecond Samuel:\u2014\u201cThus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which\nAmalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came\nup from Egypt. Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that\nthey have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and\nsuckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.\u201d This passage he applied to the\ncondition of the Covenanters. He described the sufferings and grievances\nof the persecuted kirk, and showed that the Almighty did not disregard\nthese, but, in His own time, would avenge the blood of His saints. He\ntold them that God was now calling on all who were on His side to fight\nfor the good of the land, and that His soul could have no pleasure in\nthose who drew back from the approaching contest. \u201cAnd now,\u201d said he,\nwhile the fire flashed from his eyes, as with prophetic ardour, which\nwas answered by a corresponding enthusiasm in his hearers; \u201cand now the\nmen of Babylon have set up an image of gold, even a molten image, and\nthey say, \u2018Fall down and worship the image that we have set up;\u2019 and\nthey have fenced themselves with trenched cities, and they have\nencompassed themselves with spears, and a multitude of horsemen and\nslingers, and archers, and they say unto this help from Egypt, \u2018This\nshall be for a deliverance unto us.\u2019 But fear not ye the multitude of\ntheir strong ones, neither be dismayed at the neighing of their horses;\nfor the Lord of hosts is on our side, and His right hand shall work\nvaliantly for us. He breaketh the iron weapon, and burneth the chariot\nin the fire. He laugheth at the bow of steel and the rattling of the\nquiver. Walled cities are no defence against His hand, nor the place of\nstrength, when His thunder muttereth in the sky. Wherefore, gird up your\nloins to fight the battles of the Lord. Smite the Amalekites from Dan\neven unto Beersheba. Destroy the lines of their tents, and their choice\nyoung men, that the reproach may be removed from the camp of Israel.\nTurn not aside from the sacrifice like the faint-hearted Saul, but smite\nthem till they be utterly consumed, and their name become a hissing, and\nan abomination, and a by-word upon the earth. Think on your children,\nand your children\u2019s children, from age to age, who shall hold your name\nin everlasting remembrance, and look to the reward of Him who sitteth\nbetween the cherubim, who hath said, that whosoever layeth down his life\nfor My sake shall find it.\n\n\u201cThe days are now come when the father shall deliver up the son to\ndeath, and the son the father; when the brother shall be divided against\nthe sister, and the sister against the mother. But the days of Zion\u2019s\npeace shall also come, when all the princes of the earth shall bow down\nbefore her, and call her the fairest among women. (Canticles, sixth and\nfirst.) The house of the Lord shall be established on the tops of the\nmountains. The New Jerusalem shall appear as a bride adorned for her\nhusband. (Revelations, twenty-first and second.) The tabernacle of God\nshall be with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His\npeople, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God; and God\nshall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more\ndeath, neither sorrow nor sighing, neither shall there be any more pain,\nfor the former things shall have passed away. Go forth, then, to the\nbattle. Quit yourselves like men. Be strong. Look to those ancient\nworthies who, through faith, subdued kingdoms, stopped the mouths of\nlions, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the alien.\nFear not their multitude nor their fury, for he that is with you is\ngreater than your enemies. Think on the persecuted state of Zion, and\nmay the God of battles be for a buckler and a defence unto you!\u201d\n\nA hum of approbation ran along the lines of the Covenanters at the\nconclusion of this discourse, while the preacher called upon them to\njoin with him in praising the Almighty. The part chosen was that\neloquent passage of the eightieth psalm, where the Israelites are spoken\nof under the similitude of a vine.\n\nAs the last note of this hymn ascended in solemn strains to the lofty\nheaven, several of the scouts made their appearance, with jaded horses,\nbringing the news that Aboyne was already on his march, and approaching\nrapidly to Stonehaven. Orders were immediately given to the army of the\nCovenanters to set out on their journey. These were promptly obeyed,\nand, in a few hours, the armies met at Megray Hill. This was announced\nto the Covenanters by their advanced guard being driven back by the\nroyalists. It was not, however, Aboyne\u2019s intention to hazard a general\nengagement, as his soldiers were wearied by the march. But Montrose,\ndispatching a strong band of infantry, supported by a detachment of\ncavalry, broke upon them suddenly both in flank and rear, involved them\nin the greatest confusion, and forced them to seek Aberdeen by a rapid\nflight, after leaving a considerable number dead on the field. Montrose\npursued them, with the greatest possible dispatch, to Aberdeen, where\nthey made a stand. The Bridge of Dee was fortified in a very strong\nmanner, and protected by four field-pieces and a strong guard of the\ncitizens. Montrose made several attempts at forcing it, but was\nvigorously repulsed by the defenders, who poured in a shower of missiles\nwith effect on the assailants, while they themselves were so sheltered\nby their breastworks that they received little injury. Montrose was\nobliged, therefore, to draw off his forces, and, as it was evening, gave\nup the thought of any farther attack. Having found a convenient place,\nhe pitched his camp about a mile from the bridge, and stationed his\nsentinels on the little eminences in its neighbourhood, while those of\nAboyne were planted on both sides of the river for a considerable\ndistance above and below the bridge. Both armies, fatigued with the\nexertions of the day, availed themselves of the repose offered by their\nsituation, and in a short time the busy hum of both camps was changed\ninto stillness.\n\nOur hero had accompanied the army during the march, with that wonder and\nadmiration which youthful minds feel in such spirit-stirring scenes. The\nstrictness of the military duty, the contempt of danger, the degree of\nsubordination and regularity that prevailed (for the abilities of\nMontrose prevented that ruinous confusion which the camp of the\nCovenanters too often exhibited), and the promptness and patience with\nwhich the necessary commands were executed made an impression on the\nmind of Basil strongly in favour of his military life. The general, at\nthe commencement of the march, ordered him to be near his person, and by\nmeans, as the Covenanters would have said, of a \u201csoul-searching\u201d\nconversation, contrived to get a clear view of his character and worth.\nThe opinion that he made up was in favour of Basil, and he scrupled not\nto give him more direct assurances of his favour than he had hitherto\ndone. The honours that had been paid him by this distinguished statesman\nand general gave rise to a new train of ideas in his mind; and, as the\narmy was preparing for the night\u2019s repose, he was charging the enemy at\nthe head of his own troops, succouring the distressed damsel, and\nhurling unheard-of destruction on his foes. But the mightiest conquerors\nhave often found themselves conquered when they least expected it; and,\nas the valiant Don Quixote felt his very soul withering when thinking on\nthe absence of his Dulcinea, so our hero regarded the short time that he\nhad been separated from his Mary to be an age. An ugly river and a\nhostile army lay between him and his love. If Leander swam across the\nHellespont, surely he might cross the Dee, and trust the rest to his\nprudence and good fortune.\n\nHis father was engaged with the general; so out he wandered, and, by his\ncorrect local knowledge, succeeded in passing the various sentinels, and\ngetting to the banks of the river, a little below the rocks called the\nCraig-lug, where he had the fortune to find a small fishing-boat (for,\nso far back as the year 1290, Aberdeen is celebrated in history for its\nsalmon-fishings). He easily rowed himself across the river, and,\nfastening the boat on the northern bank, stole along the water\u2019s edge,\nand entered that part of the town which, as fronting the harbour, was\nnot walled. He directed his course to the Broadgate, and, as there were\nstill several stragglers in the street, ensconced himself behind a\nprojecting shop till all should be quiet.\n\nWhen he left the camp, the night was calm and serene. The breeze that\nfloated by was unable to curl the surface of the river, and the\nmoonbeams were dancing in silvery circles on the placid waters as they\ngurgled by. But this was not of long continuance. The atmosphere became\nquickly loaded with clouds, the moon was obscured, the rain fell in\ntorrents, and the sullen howling of the east wind, with the hollow\nmuttering of the thunder, indicated one of those storms which not\nunfrequently disturb the beauty of summer. Basil wrapped his cloak the\ncloser around him, and hastened to the provost\u2019s house. All in it was\ndark and still. He knocked; but no one returned an answer. Astonished at\nthis, he endeavoured to open the door, but it resisted his efforts.\nBeing acquainted with all the intricacies of the provost\u2019s domicile, he\ngained admission by a window, but found the house deserted of its\ninhabitants and stripped of its furniture. Mary Leslie\u2019s apartment was\nthen the object of his search. It was also desolate. Her lute, her\nbooks, and her landscapes were all removed. In groping through the room,\nhis hand fell on a small picture, which the next flash of lightning\ndiscovered to be her miniature. He pressed it to his lips and hid it in\nhis bosom, regarding it, as the holy man did the prophetic mantle, as\nthe last unexpected memorial of a lost friend. It would be vain to\nattempt to describe his amazement at these appearances. He trembled for\nhis friends, when he knew the deeds of violence that were daily\npractised in these perilous times. He determined to arouse the\nneighbourhood\u2014to search for, pursue, and destroy in one breath, all who\nhad been any way concerned in this outrage. Reason, however, came to his\naid, and he saw the utter uselessness of _his_ attempting such a thing,\nexcept by the assistance that he could obtain from the Covenanters. He\ntherefore turned sorrowfully to retrace his steps, which, from the\ndarkness of the night and the violence of the storm, was not an easy\nmatter. Having rowed himself across the river by the little boat, he was\nmaking a circuit to reach the camp, when he saw a light at a small\ndistance from the landing-place. It proceeded from a hut that was built\nat the foot of the rock for the accommodation of the fishermen. Curious\nto know who were in it at this untimely hour, he pressed forward, and\nlistened to the following dialogue:\u2014\n\n\u201cAy! an\u2019 will ye tell me that the possession of Joash, the Abiezrite,\nwasna in Ophrah? But it\u2019s just like a\u2019 your fouk; ye ken naething about\nthe Scriptures, but daze yourselves wi\u2019 that ill-mumbled mass, the\nprayer-beuk. But your yill\u2019s very gude, and far better than what we\nhave.\u201d\n\n\u201cI doubtna, my lad,\u201d said another voice; \u201cyour fouk are sae stocked, I\ndaresay Montrose is gaun to mak you a\u2019 Nazarenes, for he gies you\nneither wine nor strong drink.\u201d\n\n\u201cDinna speak lightly o\u2019 the Scriptures, Sawnie Hackit; ye\u2019re just a\nblaspheming Shemei, or a time-serving Balaam.\u201d\n\n\u201cHout,\u201d said Hackit, \u201cgie\u2019s nane o\u2019 your foul-mou\u2019d misca\u2019ings. I wunner\nwhat the deil garred you turn a Covenanter, Tammas Granehard, for ye\nusedna to be that fond o\u2019 covenants, unless it was ane for a fou pint\nstoup at Jamie Jinks\u2019 hostelry.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wasna aye i\u2019 the right way, Sandie, muckle to my shame; but better\nlate mend than never do weel; an\u2019 I\u2019m thinking it would be better for\nyou if ye would come wi\u2019 us, for your fouk can never stand ours, and,\ninstead o\u2019 getting share o\u2019 the spuilzie, ye\u2019ll maybe get but a\nweel-clawed crown.\u201d\n\n\u201cI doubtna but ye\u2019re very right, Tammas; but what would come o\u2019 my ten\nachisons ilka day, forby the jibble o\u2019 drink, an\u2019 my place at Provost\nLeslie\u2019s?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m doubtin\u2019 your place there\u2019ll no\u2019 be worth muckle, if we tak the\ntown. The provost isna a man to be passed over, wha can sae weel afford\nto pay for\u2019s idolatry.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid ye ever hear,\u201d said Hackit, \u201co him ever losing ony thing when the\nwhigs had the town one day and the royalists the next?\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, Sandie,\u201d said the other, \u201cI canna just charge my memory wi\u2019 ony\nthing o\u2019 the kind; and gif it wasna, it was that God-fearing man, Samuel\nFairtext, that saved him.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy,\u201d said Hackit; \u201cand, when the royalists were here, it was the jolly\nold cavalier that saved Fairtext. Troth, it\u2019s the only wiselike\npartnership that I ken o\u2019 at present; for, if they had been baith whigs\nor baith royalists, they would have been ruined out o\u2019 house and ha\u2019 ere\nthis time. But, ye see, when the royalists were in the town, Fairtext\nkept himself quiet, and they wadna meddle wi\u2019 him on Provost Leslie\u2019s\naccount. And now a\u2019 the gudes are removed, an\u2019 put under Fairtext\u2019s\ncare; sae that the Covenanters wudna tak the value of a shoe-tie frae\nhim, for he can pray and grane as weel as ony o\u2019 them. The provost and\nhis dochter have left their ain house, and are to dwell wi\u2019 Fairtext\ntill the danger be ower.\u201d\n\nBy the latter part of this conversation, Basil felt as if the imaginary\nweight of sorrow were removed from his bosom; but, instead of it, his\narms were pinioned on a sudden, by a strong physical force, so firmly,\nthat he was unable to move himself round to discover the occasion of\nthis unceremonious embrace.\n\n\u201cCome here, ye dotterels!\u201d said a strong voice; \u201cye sit there, gabbin\u2019\nan\u2019 drinkin\u2019 awa, nae caring wha may be hearing you. An\u2019 you, my birkie,\nwill better be as quiet \u2019s you can, or, deil tak me,\u2014an\u2019 I\u2019m no used to\nswear,\u2014but I\u2019ll scour my durk atween the ribs o\u2019 ye.\u201d\n\nA couple of men now came out of the hut and assisted in dragging Basil\ninto it. As soon as they had forced him in, the person who had first\nseized him quitted his hold, exclaiming, \u201cEh, sirs! is that you?\u201d Hackit\nalso let him go, and Basil was able to look around him. There was\nneither chair nor table in the booth, but turf seats around the walls,\nplentifully littered with straw. A candle, fixed in the neck of an empty\nbottle, illuminated the place, and revealed a goodly quantity of\nbottles, with two or three horn drinking-cups on the floor, by which it\nappeared that the party had been engaged in a debauch.\n\nThomas Granehard still kept his hold, and, in a stern voice, demanded\nwhat he was?\n\n\u201cWhat the deil\u2019s your business wi\u2019 that?\u201d said Hackit. \u201cI ken him, an\u2019\nthat\u2019s eneuch.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut I am strong in spirit,\u201d muttered the Covenanter.\n\n\u201cThe toom bottles testify that, to a certainty, Tammas,\u201d said the other.\n\u201cBut, never mind; get anither stoup, Geordie, an\u2019 sit down, Master\nBasil.\u201d\n\n\u201cBlithely,\u201d said Geordie; \u201cand troth, Master Rolland, I didna ken it was\nyou, or I wudna hae handled you sae roughly. But sit down, for it\u2019s a\ncoarse night.\u201d\n\n\u201cI may not,\u201d said Basil. \u201cI must to the camp. But why do I find you\nhere?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu,\u201d said Hackit, \u201cye see Geordie and me belangs to Aboyne, for the\nprovost sent a\u2019 his servants to him. We\u2019re upon the watch the night, ye\nmaun ken. But wha, i\u2019 the name of the seventy disciples, could stand\nthereout in a night like this? Sae we made up to the Covenanters\u2019\nwarders, and met in wi\u2019 Tammas there, an auld acquaintance; and we\nthought it best to come here and keep ourselves warm wi\u2019 sic liquor as\nwe could get, and let the camps watch themselves.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you know that you all expose yourselves to death for this frolic?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere gang twa words to that bargain. We\u2019ve done a\u2019 that could be\nreasonably expected,\u2014we watched till the storm came.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, you are not accountable to me; I must depart.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel, a gude evening to you. But stop!\u2014now that I mind\u2014ye maun gie me\nthe pass-word.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe pass-word!\u201d said Basil, in a tone of surprise.\n\n\u201cAy, the pass-word! Ye see, Sergeant Clinker says to me, \u2018Now, Saunders,\nif ony ane comes to you that canna say _Balgownie_, ye\u2019re to keep him\nand bring him to me.\u2019 Sae, for as weel\u2019s I like you, Master Basil, ye\ncanna pass without it.\u201d\n\n\u201cBalgownie, then,\u201d said Basil laughing.\n\nHackit turned on his heel, saying it was \u201cvera satisfactory,\u201d when\nGranehard remembered that he had got a similar injunction; wherefore,\nmaking shift to steady himself a little by leaning on his arquebuss, he\ndelivered himself thus:\u2014\n\n\u201cBeloved brethren,\u2014I mean young man,\u2014I, even I, have also received a\ncommandment from ancient Snuffgrace, saying, \u2018Thou shalt abstain from\nwine and strong drink; and whosoever cometh unto thee that cannot give\nthe pass, _Tiglathpeleser_, thou shalt by no means allow him to escape,\notherwise thou shalt be hanged on a tree, as was the bloody Haman, the\nson of Hammedatha, the Agagite.\u2019 Wherefore, now, repeat unto me the\nword\u2014the light of the moon is darkened\u2014another cup, Sandie\u2014woe to the\nMan of Sin\u2014a fearsome barking\u2014dumb dogs\u2014Malachi\u2014\u2014\u201d And he sank down in a\nstate of complete and helpless intoxication.\n\nBasil earnestly advised Hackit and his companions to return immediately\nto their posts, and retraced his steps to the camp, as the reader may\njudge, not excessively gratified with the issue of the night\u2019s\nadventure.\n\n\n CHAPTER IV.\n\n With forkis and flales they lait grit flappis,\n And flang togedder lyk freggis,\n With bougars of barnis they best blew kappis,\n Quhyle they of bernis made briggis;\n The reird rais rudelie with the rappis,\n Quhen rungis were layd on riggis,\n The wyffis cam furth with cryis and clappis,\n \u2018Lo! quhair my lyking liggis,\u2019\n Quo they;\n At Christis Kirk on the Grene that day.\u2014_King James I._\n\nBasil was dreaming about Mary Leslie when he was awakened by the\ndreadful note of preparation. The bugles were sounding, men and horses\nhurrying to and fro, and a body of Cameronians\u2014or \u201chill-fouk\u201d\u2014had formed\nthemselves into a conventicle beside his tent, and were listening with\nthe greatest attention to a favourite preacher. When he came out, the\nscene was beyond measure animating. There was no trace of the late\nstorm, and the little birds sang their accustomed songs. All was bustle,\nboth in the camp of the Covenanters and that of the royalists. The\nlatter were repairing the fortifications of the bridge, which had\nsuffered in the last night\u2019s attack. The royalists were already under\narms, but Montrose had no design of attacking them, till the ebbing of\nthe tide should render the lower fords passable in case he should be\nunable to force the bridge. The Covenanters remained idle during the\nforenoon, while the royalists stood in order of battle, uncertain as to\nthe time of attack.\n\nAbout two in the afternoon, the shrill sound of a bugle collected the\nCovenanters to their standards; and Aboyne\u2019s sentinels, who till now had\nkept on the south bank of the river, fell back to the main body. Our\nhero was ordered by Montrose to lead a body of horsemen to the lower\nford, to remain there till informed of the bridge\u2019s being taken, when he\nwas to push to the town and guard Aboyne\u2019s house from being plundered,\nand seize on all papers that might be found in it. He departed\naccordingly.\n\nAboyne, being aware that Montrose\u2019s intention was to storm the bridge,\ndrew all his forces to its defence. In a valley, at a small distance\nfrom the bridge, Montrose stationed the flower of his army, and, with\nthe rest, including the waggoners and other followers of the camp, to\nmake a more formidable appearance, made a feint as if he intended to\nford the river above the bridge. This stratagem succeeded, for Aboyne\ninstantly withdrew the greater part of his forces to oppose them, and\nthus left the most important station almost at the mercy of the enemy.\nThe ambuscade rose immediately, and advanced even to the cannons\u2019\nmouths. The artillery, however, of that period, was not so formidable as\nit is now. It was ill-served, ill-directed, and did little execution. A\nbrisk engagement took place at the bridge, which, however, was\nmaintained but a few minutes; for the Covenanters, clearing the bridge\nof its defenders, and quickly removing the barricades, opened to the\nright and left a path for their cavalry, who drove the citizens off the\nfield with considerable loss. Aboyne returned quickly with his men to\nassist the citizens, but their courage was now damped with their loss;\nso that, by the first charge of the Covenanters, their ranks were\nbroken, and they began to fly in every direction. It was no longer a\nbattle but a rout. The Covenanters hewed down without mercy their flying\nenemies; and, so exasperated were they at their obstinate fickleness in\nformer times, that the more merciful among them were hardly able to\nobtain quarter for those who confessed themselves vanquished. Aboyne,\nwith great exertion, having rallied one hundred horse, made for the\ntown, determined if possible to defend it. Montrose dispatched a party\nafter him, and both, plunging their rowels into their horses\u2019 sides,\ndashed forward over friends and enemies indiscriminately, and arrived\nclose at each other\u2019s heels in the town. There was no possibility of\nshutting the gates; so both entered by St Nicholas Fort at the same\ninstant. The intention of Aboyne was thus frustrated, and he found it\nnot an easy matter to escape with his followers by the Gallowgate Port.\n\nThe inhabitants had waited with breathless expectation the event of this\nday\u2019s battle, and had in some measure made up their minds in case of\nAboyne\u2019s failure. But the anticipation fell far short of the reality.\nThe town was in the possession of the enemy. At every turning of the\nstreets there were parties engaged in desperate combat, while the troops\nof cavalry that occasionally passed sometimes trampled down both friend\nand foe, never more to rise. The poor citizens were endeavouring to\nescape from the place with whatever of their effects they could lay\nhands on. The aged were feebly endeavouring to leave the resting-place\nof their youth. Wives, mothers, and sisters were searching in tears for\ntheir friends, while a loud and piercing shriek announced the agony of\nthe maidens when informed of the death of their betrothed. The innocent\nchildren in the confusion were left to wander, neglected by their\nguardians,\u2014and the records from which this tale is compiled say, that a\nlittle boy and girl, who were twins, while wandering hand-in-hand in the\nstreets, unconscious of danger, were crushed by the coursers\u2019 hoofs,\nwhile their mother was hastening to remove them from danger. But why\ndwell upon the horrors of this scene?\n\nOn a signal given, Basil forded the Dee with his followers, and advanced\nto the city. Having taken possession of his post, he kept himself on the\nalert, to restrain any irregularity among his men, which the scene\nbefore them was but too well calculated to superinduce. The town was\ngiven up to be pillaged. It had been set on fire in different places;\ntherefore it required the utmost attention to prevent his followers from\nmingling with their companions. He had remained at his post a\nconsiderable time, when he heard a piercing shriek in a voice well known\nto him. He sprang to the place whence it seemed to come, and beheld Mary\nLeslie struggling with a Covenanter, who was plundering her of the\ntrinkets that adorned her dress. \u201cVillain!\u201d said he, drawing his sword;\nbut the exclamation put the Covenanter on his guard. He aimed a fearful\nblow at him, but the Covenanter\u2019s blade, being of better temper than\nBasil\u2019s, stood the blow, while the other was shivered into a thousand\npieces. The Covenanter\u2019s weapon was now within a few inches of his\nbreast, when Basil, in a state of desperation, enveloped his hand in his\ncloak, and seizing the blade suddenly, bent it with such force that it\nsnapped at the hilt\u2014when, seizing a partisan that lay near him, he dealt\nthe Covenanter such a blow with it as felled him to the earth. Basil\nthen hastily asked Mary what she did here.\n\nShe informed him that the soldiers had broken into the house in search\nof plunder, and that she had been obliged to fly when she met with the\nCovenanter. He asked her where her father was. She told him, weeping,\nthat forty-eight of the principal citizens, along with her father, had\nbeen bound, and cast into the common prison.\n\n\u201cThen,\u201d said he, \u201cyou must allow me to conduct you to a place of\nsafety.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, Basil, I cannot. My dear father\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cHe is in no danger; and this is no place for maidens;\u201d and running\nspeedily for his horse, he placed her, more dead than alive, behind him,\nand galloped out of the town.\n\nWhen he returned, which was about eight, the confusion had in a great\nmeasure ceased; the magistrates, by a largess of 7000 merks, having\nprevailed on Montrose to put a stop to the pillage. When Basil came near\nto his post, he discovered that the house had been plundered, and that\nan attempt had been made to set it on fire. Montrose and his suite were\nstanding before it; his father was also there, and ran to meet him.\n\n\u201cThank God, my son, that thou art come. This,\u201d looking round him, \u201cthis\nlooks not like treason.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome hither, Basil Rolland,\u201d said Montrose, \u201cand answer me truly. My\nbowels yearn for thee; yet if what is testified against thee be true,\nthough thou wert my mother\u2019s son, God do so to me, and more also, if\nthou shalt not die the death. Why\u2014why, young man, didst thou desert the\nimportant trust assigned to thee?\u201d\n\nBasil told the naked truth.\n\n\u201cThou hast done wrong, young man; yet thy father, thy youth, thine\ninexperience, all\u2014all plead with me for thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cHeaven bless you, my lord, for the word,\u201d said Isaac Rolland. \u201cMy life\nfor it, he is innocent!\u201d\n\n\u201cBelieve me,\u201d said Montrose, \u201cI would fain that he were so. There is not\nin his eye the alarmed glance of conscious guiltiness. Answer me again,\ndidst thou not join the camp with traitorous intent? Didst thou not,\nlast night, under cloud of darkness, betake thee to the camp of the\nenemy to tell the Viscount of Aboyne what thou knewest about the\nstrength and intentions of the host?\u201d\n\nThe truth and falsehood were here so blended together, that Basil\nbetrayed signs of the greatest confusion, and was silent.\n\n\u201cNay, now,\u201d said Montrose, \u201che denies it not; his confusion betrays him.\nOne of the sentinels discovered him,\u2014the very man against whom he this\nday drew the sword for a prelatemonging maiden. Young man, this hath\ndestroyed my aversion to sacrifice thee; and the good cause demands that\nsuch treachery pass not unpunished. If thou hast any unrepented sin,\nprepare thyself; for yet two days, and thou art with the dead. Bind him,\nsoldiers; and on the second day hence let him suffer the punishment due\nto his crimes.\u201d\n\n\u201cStop, my lord,\u201d said Isaac Rolland, \u201cand shed not innocent blood. O cut\nnot down the flower in the bud! Exhaust your vengeance on me; but spare,\noh, spare my son!\u201d\n\n\u201cEntreaty avails not. My duty to the host demands it. And know, I do\nnothing but what I wish may be my own lot if I betray the good cause. If\nI betray it, may my best blood be spilled on the scaffold, and may the\nhangmen put on my shroud!\u201d\n\nThis was spoken in an inflexible and enthusiastic tone; but he knew not\nthat he was condemning himself. His wish was accomplished; for they who\nhad that day witnessed his proud desire, ere many years, saw one of his\nmangled limbs bleaching over the city gates. Basil was led off by the\nguards; while his father, unable to follow, stood speechless and\nmotionless as a statue.\n\n\n CHAPTER V.\n\n Farewell, ye dungeons, dark and strong,\n The wretch\u2019s destinie;\n Macpherson\u2019s time will not be long\n On yonder gallows-tree.\u2014_Old Song._\n\nBasil Rolland was conducted into one of the cells of the common prison,\nand, notwithstanding his excitement, fell into a profound slumber; but\nit was of that troubled kind which nature obtains by force when the mind\nis disposed for watchfulness. He imagined himself by the sea, on a\nbeautiful summer evening, walking with his love by the murmuring shore.\nOn a sudden they were separated; and he, in a small boat, was on the\nbosom of the ocean. The tempest was raging in all its grandeur, and the\nunwilling bark was whirling and reeling on the mountainous waves; it\nstruck upon a rock, and was dashed into a thousand pieces. He felt the\nwaters rushing in his ears; he saw the sea-monsters waiting for their\nprey; and his bubbling screams filled his own heart with horror. He\nsunk\u2014but the waters receded and receded, till he stood firmly on a dry\nrock. A vast plain was around him\u2014a black and barren wilderness, without\none plant, one shrub, or one blade of grass. It lay stretched before\nhim, as far as his eye could reach, the same dismal, monotonous scene of\ndesolation. On a sudden, the mists that covered its termination were\ndispelled, and piles of rocky mountains, whose tops touched the clouds,\nbegan to close around him. A vast amphitheatre of smooth and\nperpendicular stone surrounded him, and chained him to the desert. The\nrocky walls began to contract themselves, and to move nearer to the spot\nwhere he stood. Their summits were covered with multitudes of\nspectators, whose fiendish shout was echoed from rock to rock, until it\nfell upon his aching ear. Wild, unearthly faces were before him on every\nside; and fingers pointed at him with a demoniacal giggle. The rocks\nstill moved on. The narrow circle on which he stood was darkened by\ntheir height\u2014he heard the clashing of their collision\u2014he felt his body\ncrushed and bruised by the gigantic pressure. He raised his voice to\nshriek his last farewell; but the scene was changed. The grave had given\nup her dead; and the sea, the dead that were in her. He was among the\ncompanions of his childhood; and not one was wanting. The jest and the\ngame went on as in the days of his youth. His departed mother awaited\nhis return; but her kiss of welcome blenched his cheek with cold. Again\nhe was involved in a scene of strife. The death-bearing missiles were\nwhizzing around him; but he had not the power to lift an arm in his own\ndefence. A supernatural energy chained him to the spot, and paralysed\nall his efforts. A gigantic trooper levelled his carbine at him; the aim\nwas taken deliberately; he heard the snap of the lock; he saw the flash\nof fire; he gave a loud and piercing shriek, and awoke in agony, gasping\nfor breath.\n\nThe sun was shining through the grated window when he awoke, weak and\nexhausted by his unrefreshing sleep. He found the sober form of the\nCovenanting preacher seated beside his pallet, with a small Bible in his\nhand.\n\n\u201cI thought it my duty,\u201d said the preacher, \u201cto visit thee, and mark how\nthou bearest thyself under this dispensation, and to offer thee that\nconsolation, in the name of my Master, which smoothes the passage to the\ntomb.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have my thanks,\u201d said the unfortunate youth. \u201cHave you waited long\nin the apartment?\u201d\n\n\u201cI came at daybreak; but often was I tempted to rouse thee from thy\nslumbers, for thy dreams seemed terrifying.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have indeed passed a fearful night. Fancy has chased fancy in my\nscorching brain till it appeared reality. But I can spend only another\nsuch night.\u201d\n\n\u201cI grieve to tell thee, young man, that thy days are numbered: all the\nintercession of thy father and his friends hath been fruitless. I also\ntalked to James of Montrose concerning thee; for I hold that he hath\noverstretched the limit of his power, and that there is no cause of\ndeath in thee: but he treated me as one that mocketh, when I unfolded\nthe revealed will of God, that the earth will not cover Innocent blood;\nwherefore turn, I beseech thee, thine eyes to the Lord,\u2014for vain is the\nhelp of man. Look to the glory on the other side of the grave. Fear not\nthem which can kill the body, but after that can have no power; but fear\nHim that can cast both soul and body into hell.\u201d\n\n\u201cI fear not, father; I fear not death. I could close my eyes for ever on\nthe green land of God without a sigh. Had death met me in the field, the\nbugle would have sung my requiem, and I would have laid me on the turf,\nhappy in being permitted to die like a man; but to die like a thief\u2014like\na dog\u2014is fearful and appalling. Besides, there are ties which bind to\nearth souls stronger than mine. Alas! alas! what is the common approach\nof Death to the stealthy and ignominious step with which he visits me!\u201d\n\n\u201cCompose thyself,\u201d said the preacher, \u201cand let these earthly wishes have\nno place in thy thoughts. Time, to thee, is nearly done, and eternity is\nat hand. Approach thy Creator, as the Father of Mercy, in His Son.\nMurmur not at His dispensations; for He chasteneth in love.\u201d\n\n\u201cA hard lesson!\u201d said Basil. \u201cTell me, didst though ever love a wife, a\nson, or a daughter?\u201d\n\n\u201cI lost a wife and a son,\u201d said the preacher with emotion.\n\n\u201cIn what manner?\u201d said Basil.\n\n\u201cI visited the west country, on business of the Congregation, and in my\nabsence the hand of Death was busy in my house. When I returned, my wife\nand son were both beneath the sod. But God\u2019s will be done! They are now\nin heaven,\u201d said he, while the tears stole down his cheeks.\n\n\u201cAnd,\u201d said Basil, \u201cdid you never feel a desire again to see them? Did\nyou not wish that the decree of fate had been altered, and that your\nfamily had been again restored to you?\u201d\n\n\u201cOften\u2014often,\u201d said he, wringing his hands. \u201cGod forgive me! often have\nI murmured at His dispensation. At some seasons I would have bartered my\nlife\u2014nay, my soul\u2019s weal\u2014for one hour of their society.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd yet ye bid me do that which ye confess to be above your efforts!\nYou lost but your wife and child; I lose my own life\u2014my fame\u2014my Mary.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut your father\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cPeace! I have no father\u2014no friend\u2014no love. To-morrow\u2019s sun will see me\nas I was before my being; all of me gone, except my name coupled with\nhated murderers and traitors. Away, away, old man! it drives me to\nmadness. But, if the spirits of the dead can burst the sepulchre, I will\nbe near my murderer. In the blackness of night I will be near him, and\nwhisper in his thoughts dark, dark as hell.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave patience\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cPatience! Heaven and earth! Remove these bonds,\u201d said he, striking his\nmanacles together till the vaulted roof echoed the clanking. \u201cGive me my\nsword,\u2014place Montrose before me,\u2014and I\u2019ll be patient! very patient!\u201d\u2014and\nhe burst into a fit of hysterical laughter which made the preacher\nshudder.\n\n\u201cPrepare to meet thy God, young man,\u201d exclaimed the Covenanter. He\nsucceeded in gaining his attention, and resumed: \u201cThy thoughts are full\nof carnal revenge, forgetting Him who hath said, \u2018vengeance is mine.\u2019 I\ntell thee that thy thoughts are evil, and not good. Turn thyself to thy\nSaviour, and, instead of denouncing woe on thy fellows, prepare thyself\nfor thy long journey.\u201d\n\n\u201cLong, indeed!\u201d said Basil, entering into a new train of ideas. \u201cEre\nto-morrow\u2019s sun go down, my soul, how far wilt thou have travelled? Thou\nwilt outstrip the lightning\u2019s speed. And then, the account! I am wrong,\ngood man; but my brain is giddy. Leave me now,\u2014but, prithee, return.\u201d\n\n\u201cI shall see thee again. Put thy trust in the Lord. Compose thy troubled\nmind, and God be with thee! Thy father is soliciting thy pardon; and he\nbade me tell thee he would visit thee to-day. I\u2019ll go to Montrose\nmyself,\u2014for he shall pardon thee.\u201d\n\nThe day following, a dark gibbet frowned in the centre of the\nmarket-place, erected in the bore of the millstone which lies at this\nday in the middle of Castle Street. At an early hour the whole square\nwas filled with spectators to witness the tragedy. A powerful band of\nthe Covenanters guarded the scaffold. A deep feeling of sympathy\npervaded the multitude, for the wretched prisoner was known to almost\nevery individual. Every one was talking to his neighbour on the\ndistressing event, with an interest which showed the intensity of their\nsympathy with the sufferer.\n\n\u201cWillawins! willawins!\u201d said an aged woman; \u201cI suckled him at this auld\nbreast, and dandled him in these frail arms. On the vera last winter,\nwhen I was ill wi\u2019 an income, he was amaist the only ane that came to\nspeir for me; an\u2019 weel I wat, he didna come toom-handed. I just hirpled\nout, because I thought I wad like to see his bonny face and his glossy\ncurls ance mair; but I canna thole that black woodie! It glamours my\nauld een. Lord be wi\u2019 him! Eh, sirs! eh, sirs!\u201d\n\n\u201cVera right, cummer,\u201d said Tenor the wright; \u201cit\u2019s a waesome business.\nTroth, ilka nail that I drave into that woodie, I could have wished to\nhave been a nail o\u2019 my ain coffin.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what for stand ye a\u2019 idle here?\u201d said a withered beldame, whom\nBasil had found means to save from being tried for witchcraft, which, as\nthe reader is aware that \u201cJeddart justice\u201d was administered on these\noccasions, was tantamount to condemnation. \u201cWhy stand ye idle here? I\u2019ve\nseen the time when a\u2019 the Whigs in the land dauredna do this. Tak the\nsword! tak the sword! The day \u2019ill come when the corbies will eat\nMontrose\u2019s fause heart, and\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cWhisht, sirs! whisht!\u201d exclaimed several voices; and there was a rush\namong the crowd, which made the whole mass vibrate like the waves of the\nsea. It was the appearance of our hero, surrounded by a guard of the\ninsurgents. His arms were bound. The cart followed behind; but he was\nspared the indignity of riding in it. It contained the executioner, a\nmiserable-looking man, tottering in the extremity of old age. It also\nbore the prisoner\u2019s coffin. His demeanour was calm and composed, his\nstep firm and regular; but the flush of a slight hectic was on his\ncheek. He was attended by the Covenanting preacher, whom, on his coming\nout, he asked, \u201cIf _she_ knew of this?\u201d He whispered in his ear. \u201cThen\nthe bitterness of death is past;\u201d and the procession moved on. These\nwere the last words he was heard to utter. He never raised his eyes from\nthe ground till he reached the scaffold, when, with a determined and\nconvulsive energy, he bent his eyes upon the scene before him. It was\nbut for a moment; and they sank again to the earth, while his lips were\nmoving in secret prayer.\n\nWe must now retrograde a little in our story, to mark the progress of\ntwo horsemen, who, about noon, were advancing with the utmost rapidity\nto Aberdeen. These were Isaac Rolland and Hackit, Provost Leslie\u2019s\nservant. To explain their appearance here, it will be necessary to\nnotice some events of the preceding day. Isaac Rolland and his friends\nhad applied earnestly to Montrose for the repeal of his hasty sentence;\nand their representations seemed to have great weight with him. He told\nthem to return early next morning to receive his answer. At the first\npeep of day Isaac was at his lodgings, and found, to his surprise and\nsorrow, that news had arrived of the pacification of Berwick late the\nevening before, and that Montrose had instantly taken horse for the\nsouth. There was no time to be lost, and, accompanied by Hackit, he set\nout on horseback to Arbroath, where Montrose was to rest for a little,\nand reached it as the other was preparing to depart.\n\nThe pardon was readily granted, as peace was now established between all\nthe king\u2019s subjects. Montrose, moreover, acknowledged that he had\nproceeded too hastily.\n\nThey accordingly set out on their journey, and spared neither whip nor\nspur, lest they should arrive too late. They changed horses at Dunottar,\nand rode on to Aberdeen with all the speed they could make. When about\nsix miles from the town, Isaac Rolland\u2019s horse broke down under him,\nwhen Hackit, who was better mounted, seized the papers, and, bidding him\nfollow as fast as possible, pushed on. The noble animal that bore him\nwent with the speed of lightning, but far too slowly for the impatient\nrider. Having shot along the bridge of Dee at full gallop, he arrived at\nCastle Street, by the Shiprow with his horse panting and foaming, while\nthe clotted blood hung from the armed heels of his rider.\n\n\u201cA pardon! a pardon!\u201d shouted Hackit, as he recklessly galloped over and\nthrough the thick-set multitude, and lancing to the quick his horse\u2019s\nsides with his deep rowels at every exclamation. \u201cA pardon! a pardon!\u201d\ncried he, advancing still faster, for the rope was adjusted, and all was\nready for the fatal consummation. \u201cLord hae mercy on him!\u201d His horse\nwith one bound brought him to the foot of the scaffold, and then dropped\ndown dead, while a loud execration burst from the spectators, which\ndrowned his cries. The prisoner was thrown off just in Hackit\u2019s sight as\nhe advanced, the Covenanters having dreaded that this was the beginning\nof some commotion. He threw the sealed pardon at the head of the\ncommandant, and, mounting the scaffold, cut the cord in a twinkling,\nletting the body fall into the arms of some of the crowd who had\nfollowed him; and, quicker than thought, conveyed him into an adjacent\nhouse, where every means was tried to restore animation. There was not\none who could refrain from tears when they compared the crushed and\nmaimed being before them with the jovial young man he was a few days\nbefore. His eyes, bleared and bloodshot, were protruded from their\nsockets; a red circle surrounded his neck, and the blood, coagulated\nunder his eyes, showed the effects of strangulation. After some time he\nheaved a sigh, and attempted to raise his right hand to his breast; his\nintention was anticipated, and a picture that hung round his neck was\nput into his hand. At this moment Mary Leslie entered the apartment. A\ntremulous shuddering ran through his frame; he attempted to raise\nhimself, but life ebbed by the effort, and, with a deep groan, he fell\nback into the arms of death. Mary Leslie, however, did not witness his\ndeparture, for she had sunk senseless on the floor. When she recovered,\nall was calm, save her eye which rolled with the quickness of insanity.\n\n\u201cHush!\u201d said she; \u201che sleeps, and you will waken him. I\u2019ll cover him\nwith my own plaid, for it is cold\u2014cold.\u201d She set herself to cover him,\nand sang the verse of the ballad\u2014\n\n My love has gone to the good green wood\n To hunt the dark-brown daes;\n His beild will be the ferny den,\n Or the shade of the heathery braes.\n But I\u2019ll build my love a bonny bower\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cBasil, awake! the old man waits you at the Playfield\u2014arise! He hears me\nnot\u2014ha\u2014I remember!\u201d and she sank again on the floor, and was carried\nhome by her friends.\n\nA fair company of young men bore Basil to his grave; and by his side a\nweeping band of maidens carried Mary Leslie. They were lovely in their\nlives, and in death they were not separated. One grave contains them\nboth, which was long hallowed by the remembrance of this tragical\ntransaction. The sacred spot has now become common ground, and I have\nsearched in vain for it, that I might shed one tear to the memory of the\nunfortunate lovers.\n\nThe goodwill of his fellow-citizens called Patrick Leslie several times\nto be their chief magistrate; but life to him had lost its savour, and\nhe lingered for several years in this world as one whose hopes and\nenjoyments were elsewhere. It was said that Isaac Rolland, at stated\nintervals, visited the grave of his son, and watered it with the tear of\nunavailing sorrow. He afterwards involved himself with the factions that\ntore the kingdom asunder, and, it was supposed, perished at the battle\nbetween the Covenanters and Oliver Cromwell, at Dunbar, in\n1650.\u2014_Aberdeen Censor._\n\n\n\n\n THE LAST OF THE JACOBITES.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\nI had occasion to mention, at the conclusion of my \u201cHistory of the\nInsurrection of 1745,\u201d that after that period the spirit of Jacobitism\nbecame a very different thing from what it had formerly been; that,\nacquiring no fresh adherents among the young subsequent to that\ndisastrous year, it grew old, and decayed with the individuals who had\nwitnessed its better days; and that, in the end, it became altogether\ndependent upon the existence of a few aged enthusiasts, more generally\nof the female than the male sex.\n\nThese relics of the party\u2014for they could be called nothing else\u2014soon\nbecame isolated in the midst of general society; and latterly were\nlooked upon, by modern politicians, with a feeling similar to that with\nwhich the antediluvian patriarchs must have been regarded in the new\nworld, after they had survived several generations of their short-lived\ndescendants. As their glory lay in all the past, they took an especial\npride in retaining every description of manners and dress which could be\nconsidered old-fashioned, much upon the principle which induced Will\nHoneycomb to continue wearing the wig in which he had gained a young\nlady\u2019s heart. Their manners were entirely of that stately and formal\nsort which obtained at the commencement of the eighteenth century, and\nwhich is so inseparably associated in the mind of a modern with ideas of\nfull-bottomed perukes, long-backed coats, gold-buckled shoes, and tall\nwalking canes. Mr Pitt\u2019s tax, which had so strong an effect upon the\nheads of the British public, did not perhaps unsettle one grain of truly\nJacobite powder; nor is it hypothetical to suppose that the general\nabandonment of snuff-taking by the ladies, which happened rather before\nthat period, wrenched a single box from the fingers of any ancient dame,\nwhose mind had been made up on politics, as her taste had been upon\nblack rappee, before the year of grace 1745.\n\nIn proportion as the world at large ceased to regard the claims of the\nhouse of Stuart, and as old age advanced upon those who still cherished\nthem, the spirit of Jacobitism, once so lofty and so chivalrous,\nassimilated more and more with the mere imbecility of dotage. What it\nthus lost, however, in extensive application, it gained in virulence;\nand it perhaps never burned in any bosoms with so much fervour as in\nthose few which last retained it. True, the generosity which\ncharacterised it in earlier and better times had now degenerated into a\nsort of acrid humour, like good wine turned into vinegar. Yet, if an\nexample were wanting of the true inveterate Jacobite, it could not be\nfound anywhere in such perfection as amongst the few who survived till\nrecent times, and who had carried the spirit unscathed and unquenched\nthrough three-quarters of a century of every other kind of political\nsentiment.\n\nAs no general description can present a very vivid portraiture to the\nmind, it may be proper here to condescend upon the features of the\nparty, by giving a sketch of an individual Jacobite who was\ncharacterised in the manner alluded to, and who might be considered a\nfair specimen of his brethren. The person meant to be described, might\nbe styled the LAST OF THE JACOBITES; for, at the period of his death in\n1825, there was not known to exist, at least in Edinburgh, any person,\nbesides himself, who refused to acknowledge the reigning family. His\nname was Alexander Halket. He had been, in early life, a merchant in the\nremote town of Fraserburgh, on the Moray Firth; but had retired for many\nyears before his death, to live upon a small annuity in Edinburgh. The\npropensity which characterised him, in common with all the rest of his\nparty, to regard the antiquities of his native land with reverence,\njoined with the narrowness of his fortune in inducing him to take up his\nabode in the Old Town.\n\nHe lodged in one of those old stately hotels near the palace of\nHolyroodhouse, which had formerly been occupied by the noblemen\nattendant upon the Scottish court, but which have latterly become so\ncompletely overrun by the lower class of citizens. Let it not be\nsupposed that he possessed the whole of one of these magnificent hotels.\nHe only occupied two rooms in one of the floors or \u201cflats\u201d into which\nall such buildings in Edinburgh are divided; and these he possessed only\nin the character of a lodger, not as tenant at first hand. He was,\nnevertheless, as comfortably domiciled as most old gentlemen who happen\nto have survived the period of matrimony. His room\u2014for one of them was\nso styled _par excellence_\u2014was cased round with white-painted panelling,\nand hung with a number of portraits representing the latter members of\nthe house of Stuart, among whom the Old and Young Chevaliers were not\nforgotten.[15] His windows had a prospect on the one hand of the quiet\nand cloistered precincts of Chessels\u2019 Court, and on the other to the\ngilded spires and gray, time-honoured turrets of Holyroodhouse. Twice a\nyear, when he held a card party, with three candles on the table, and\nthe old joke about the number which adorn that of the laird of Grant,\nwas he duly gratified with compliments upon the comfortable nature of\nhis \u201croom,\u201d by the ancient Jacobite spinsters and dowagers, who, in silk\nmantles and pattens, came from Abbeyhill and New Street to honour him\nwith their venerable company.\n\nFootnote 15:\n\n Some rascally picture-dealer had imposed upon him a nondescript daub\n of the female face divine as a likeness of the beautiful Queen Mary.\n How he accomplished this it is not easy to say; probably he was\n acquainted with Mr Halket\u2019s ardent devotion to the cause of the house\n of Stuart, at every period of its history, and availed himself of this\n knowledge to palm the wretched portrait upon the old gentleman\u2019s\n unsuspecting enthusiasm. Certain it is that the said portrait was hung\n in the place of honour\u2014over the mantelpiece\u2014in Mr Halket\u2019s apartment,\n and was, on state occasions, exhibited to his guests with no small\n complacency. Many of his friends were, like himself, too blindly\n attached to everything that carried a show of antiquity to suspect the\n cheat; and others were too good-natured to disturb a harmless\n delusion, from the indulgence of which he derived so much\n satisfaction. One of them, however, actuated by an unhappy spirit of\n connoisseurship, was guilty of the cruelty of undeceiving him, and not\n only persuaded him that the picture was not a likeness of the goddess\n of his idolatry,\u2014Queen Mary,\u2014but possessed him with the belief that it\n represented the vinegar aspect of the hated Elizabeth. Mr Halket,\n however, was too proud to acknowledge his mortification by causing the\n picture to be removed, or perhaps it might not have been convenient\n for him to supply its place; and he did not want wit to devise a\n pretext for allowing it to remain, without compromising his hostility\n to the English queen one whit. \u201cVery well,\u201d said he, \u201cI am glad you\n have told me it is Elizabeth; for I shall have the pleasure of showing\n my contempt of her every day by turning my back upon her when I sit\n down to table.\u201d\n\nHalket was an old man of dignified appearance, and generally wore a\ndress of the antique fashion above alluded to. On Sundays and holidays\nhe always exhibited a sort of court-dress, and walked with a cane of\nmore than ordinary stateliness. He also assumed this dignified attire on\noccasions of peculiar ceremony. It was his custom, for instance, on a\nparticular day every year, to pay a visit to the deserted court of\nHolyrood in this dress, which he considered alone suitable to an affair\nof so much importance. On the morning of the particular day which he was\nthus wont to keep holy, he always dressed himself with extreme care, got\nhis hair put into order by a professional hand, and, after breakfast,\nwalked out of doors with deliberate steps and a solemn mind. His march\ndown the Canongate was performed with all the decorum which might have\nattended one of the state processions of a former day. He did not walk\nupon the pavement by the side of the way. That would have brought him\ninto contact with the modern existing world, the rude touch of which\nmight have brushed from his coat the dust and sanctitude of years. He\nassumed the centre of the street, where, in the desolation which had\novertaken the place, he ran no risk of being jostled by either carriage\nor foot-passenger, and where the play of his thoughts and the play of\nhis cane-arm alike got ample scope. There, wrapped up in his own pensive\nreflections, perhaps imagining himself one in a court-pageant, he walked\nalong, under the lofty shadows of the Canongate,\u2014a wreck of yesterday\nfloating down the stream of to-day, and almost in himself a procession.\n\nOn entering the porch of the palace he took off his hat; then, pacing\nalong the quadrangle, he ascended the staircase of the Hamilton\napartments, and entered Queen Mary\u2019s chambers. Had the beauteous queen\nstill kept court there, and still been sitting upon her throne to\nreceive the homage of mankind, Mr Halket could not have entered with\nmore awe-struck solemnity of deportment, or a mind more alive to the\nnature of the scene. When he had gone over the whole of the various\nrooms, and also traversed in mind the whole of the recollections which\nthey are calculated to excite, he retired to the picture-gallery, and\nthere endeavoured to recall, in the same manner, the more recent glories\nof the court of Prince Charles. To have seen the amiable old enthusiast\nsitting in that long and lofty hall, gazing alternately upon vacant\nspace and the portraits which hang upon the walls, and to all appearance\nabsorbed beyond recall in the contemplation of the scene, one would have\nsupposed him to be fascinated to the spot, and that he conceived it\npossible, by devout wishes, long and fixedly entertained, to annul the\ninterval of time, and reproduce upon that floor the glories which once\npervaded it, but which had so long passed away. After a day of pure and\nmost ideal enjoyment, he used to retire to his own house, in a state of\nmind approaching, as near as may be possible on this earth, to perfect\nbeatitude.[16]\n\nFootnote 16:\n\n He paid a visit, in full dress, with a sword by his side, to the Crown\n Room, in Edinburgh Castle, immediately after the old regalia of the\n kingdom had been there discovered in 1818. On this occasion a friend\n of the author saw him, and endeavoured to engage him in conversation,\n as he was marching up the Castle Hill; but he was too deeply absorbed\n in reflection upon the sacred objects which he had to see, to be able\n to speak. He just gazed on the person accosting him, and walked on.\n\nMr Halket belonged, as a matter of course, to the primitive apostolical\nchurch, whose history has been so intimately and so fatally associated\nwith that of the house of Stuart. He used to attend an obscure chapel in\nthe Old Town; one of those unostentatious places of worship to which the\nEpiscopalian clergy had retired, when dispossessed of their legitimate\nfanes at the Revolution, and where they have since performed the duties\nof religion, rather, it may be said, to a family, or at most a circle of\nacquaintances, than to a congregation. He was one of the old-fashioned\nsort of Episcopalians, who always used to pronounce the responses aloud;\nand, during the whole of the Liturgy, he held up one of his hands in an\nattitude of devotion. One portion alone of that formula did he abstain\nfrom assenting to\u2014the prayer for the Royal Family. At that place, he\nalways blew his nose, as a token of contempt. In order that even his eye\nmight not be offended by the names of the Hanoverian family, as he\ncalled them, he used a prayer-book which had been printed before the\nRevolution, and which still prayed for King Charles, the Duke of York,\nand the Princess Anne. He was excessively accurate in all the forms of\nthe Episcopalian mode of worship; and indeed acted as a sort of fugleman\nto the chapel; the rise or fall of his person being in some measure a\nsignal to guide the corresponding motions of all the rest of the\ncongregation.\n\nSuch was Alexander Halket\u2014at least in his more poetical and gentlemanly\naspect. His character and history, however, were not without their\ndisagreeable points. For instance, although but humbly born himself, he\nwas perpetually affecting the airs of an aristocrat, was always talking\nof \u201cgood old families, who had seen better days,\u201d and declaimed\nincessantly against the upstart pride and consequence of people who had\noriginally been nothing. This peculiarity, which was, perhaps, after\nall, not inconsistent with his Jacobite craze, he had exhibited even\nwhen a shopkeeper in Fraserburgh. If a person came in, for instance, and\nasked to have a hat, Halket would take down one of a quality suitable,\nas he thought, to the rank or wealth of the customer, and if any\nobjection was made to it, or a wish expressed for one of a better sort,\nhe would say, \u201cThat hat, sir, is quite good enough for a man in your\nrank of life. I will give you no other.\u201d He was also very finical in the\ndecoration of his person, and very much of a hypochondriac in regard to\nlittle incidental maladies. Somebody, to quiz him on this last score,\nonce circulated a report that he had caught cold one night, going home\nfrom a party, in consequence of having left off wearing a particular\ngold ring. And it really was not impossible for him to have believed\nsuch a thing, extravagant as it may appear.\n\n\n\n\n THE GRAVE-DIGGER\u2019S TALE.\n\n\nIt was one cold November morning, on the day of an intended voyage, when\nMrs M\u2018Cosey, my landlady, tapped at my bed-chamber door, informing me\nthat it was \u201cbraid day light;\u201d but on reaching the caller air I found,\nby my watch and the light of the moon, that I had full two hours to\nspare for such sublunary delights as such a circumstance might create. A\ntraveller, when he has once taken his leave, and rung the changes of\n\u201cfarewell,\u201d \u201cadieu,\u201d \u201cgoodbye,\u201d and \u201cGod bless you,\u201d on the connubial\nand domestic harmonies of his last lodgings, will rather hazard his\nhealth by an exposure to the \u201cpelting of the pitiless storm,\u201d for a\nhandful of hours, than try an experiment on his landlady\u2019s sincerity a\nsecond time, within the short space of the same moon. If casualty should\nforce him to make an abrupt return, enviable must be his feelings if\nthey withstand the cold unfriendly welcome of \u201cYe\u2019re no awa yet!\u201d\ndelivered by some quivering Abigail, in sylvan equipment, like one of\nDian\u2019s foresters, as she slowly and uninvitingly opens the creaking\ndoor\u2014a commentary on the forbidding salute. He enters, and the strong\ncaloric now beginning to thaw his sensibilities, he makes for his room,\nwhich he forgets is no longer _his_; when, though he be still in the\ndark, he has no need of a candle to enable him to discover that some\nkind remembrancer has already been rummaging his corner cupboard, making\nlawful seizure and removal (\u201c\u2018convey\u2019 the wise it call\u201d) of the contents\nof his tea-caddy, butter-kit, sugar-bowl, and \u201ccomforter;\u201d to which he\nhad looked forward, on his return, as a small solace for the\ndisappointment of the morning, affording him the means of knocking up a\ncomfortable \u201ccheck,\u201d without again distressing the exchequer.\n\nI had therefore determined not to return to Mrs M\u2018Cosey\u2019s; for \u201cfrailty,\nthy name is woman;\u201d and I felt myself getting into a sad frame of mind,\nas I involuntarily strolled a considerable distance along the high road,\npondering on the best means of walking \u201cout of the air,\u201d as Hamlet says,\nwhen, as the moon receded behind a black cloud, my head came full butt\nagainst a wall; the concussion making it ring, till I actually imagined\nI could distinguish something like a tune from my brain. Surely, said I,\nthis is no melody of my making; as I now heard, like two voices trolling\na merry stave\u2014\n\n Duncan\u2019s comin\u2019, Donald\u2019s comin\u2019, &c.\n\nTurning round to the direction from whence the sound seemed to proceed,\nI perceived I was in the neighbourhood of the \u201cAuld Kirk Yard;\u201d where,\nby the light from his lantern, I could discover the old grave-digger at\nwork\u2014his bald head, with single white and silvery-crisped forelock,\nmaking transits over the dark line of the grave, like a white-crested\ndove, or a sea-gull, flaunting over the yawning gulf.\n\nOne stride, and I had cleared the wall of the Auld Kirk Yard.\n\n\u201cYou seem merry, old boy!\u2014You are conscious, I presume, that this world\nhas few troubles that can affect you in your present situation\u2014the\ngrave.\u201d\n\n\u201cI was takin\u2019 my medicine to keep my heart up, sir; but I wasna merry:\nyet I\u2019m content wi\u2019 my station, and am a thocht independent. I court the\ncompany o\u2019 nae man alive; I boo to nae man breathin\u2019\u2014I quarrel nane wi\u2019\nmy neebours;\u2014yet am I sought after by high and low, rich and puir; the\nking himsel maun come under my rule\u2014this rod of airn;\u2014though I\u2019m grown\nfrail and feckless afore my time: for healthy as my looks be, I\u2019m aye,\naye at death\u2019s door; our work, ye see, sir, \u2019s a\u2019 below the breath; and\nthat\u2019s a sair trade for takin\u2019 the wind oot o\u2019 a body. Then, I hae my\ntrials,\u2014sair visitations, sic as fa\u2019 to the lot o\u2019 nae man on this side\nthe grave but mysel! It\u2019s true, that when the wind gaes round merrily to\nthe east, I get a sma\u2019 share o\u2019 what\u2019s gaun; but just look at that yird,\nsir,\u2014as bonnie a healthy yird as ane could delight to lie in;\u2014neist,\nlook at that spear,\u2014a fortnight\u2019s rust upon that dibble! Mind, I downa\ncomplain;\u2014_Live, and let live_, say I!\n\n\u201cBut what\u2019s the use of talkin\u2019 sae to a life-like, graceless,\nthochtless, bairn-getting parish?\u2014the feck o\u2019 whom, after having lived\non the fat o\u2019 the kintra-side, naething will sair, but they maun gang up\nto the town to lay their banes amang the gentles, and creesh some hungry\nyird wi\u2019 their marrow! The fa\u2019 o\u2019 the leaf is come and gane; an\u2019 saving\nsome twa or three consumptions\u2014for whilk the Lord be thankit, as a sma\u2019\nfend\u2014tak the parish a\u2019 ower head\u2014frae head to tail\u2014and for ane that gaes\nout at my gate-end, ye\u2019ll find a score come in at the howdie\u2019s!\u201d\n\n\u201c_Damna fam\u00e6 majora quam qu\u00e6 \u00e6stimari possint._\u201d[17]\n\nFootnote 17:\n\n The loss of reputation is greater than can be reckoned.\n\n\u201cI hae lost my Gaelic, sir; but ye speak like a sensible man. The fame\no\u2019 the place is just as ye say, there\u2019s ower mony _merry pows in\u2019t_. But\nsee, there\u2019s a sober pow, wi\u2019 a siller clasp on\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cWith all due gravity, may I ask, whose property was that?\u201d\n\n\u201cHech, man! that\u2019s a skeigh tune for a dry whistle; sae, gin ye please,\nwe\u2019ll tak our morning first.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he took his spade, and cutting steps in the side of the grave\nhe was digging, he mounted to the surface; then, walking off a few\npaces, I saw him strike some dark substance lying on a flat stone; when,\nto my astonishment, a Flibbertigibbet-looking creature unrolled itself,\nfrom a mortcloth, at my feet.\n\n\u201cHannibal Grub, my \u2019prentice, sir, at your service.\u2014Hawney, tak the\nshanker ower to Jenny Nailor\u2019s, an\u2019 bring a dooble-floorer to the\ngentleman; an\u2019, hear ye, say it\u2019s for the minister\u2019s wife\u2014fourpenny\nstrunt, Grub, mind\u2014nae pinchin\u2019. If ye meet his reverence, honest man,\ntell him ye\u2019re gaun for oil to the cruizie.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat auld wizzened pow is a\u2019 that\u2019s left o\u2019 the Laird o\u2019 Nettleriggs.\nIt was lying face down, when I cam till\u2019t this morning, maist horrifu\u2019\nto see; for he maun hae turned in his kist, or been buried back upwards!\nIt was ae blawy, sleety nicht, about this time twal-year, when I was\nsent for express to speak wi\u2019 the laird. Thinkin\u2019 that he maybe wanted\nthe family lair snodded out, or a new coat o\u2019 paint to the staunchels, I\nset out without delay. I had four mile o\u2019 gate to gang on a darksome\ndreary road, an\u2019 I couldna but say that I felt mair eerie than I had\never felt in my ain plantin\u2019, amang honest folk. Sae, wi\u2019 your leave,\nI\u2019ll just put in ane o\u2019 Jenny\u2019s screws, afore I gae ony farther. Here\u2019s\nwishing better acquaintance to us, sir.\u2014Is this frae the \u2018Broon Coo,\u2019\nGrub?\u201d\n\n\u201cAy!\u201d groaned an unearthly voice, as if the \u201cBroon Cow\u201d herself had\nspoken.\n\n\u201cWeel, I gaed, an\u2019 I better gaed. \u2018The wind blew as \u2019twad blawn its\nlast;\u2019 the fitfu\u2019 changes o\u2019 the shrouded moon threw flitting shadows\nacross my path;\u2014whiles like a muckle colley, and syne as if I stood on\nthe brink o\u2019 a dreadfu\u2019 precipice, when I wad then stand still, till the\nmoon shone again. The bleachfield dogs sent round their lang, uncanny\nbodings; the vera cocks crawed,\u2014sic horror had the time; the last leaves\no\u2019 hairst were driftin\u2019 an\u2019 clatterin\u2019 amang my feet\u2014whiles hittin\u2019 me\nlike a whup on the face; or tappin\u2019 me on the back, as if ane wad say,\n\u2018Saunders, this is death!\u2019 when I wad then stand stockstill again, my\nknees fechtin\u2019 an\u2019 thumpin\u2019 at ane anither, and my teeth gaun like a\nwatchman\u2019s rattle; while noos and thans, the wind wad howl and birr, as\nif the Prince o\u2019 Air himsel were pipin\u2019 to the clouds. I ne\u2019er doubted\nthae things to be the bodings o\u2019 death; but I thocht sic feydoms might\nhae been better wared on a muckle better man than me. At length I got to\nthe house-door, as the laird\u2019s messan began to bark.\n\n\u201c\u2018Look to the door, Peggy!\u2019 quo\u2019 the gudewife.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ay, mither. Jock, look to the door for your mither, will ye no?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Look till\u2019t yersel! Can I gang, when I\u2019m greetin\u2019 this way?\u2014Pate\u2014look\nto the door!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019m greetin\u2019 too,\u2019 says Pate.\n\n\u201c\u2018Peggy Mucklewham, will ye no look to the door, for your deein\u2019\nfaither\u2019s sake?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Tuts!\u2019 quo\u2019 Peggy, \u2018Can ye not get up yersel\u2014fashin\u2019 folk?\u2019\n\n\u201cWeel, I then got entrance\u2014the sneck being cannily lifted, an\u2019 the\nbairns makin\u2019 a breenge into a hidin\u2019 corner, until, by the light o\u2019 the\nfire, they kent my face.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ou, it\u2019s auld Saunders, as sure as death. Ay, man, my faither\u2019s real\nill\u2014he\u2019s just gaspin\u2019, and that\u2019s a\u2019! Hear till that\u2014that\u2019s him\nwhistlin\u2019! Hae ye no brought Towzie wi\u2019 ye? Man, Pate and me wad hae\u2019n\nsic grand fun chasin\u2019 the mawkins, when my mither\u2019s at the kirk the\nmorn.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Are ye sorry to lose your faither, bairnies?\u2019 quo\u2019 I.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ou, ay,\u2019 quo\u2019 Pate, \u2018but I dinna like to look at him, he maks sic\nawfu\u2019 faces, man; but I hae been thrang greetin\u2019, sin\u2019 four o\u2019clock even\non\u2014twice as muckle\u2019s Jock!\u2019\n\n\u201cA lang deep groan now was heard from out o\u2019 the spence, whaur the laird\nwas lying; and the bairnies, in a fricht, ran screeching to anither\napartment, leaving the youngest wean by the fireside, rowed in ane o\u2019\nthe auld man\u2019s black coats.\n\n\u201c\u2018Gude save us, lammie!\u2019 quo\u2019 I, \u2018is there naebody tending your puir\nauld faither? Whaur\u2019s uncle, lammie? and aunty? and your minnie,\nlammie?\u2019 I mind weel the bit bairnie\u2019s answer\u2014\u2018Unkey a\u2019 doon\u2014aunty a\u2019\ndoon\u2014daddy a\u2019 doon!\u2019\n\n\u201cMrs Mucklewham was a stout buirdly quean, like a house-end; and the\nlaird was just a bit han\u2019fu\u2019 o\u2019 a cratur\u2014a bit saxteen-to-the-dizzen\nbody. They were a pair o\u2019 whom it was said, by the kintra-side, that\nthey had married afore they had courted. The laird was an auld man when\nhe brought hame a woman thirty years younger than himsel;\u2014auld folk are\ntwice bairns, and he was beginning to need nursing. It\u2019s wonderfu\u2019 to\nthink how little a matter hinders gentlebred folk frae getting on in the\nwarld! A\u2019 that Jenny Screameger wantit o\u2019 the complete leddy was the bit\ndirty penny siller; an\u2019 sae they were joined thegither, without its ever\nbeing mentioned in the contract, or understood, that they bound and\nobliged themselves to hae a heartliking for ane anither!\n\n\u201cShe had been keepit by the gudeman geyan short by the tether; sae as\nher hale life was made just a dull round till her\u2014o\u2019 rising and lying\ndown\u2014eating, drinking, and sleeping\u2014feeding the pigs, milking the\ncow\u2014flyting the servant\u2014and skelping the weans a\u2019 round;\u2014unless when she\ndreamed o\u2019 burials, or saw a spale at the candle\u2014or heard o\u2019 a murder\ncommitted in the neighbourhood\u2014or a marriage made or broken aff\u2014or a\ncriminal to suffer on the gallows; till at her advanced time o\u2019 life it\nwas grown just as neccessar\u2019 that food should be gotten for her mind\u2019s\nmaintenance, as it was for her body\u2019s.\n\n\u201c\u2018This is a sair time for ye, Mrs Mucklewhaum,\u2019 quo\u2019 I, as she cam ben\nfrae her bedroom gauntin\u2019.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hey! ho! hy! Saunders\u2014I haena closed an ee thae twa lang nichts! But I\nhear there\u2019s something gaun to be dune noo\u2014Hey! ho! hy!\u2019\n\n\u201cI stappit ben wi\u2019 her to the laird\u2019s room; and I saw in his face he was\nbespoken. Everything was laid out in the room, comfortable and in\napple-pie order, befitting the occasion. The straughtin\u2019 board, on whilk\nhis death\u2019s ee was fixed, stood up against the wa\u2019; here lay a bowt o\u2019\ntippeny knittin\u2019 for binding his limbs, and as mony black preens as wad\nhae stockit a shop; there hung his dead shirt, o\u2019 new hamespun claith,\nprovidently airing afore the fire.\n\n\u201c\u2018Gin ye be thrang, Saunders, ye needna wait on the gudeman\u2014ye ken his\nlength\u2014and gie him a deep biel,\u2019 quo\u2019 the gudewife; when just as I laid\nmy hand upon his brow, he fixed his ee upon me like a hawk; an\u2019 after\nanither kirkyard groan\u2014the like I never heard from mortal man\u2014he seemed\nreviving, an\u2019 new strength to be filling his limbs, as he rose up on his\nelbow, on the bed, and laid his other hand on mine\u2014sic an icy hand as I\nnever felt abune grund!\u2014thus speaking to me in his seeming agony:\n\n\u201c\u2018Saunders, do not pray for me; I have been long a dead man; lay your\nhand upon my bosom, and you will feel the flames of hell ascending to my\nsoul!\u2019 I laid my hand upon his heart, and I declare, sir, I thocht the\nflesh wad hae cindered aff the finger-banes! The heat was just awfu\u2019!\n\n\u201c\u2018I was made life-renter of a sum which at my decease descends to the\nyounger branches of my father\u2019s family; and my life has been miserable\nto myself\u2014a burden to others\u2014and my death the desire of my kindred!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018He\u2019s raving, Saunders\u2014he\u2019s clean raving! An\u2019 I canna persuade him he\u2019s\na deein\u2019 man,\u2019 quo\u2019 Mrs Mucklewham, as she stapped forrit wi\u2019 a red\nbottle, to gie him a quatenin\u2019 dram.\n\n\u201c\u2018Haud, haud!\u2019 quo\u2019 I, \u2018he\u2019ll do without it,\u2019 as the laird, raising his\nvoice, began again to speak:\n\n\u201c\u2018I had but one friend in the world,\u2014the highwayman that robbed me, and\nthen laid my skull open with the butt-end of his whip;\u2014would to God he\nhad made me a beggar, and saved my soul! I had no worse wish to bestow\non him than that he might be a life-renter for his poor relations.\nSaunders, look on the face of that unfeeling woman\u2014more horrible to me\nthan death itself;\u2014look on my deserted death-bed, and my chamber\ndecorated like a charnel house? Horrible as the sensation of death is,\nas his iron gropings are stealing round my heart, there is yet to me a\nsight more hideous, and which I thank God I shall be spared\nwitnessing\u2014_when the dead shall bury the dead_!\u2019\n\n\u201cMrs Mucklewham broke frae my weak hand\u2014wrenched open his locked teeth,\nand emptied the hale contents down his throat\u2014grunds an\u2019 a\u2019\u2014o\u2019 his\n\u2018quatenin\u2019 draught;\u2019 I felt myself a\u2019 _ug_, as I saw his teeth gnash\nthegither, an\u2019 his lips close in quateness for ever.\n\n\u201cI gaed out wi\u2019 the mortclaith; I saw the gathering; I was present when\nthe bread an\u2019 dram service were waiting for the grace:\u2014\u2018Try ye\u2019t, John,\u2019\nquo\u2019 ane. \u2018Begin yersel; ye\u2019re dead sweer,\u2019 quo\u2019 anither; when I heard\nane break down an\u2019 auld prayer into twa blessin\u2019s. Some were crackin\u2019\nabout the rise o\u2019 oats; some about the fa\u2019 o\u2019 hay. His bit callans were\nthere in rowth o\u2019 claith; auld elbows of coats mak gude breekknees for\nbairns. I saw the coffin carried out to the hearse without ane admiring\nits bonnie gilding\u2014quite sair and melancholy to see! I saw the bedral\nbodies, wi\u2019 their light-coloured gravats, an\u2019 rusty black cowls,\nstuffing their wide pouches\u2014maist pitifu\u2019, I thought, to behold. Then I\nsaw the house-servants, wha had drunk deepest o\u2019 the cup o\u2019 woe; till\nsae mista\u2019en were their notions o\u2019 sorrow, that they were just by the\nconception o\u2019 the mind o\u2019 man. Then there was sic a clanjamphry o\u2019\nbeggars; some praising the laird for virtues that they wha kenned him\nkent they were failings in him; an\u2019 ithers were cracking o\u2019\nfamiliarities wi\u2019 him, that might hae been painful to his nearest o\u2019 kin\nto hear: there was but sma\u2019 grief when they first gathered; but when\nthey learned there was nae awmous for them, I trow ony tears that were\nshed at the burial were o\u2019 their drappin\u2019.\n\n\u201cThere was the witless idewit Jock Murra, mair mournfu\u2019 to see than a\u2019\nthat was sad there; when just as the hearse began to move on, he liltit\nup a rantin\u2019 sang\u2014\n\n Mony an awmous I\u2019ve got.\n\nI lookit round me when the company began to move on frae the house wi\u2019\nthe hearse; but as I shall answer, sir, there wasna ae face that lookit\nsad but might as well hae smiled; the vera look o\u2019t, in a Christian\nland, broucht the saut tears gushing frae my ain auld dry withered ee!\n\n\u201cIn compliance with the friends\u2019 request, as it was a lang road to come\nback, his will had been read afore the interment; when sae muckle was\nleft to ae hospit an\u2019 sae muckle to anither, as if the only gude he had\never done was reserved for the day o\u2019 his burial; or like ane wha delays\nhis letter till after the mail shuts, and then pays thrice the sum to\novertake the coach. It was the certainty o\u2019 thae things that made it the\nmaist mournfu\u2019 plantin\u2019 I e\u2019er made; an\u2019 I threw the yird on him, as he\nwas let down by stranger hands (for the friends excused themselves frae\ngaun ony farther, after they had heard his will), and happit him up, wi\u2019\na heavier heart than on the morning when I took my ain wifie frae my\nside, an\u2019 laid her in the clay.\u2014You\u2019ll excuse me, sir; here\u2019s \u2018success\nto trade!\u2019\u201d\u2014\u201c_The Auld Kirk Yard._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE FAIRY BRIDE:\n _A TRADITIONARY TALE_.\n\n\nA short time before the rising of the Presbyterians, which terminated in\nthe rout at Pentland, a young gentleman of the name of Elliot had been\ncalled by business to Edinburgh. On his way homeward, he resolved to pay\na visit to an old friend named Scott, whose residence was either upon\nthe banks of the Tweed or some of its larger tributaries,\u2014for on this\npoint the tradition is not very distinct. Elliot stopped at a small\nhouse of entertainment not far from Scott\u2019s mansion, in order to give\nhis parting directions to a servant he was despatching home with some\ncommissions.\n\nThe signs of the times had not altogether escaped the notice of our\nhero. The people were quiet, but reserved, and their looks expressed\nanything but satisfaction. In Edinburgh there were musterings and\ninspections of troops, and expresses to and from London were hourly\ndeparting and arriving. As Elliot travelled along, he had more than once\nencountered small parties of military reconnoitring the country, or\nhastening to some post which had been assigned them. Fewer labourers\nwere to be seen in the fields than was usual at the season. The cottars\nlounged before their doors, and gazed after the passing warriors with an\nair of sullen apathy. There was no violence or disturbance on the part\nof the people,\u2014there had as yet been no arrestments,\u2014but it was evident\nto the most careless that hostile suspicion was rapidly taking the place\nof that inactive dislike which had previously existed between the\ngovernors and the governed.\n\nIt was natural that in such a condition of the national temper, affairs\nof state should form the chief subject of gossip around the fireside of\na country inn. Elliot was not surprised, therefore, while sitting at the\nlong deal table, giving directions to his servant, to hear the name of\nhis friend frequent in the mouths of the peasantry. It was a matter of\ncourse that at such a period the motions and inclinations of a wealthy\nand active landholder of old family should be jealously watched. But it\nstruck him that Scott\u2019s name was always uttered in a low, hesitating\ntone, as if the speakers were labouring under a high degree of awe. He\ncontinued, therefore, some time after he had dismissed his attendant,\nsitting as if lost in thought, but anxiously listening to the desultory\nconversation dropping around him, like the few shots of a distant\nskirmish. The allusions of the peasants were chiefly directed to his\nfriend\u2019s wife. She was beautiful and kind, but there was an unearthly\nlight in her dark eye. Then there was a dark allusion to a marriage on\nthe hillside,\u2014far from human habitation,\u2014to the terror of the clergyman\nwho officiated, at meeting so lovely a creature in so lonely a place.\nThe Episcopalian predilections of the family of Scott were not passed\nunnoticed. And it seemed universally admitted that the house had been\ngiven over to the glamour and fascination of some unearthly being. The\npower of a leader so connected, in the impending strife, was the subject\nof dark forebodings.\n\nRather amused to find his old crony become a person of such consequence,\nElliot discharged his reckoning, mounted his steed, and on reaching\nScott\u2019s residence, was warmly and cheerfully welcomed. He was\nimmediately introduced to the lady, whom he regarded with a degree of\nattention which he would have been ashamed to confess to himself was in\nsome degree owing to the conversation he had lately overheard. She was a\nfigure of a fairy size, delicately proportioned, with not one feature or\npoint of her form to which objection could be urged. Her rich brown hair\nclustered down her neck, and lay in massive curls upon her bosom. Her\ncomplexion was delicate in the extreme, and the rich blood mantled in\nher face at every word. Her eyes were a rich brownish hazel, and emitted\nan almost preternatural light, but there was nothing ungentle in their\nexpression. The honeymoon had not elapsed, and she stood before the\nadmiring traveller in all the beauty of a bride\u2014the most beautiful state\nof woman\u2019s existence, when, to the unfolding delicate beauty of girlhood\nis superadded the flush of a fuller consciousness of existence, the\nwarmth of affection which dare now utter itself unchecked, the first\nhalf-serious, half-playful assumption of matronly dignity. After a brief\ninterchange of compliment with her guest, she left the apartment, either\nbecause \u201cthe house affairs did call her thence,\u201d or because she wished\nto leave the friends to the indulgence of an unrestrained confidential\nconversation.\n\n\u201cA perfect fairy queen,\u201d said Elliot, as the door closed behind her.\n\n\u201cSo you have already heard that silly story?\u201d answered his host. \u201cWell!\nI have no right to complain, for I have only myself to thank for it.\u201d\n\nElliot requested that he would explain his meaning, and he in compliance\nnarrated his \u201cwhole course of wooing.\u201d\n\n\u201cI was detained abroad, as you well know, for some years after his\nMajesty\u2019s restoration, partly on account of the dilapidated state of my\nfortunes, and partly because I wished to prosecute the career of arms I\nhad commenced. It is now about nine months since I returned to my native\ncountry. It was a gloomy day as I approached home. You remember the\nfootpath which strikes across the hill behind the house, from the bed of\nthe stream which mingles, about a mile below us, with that on whose\nbanks we now are. Where it separates from the public road, I gave my\nhorse to the servant, intending to pursue the by-path alone, resolved\nthat no one should watch my emotions when I again beheld the home of my\nfathers. I was looking after the lad, when I heard the tread of horses\nclose behind me. On turning, I saw a tall, elderly gentleman, of\ncommanding aspect, and by his side a young lady upon a slender\nmilk-white palfrey. I need not describe her; you have seen her to-day. I\nwas struck with the delicacy of her features, the sweet smile upon her\nlips, and the living fire that sparkled from her eyes. I gazed after her\nuntil a turning of the road concealed her from my view.\n\n\u201cIt was in vain that I inquired among my relations and acquaintances. No\nperson was known in the neighbourhood such as I described her. The\nimpression she left upon me, vivid though it was at the moment, had died\naway, when one day, as I was walking near the turn of the road where I\nhad lost her, she again rode past me with the same companion. The sweet\nsmile, the glance of the eye, were heightened this time by a blush of\nrecognition. The pair were soon lost to me round the elbow of the road.\nI hurried on, but they had disappeared. The straggling trees which\nobscured the view, ceased at a bridge which stood a couple of gun-shots\nbefore me. Ere I could reach it, I caught a glimpse of the companions.\nThey were at the edge of the stream, a little way above the bridge\u2014their\nhorses were drinking. I pressed onward, but before I had cleared the\nintervening trees and reached the bridge, they had once more\ndisappeared. There was a small break in the water immediately beneath\nthe place where they had stood. For a moment, I thought that I must have\nmistaken its whiteness for the white palfrey, but the glance I had got\nof them was too clear to have been an illusion. Yet no road led in that\ndirection. I examined the banks on both sides of the river, but that on\nwhich I saw them was too hard to receive a hoof-print, and the opposite\nbank was loose shingle, which refused to retain it when made. The\nexceeding beauty of the maiden, the mysterious nature of her\ndisappearance, the irritable humour into which I had worked myself by\nconjectures and an unavailing search, riveted her impression upon my\nmemory. I traversed the country telling my story, and making incessant\ninquiry. In vain! No one knew of such a person. The peasants began to\nlook strangely on me, and whisper in each other\u2019s ears, that I had been\ndeluded by some Nixy. And many were the old prophecies regarding my\nfamily remembered\u2014or manufactured\u2014for the occasion.\n\n\u201cFive months passed away in vain pursuit. My pertinacity was beginning\nto relax, when one evening, returning from a visit to our friend\nWhitelee, I heard a clashing of swords on the road before me. Two\nfellows ran off as I rode hastily up, leaving a gentleman, who had\nvigorously defended himself against their joint assault. \u2018Are you hurt,\nsir?\u2019 was my first inquiry. \u2018I fear I am,\u2019 replied the stranger, whom I\nimmediately recognised as the companion of the mysterious beauty. \u2018Can I\nassist you?\u2019 He looked earnestly at me, and with an expression of\nhesitation on his countenance. \u2018Henry Scott, you are a man of honour.\u2019\nHe paused, but immediately resumed, \u2018I have no choice, and I dare trust\na soldier. Lend me your arm, sir. My dwelling is not far from here.\u2019 I\naccompanied him, he leaning heavily upon me, for the exertion of the\ncombat had shaken his frame, and the loss of blood weakened him. We\nfollowed the direction he indicated for nearly half an hour round the\ntrackless base of a hill, until we came in sight of one of those old\ngray towers which stud our ravines. \u2018There,\u2019 said my companion, pointing\nto the ruin. I recognised it immediately; it stood not far distant from\nthe place where he and his fair fellow-traveller had disappeared, and\nhad often been examined by me, but always in vain.\n\n\u201cTurning an angle of the building, we approached a heap of _debris_,\nwhich in one part encumbered its base. Putting aside some tangled briers\nwhich clustered around, he showed me a narrow entry between the ruins\nand the wall. Passing up to this, he stopped before a door, and gave\nthree gentle knocks; it opened, and we were admitted into a rude, narrow\nvault. It was tenanted, as I had anticipated, by his fair companion. As\nsoon as her alarm at seeing her father return exhausted, bleeding, and\nin company with a stranger, was stilled, and the old man\u2019s wound\ndressed, he turned to explain to me the circumstances in which I found\nhim. His story was brief. He was of good family; had killed a cadet of a\nnoble house, and was obliged to save himself from its resentment by\nhiding in ruins and holes of the earth. In all his wanderings his gentle\ndaughter had never quitted his side.\n\n\u201cI need not weary you with the further details of our growing\nacquaintance. It is the common story of a young man and a young woman\nthrown frequently into each other\u2019s company in a lonely place. But, oh!\ntame though it may appear to others, the mere memory of the three months\nof my life which followed is ecstasy! I saw her daily\u2014in that\nunfrequented spot there was small danger of intrusion, and she dared\nrange the hillside freely. We walked, and sat, and talked together in\nthe birchen wood beneath the tower, and we felt our love unfold itself\nas their leaves spread out to the advancing summer. There was no check\nin the tranquil progress of our affections\u2014no jealousies, for there was\nnone to be jealous of. Unmarked, it overpowered us both. It swelled upon\nus, like the tide of a breathless summer day, purely and noiselessly.\n\n\u201cA few weeks ago her father took me aside, and prefacing that he had\nmarked with pleasure our growing attachment, asked me if I had\nsufficient confidence in my own constancy to pledge myself to be for\nlife an affectionate and watchful guardian of his child? He went on to\nsay, that means of escaping from the country had been provided, and\noffers of promotion in the Spanish service made to him. Your own heart\nwill suggest my answer; and I left him, charged to return after\nnightfall with a clergyman. Our good curate is too much attached to the\nfamily to refuse me anything. To him I revealed my story. At midnight he\nunited me to Ellen, and scarcely was the ceremony over, when Sir James\ntore himself away, leaving his weeping child almost insensible in my\narms.\n\n\u201cTwo gentlemen, who accompanied Sir James to the coast, were witnesses\nof the marriage. It was therefore unnecessary to let any of the\nhousehold into the secret. You may guess their astonishment, therefore,\nwhen, having seen the curate and me ride up the solitary glen alone\nunder cloud of night, they saw us return in the course of a few hours\nwith a lady, who was introduced to them as their mistress. Great has\nbeen their questioning, and great has been the delight of our jolly\npriest to mystify them with dark hints of ruined towers, hillsides\nopening, and such like. The story of the Nixy has been revived, too, and\nEllen is looked on by many with a superstitious awe. I rather enjoyed\nthe joke at first, but now begin to fear, from the deep root the folly\nseems to have taken, that it may one day bear evil fruits for my\ndelicate girl.\u201d\n\nHis augury of evil was well-founded, but the blight fell upon his own\nheart. As soon as he heard of the rising in the west, he joined the\nroyal forces at the head of his tenantry. During his absence, and while\nthe storm of civil war was raging over the land, his cherished one was\nseized with the pangs of premature labour. She lay in the same grave\nwith her child, before her husband could reach his home. The remembrance\nof what she had undergone, her loneliness amid the tempests of winter,\nher isolation from all friends, had so shaken her frame that the first\nattack of illness snapped the thread of life. Her sufferings were\ncomparatively short. But the widower! He sought to efface the\nremembrance of his loss in active service. Wherever insubordination\nshowed itself, he prayed for employment. The Presbyterians learned at\nlast to consider him as the embodied personification of persecution. The\nstory of his mysterious marriage got wind. He was regarded as one allied\nto, and acting under, the influence of unholy powers. He knew it, and,\nin the bitterness of his heart, he rejoiced to be marked out by their\nfear and terror, as one who had nothing in common with them. His own\nmisery, and this outcast feeling, made him aspire to be ranked in their\nminds as a destroying spirit. The young, gallant, and kind-hearted\nsoldier became the most relentless persecutor of the followers of the\nCovenant. Even yet does his memory, and that of his Fairy Bride, live in\npopular tradition like a thunderstorm, gloomy and desolating, yet not\nwithout lambent flashes of more than earthly beauty.\u2014_Edinburgh Literary\nJournal._\n\n\n\n\n THE LOST LITTLE ONES.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nI have a story to tell relative to what happened to Sir George and Lady\nBeaumont, the excellent and beloved proprietors of the Hermitage, in a\nneighbouring county. At the period of which I speak, their family\nconsisted of five children, three sons and two daughters; and their\neldest, a daughter called Charlotte, was then nine years of age. She was\na remarkably clever child, and a great favourite of her parents; but her\nmother used to remark that her vivacity required checking, and,\nnotwithstanding her partiality for her, she never failed to exercise it\nwhen it became necessary. It would have been well had others acted\nequally judiciously.\n\nIt happened one day, as the family were going to sit down to dinner,\nthat Charlotte did not make her appearance. The maid was sent up to her\nroom, but she was not there. The dinner-bell was ordered to be rung\nagain, and a servant was at the same time dispatched to the garden; and\nthis having been done, Sir George and his lady proceeded with the other\nyoungsters to the dining-room, not doubting but Charlotte would be home\nimmediately. The soup, however, was finished without any tidings of her,\nwhen, Lady Beaumont seeming a little uneasy, Sir George assured her\nthere was no cause for alarm, as Charlotte would probably be found under\nher favourite gooseberry bush. Lady Beaumont seemed to acquiesce in\nthis, and appeared tolerably composed, till the servant who had been\nsent to the garden came back to say that she was not there. Sir George\ninsisted that the man had probably passed her without seeing her, the\ngarden being so large; but the servant averred that he had been through\nthe whole of it, and had shouted repeatedly Miss Charlotte\u2019s name.\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d exclaimed Sir George, \u201cshe has pretended not to hear you, Robert,\nand, I daresay, will be back immediately, now that she has succeeded in\ngiving you a race round the garden; however,\u201d added he, \u201cyou may go back\nagain, and take Samuel and Thomas with you, and if you do not find her\nhiding herself in the garden, you may take a peep into the shrubbery, as\nshe may slip in there, on seeing you returning; and as you go along, you\nmay call to her, and say that dinner waits, and that Lady Beaumont is\nmuch displeased with her being out at this time of the day. And now, my\nlove,\u201d continued Sir George to his lady, \u201cjust let us proceed with\ndinner, and compose yourself.\u201d\n\nLady Beaumont forced a smile, and busied herself in attending to her\nyoung ones; but her own plate was neglected, and her eyes were\ncontinually turned towards the window which looked upon the lawn.\n\n\u201cWhat can keep Robert, papa?\u201d said Charles to his father.\n\n\u201cIndeed, my boy,\u201d said Sir George, \u201cI do not know. Charlotte,\u201d continued\nhe to Lady Beaumont, \u201cdo you see any thing?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are all coming back,\u201d exclaimed Lady Beaumont, \u201cand alone!\u201d and\nshe rose hastily from her chair.\n\nRobert and the other men now entered, and reported that they had\nsearched every spot in the garden and the shrubbery, but without finding\nany trace of her; and the people who had been working there all day had\nseen nothing of her. Lady Beaumont now became excessively alarmed, and\nSir George himself was far from easy, though he appeared before his lady\nto treat the matter lightly.\n\n\u201cShe\u2019ll have gone up to the cottages to see her god-brother,\u201d said Sir\nGeorge; \u201cor perhaps have wandered over to the mill.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd if she has fallen into the stream!\u201d ejaculated Lady Beaumont.\n\n\u201cNow, dear Charlotte, do not needlessly alarm yourself; there\u2019s no fear\nbut we shall soon find her.\u201d\n\n\u201cGod grant it!\u201d said Lady Beaumont, \u201cbut my mind misgives me sadly.\u201d\n\nMessengers were now dispatched to the cottages, and to the mill, and in\nvarious other directions around the Hermitage, but all came back without\nhaving obtained any tidings of the missing child. Sir George, now very\nseriously alarmed, gave private directions for having the fish-pond, and\nthe stream which ran at the bottom of the garden, carefully dragged. It\nwas done, but nothing was found. The whole household was now in motion,\nand as the story spread, the tenants and neighbours came pouring from\nall quarters, with offers to search the country round in every\ndirection; so much was Sir George esteemed and beloved by all classes.\nTheir offers were thankfully accepted, and after choosing their ground,\nand dividing themselves into different parties, they set out from the\nHermitage, resolved, as they said, to find the little one, if she was\nabove ground. Sir George and his lady went out as the parties set off in\ntheir different directions, and continued walking up and down the\navenue, that they might the sooner perceive the approach of those\nbringing intelligence; but hour after hour elapsed, and no one came. Sir\nGeorge then proposed that Lady Beaumont should go home and see the young\nones put to bed. She did so, but soon returned again.\n\n\u201cI know,\u201d said she, answering Sir George\u2019s look, \u201cthat you wished me to\nremain at home and rest myself; but what rest can there be for me, till\nwe have some intelligence of\u201d\u2014\u2014and her voice faltered.\n\n\u201cWell, well, then,\u201d said Sir George, pressing her arm in his, \u201clet us\ntake a few more turns\u2014surely we must hear something soon.\u201d\n\nThe people now began to come dropping in from different quarters, but\nall had the same melancholy answer\u2014no one had seen or heard of her. The\nhearts of the poor parents were sadly depressed, for daylight was fast\nclosing in, and almost all those who had set off on the search had now\nreturned, and amongst them their faithful servant Robert, principally\nfrom anxiety to learn if any intelligence had been obtained of his\nfavourite. But when he found that all had returned unsuccessful, he\ndeclared his determination to continue the search during the night; and\nhe, and a good many others who joined him, set off soon afterwards,\nbeing supplied with torches and lanterns of various descriptions.\n\nThis determination gave new hopes to the inmates of the Hermitage, and\nLady Beaumont endeavoured to rally her spirits; but when at length, as\ndaylight broke, Robert and his party returned alone, and without\nintelligence, nature exhausted gave way, and she fell senseless in her\nhusband\u2019s arms.\n\nIn the morning Robert tapped at Sir George\u2019s door, and communicated\nquietly to him his recollecting to have seen a rather suspicious-looking\nwoman near the Hermitage the previous day, and that he had just heard\nfrom a neighbour, that a woman of that description, with a child in her\narms, had been seen passing to the eastward. Orders were immediately\ngiven for a pursuit on horseback;\u2014Sir George giving directions to bring\nin every one whom they suspected; saying, that he would compensate those\nwho had reason to complain of being used in this way. But, though many\nwere brought to the Hermitage, and large rewards were offered, yet week\nafter week passed over without bringing them the smallest intelligence\nof their lost little one.\n\n\nSome months had elapsed since their child had disappeared, and the minds\nof the parents had become comparatively composed, when their attention\nwas one evening attracted by the appearance of an unusual number of\npeople in the grounds below the terrace, and whose motions it seemed\ndifficult to understand.\n\n\u201cWhat can have brought so many people there?\u201d asked Lady Beaumont; \u201cand\nwhat are they doing?\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, my love, I do not know,\u201d said Sir George, \u201cbut there\u2019s Robert,\npassing down the walk, and he will tell us;\u201d and he called to Robert,\nwho, however, seemed rather not to wish to hear; but Sir George called\nagain, and so loudly, that Robert was obliged to stop. \u201cRobert,\u201d said\nSir George, \u201cwhat do these people seek in the low grounds there?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey are looking for \u2014\u2014 of Widow Watt\u2019s, your honour,\u201d said Robert.\n\n\u201cDid you hear what it was, my dear?\u201d said Sir George to his lady.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Lady Beaumont; \u201cbut probably her pet lamb, or more likely her\ncow, has strayed.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs it her cow that\u2019s amissing, Robert?\u201d called Sir George.\n\n\u201cNo, your honour,\u201d said Robert.\n\n\u201cHer lamb then, or some other beast?\u201d asked Sir George.\n\n\u201cNaething o\u2019 the kind, your honour,\u201d answered Robert.\n\n\u201cWhat then?\u201d demanded Sir George, in a tone that showed he would be\nanswered.\n\n\u201cWhy, your honour, they say that wee Leezie Watt\u2019s no come hame, and the\nfolk are gaun to seek for her; and nae doubt they\u2019ll soon find her,\u201d\nadded Robert, stepping hastily away to join them.\n\nSir George had felt Lady Beaumont\u2019s convulsive grasp of his arm, and\ngently led her to a seat, where after a while she became more composed,\nand was able to walk to the Hermitage.\n\n\u201cAnd now,\u201d said she, on reaching the door, \u201cthink no more of me, but\ngive all your thoughts to the most likely means of restoring the poor\nchild to its widowed parent.\u201d\n\n\u201cSpoken like yourself,\u201d said Sir George, pressing her hand; and\nimmediately flew to give directions for making the most thorough and\neffectual search. But this search, alas! proved equally unavailing as\nthe former one, and no trace whatever could be found of the widow\u2019s\nchild.\n\nThe story, joined to the disappearance of Sir George\u2019s daughter, made a\ngreat noise, and created considerable alarm in that part of the country;\nand this alarm was increased fourfold, when, in three weeks afterwards,\nanother child was lost. The whole population now turned out, and people\nwere stationed to watch in different places by night and by day. But no\ndiscovery was made; and, to add to their horror, child after child\ndisappeared, till the number of the lost little ones amounted to seven.\nParents no longer durst trust their children for a moment out of their\nsight. They went with them to school, and also went to bring them back\nagain; and these precautions had the best effect, many weeks having\nelapsed without anything unpleasant happening. The neighbours now began\nto congratulate each other on the probability, or rather certainty, that\nthose who had inflicted so much misery in that quarter of the country\nhad gone somewhere else, and that they would now be able to live in some\nkind of peace and comfort. But this peaceful state was not destined to\ncontinue.\n\nOne of Sir George\u2019s best tenants, David Williams, had been busily\nengaged in ploughing the whole day, and was thinking of unyoking and\ngoing home, when his wife looked over the dyke, and asked him how he was\ncoming on. \u201cBut whaur,\u201d continued she, \u201care the bairns? are they at the\nt\u2019ither end o\u2019 the field?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe bairns!\u201d said David, \u201cI haena seen them; but is\u2019t time for their\nbeing back frae the school?\u201d\n\n\u201cTime!\u201d exclaimed his wife; \u201cmuckle mair than time, they should hae been\nhame an hour syne; and that brought me out to see gif they were wi\u2019 you,\nas you said ye wad may be lowse and gang to meet them!\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, I was unco keen,\u201d said David, \u201cto finish this bit lea, and had nae\nnotion it was sae far in the day.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreserve us!\u201d exclaimed Matty, \u201cgif anything has happened to them!\u201d\n\n\u201cNonsense,\u201d cried David, \u201cwhen there\u2019s three o\u2019 them thegither; but,\nhere,\u201d says he, \u201ctak ye the beasts hame, and I\u2019se be off, and will soon\nbe back wi\u2019 them; sae dinna vex yoursel.\u201d\n\n\u201cI hope it may be sae,\u201d said Matty, \u201cbut my heart misgies me\nsair\u2014however, dinna wait to speak about it.\u201d\n\nDavid Williams was not long of reaching the school, where he learned\nfrom the mistress, that his children had remained a good while after the\nrest, expecting him to come for them; but that they had at length set\nout to meet him, as she understood, and that they had been gone above an\nhour, and she thought they would have been home long ago. \u201cBut,\nperhaps,\u201d continued she, \u201cthey may have called in at their aunt\u2019s, for I\nheard them speaking of her to-day.\u201d\n\nDavid took a hasty leave, and posted away to his sister\u2019s, but the\nchildren had not been there, nor had any one seen them. His\nbrother-in-law, John Maxwell, seeing his distress, proposed taking one\nroad, while David took the other, towards home, and to meet at the\ncorner of the planting near his house. They did so, and arrived nearly\nat the same time, and each without having heard or seen anything of the\nchildren. David Williams was now in a perfect agony, and the\nperspiration ran like water from his forehead.\n\n\u201cMaybe they\u2019re hame already,\u201d said his brother-in-law; \u201cI daurna gang up\nmysel to speir, bit we\u2019ll send yon herd laddie.\u201d\n\nJohn went, and gave the boy his directions to ask, first, if David\nWilliams was at hame, and then to ask, cannie-like, if the weans were\nin. He then sat down beside David, keeping his eye on the cottage, when\nhe sees Matty come fleeing out like one distracted.\n\n\u201cDown, David! down wi\u2019 your head, man,\u201d cried John, \u201cthat she mayna see\nus.\u201d But Matty had got a glimpse of them, and came right down on them as\nfast as she could run.\n\n\u201cWhaur\u2019s my bairns, David?\u201d cried she; \u201cwhaur\u2019s our bonnie bairns? I\nkent weel, whenever the callant askit if they were come hame, what was\nthe meaning o\u2019t. They\u2019re lost, they\u2019re lost!\u201d continued the poor woman,\nwringing her hands, \u201cand what\u2019ll become o\u2019 me?\u201d\n\n\u201cNow Matty, Matty, my ain wife,\u201d said David, \u201cdinna ye gang on at that\ngate, and hurt yoursel; naebody but John and me has been looking for\nthem, and we\u2019ve come straught hame, and there\u2019s a heap o\u2019 ither ways, ye\nken, that they may hae gane by.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, ower mony\u2014ower mony ways, I\u2019m doubtin\u2019,\u201d said Matty mournfully,\nshaking her head; \u201cbut dinna let us put aff time this gate. Rin ye baith\nan\u2019 alarm the neebours, and I\u2019ll awa to the Hermitage, where we\u2019re sure\nto get help; and God grant it mayna end wi\u2019 mine as it did wi\u2019 ithers!\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\u201cBy heavens!\u201d exclaimed Sir George, while the blood mounted to his\nforehead, \u201cbut this is infamous. Ring the alarm bell,\u201d continued he,\n\u201cand let all my tenants and domestics turn out on foot or on horseback,\nand form as large a circle round the place as possible; and let them\nbring out all their dogs, in case this horrid business is caused by some\nwild animal or another which may have broken from its keeper; and\nRobert,\u201d continued Sir George, \u201csee that no strangers are allowed to\npass the circle, on any pretence whatever, without my having seen and\nexamined them.\u201d\n\nThese orders were immediately obeyed, and the alarm having spread far\nand near, an immense body of people quickly assembled, and commenced a\nmost determined and active search, gradually narrowing their circle as\nthey advanced.\n\nLady Beaumont, ascending to the top of the Hermitage, which commanded a\nview of the whole surrounding country, watched their proceedings with\nthe most intense interest; trusting that the result would be not only\nthe restoration of David Williams\u2019 children, but the discovery also of\nthe others which had disappeared, and of her own little one amongst the\nnumber. At times, single horsemen would dash from the circle at a\ngallop, and presently return with some man or woman for Sir George\u2019s\nexamination; and while that lasted, Lady Beaumont\u2019s heart beat fast and\nthick; but the dismissal of the people, and the re-commencement of the\nsearch, painfully convinced her that no discovery had yet been made; and\nsighing deeply, she again turned her eyes on the searchers. At other\ntimes, the furious barking of the dogs, and the running of the people on\nfoot towards the spot, seemed to promise some discovery; but the\nbursting out from the plantation of some unfortunate calf or sheep,\nshowed that the people had been merely hastening to protect them from\nthe unruly animals which had been brought together, and who, having\nstraggled away from their masters, were under no control.\n\nThe day was now fast closing in, and the circle had become greatly\ndiminished in extent; and when, in a short time afterwards, it had\nadvanced on all sides from the plantations, and nothing but a small open\nspace divided the people from each other, Sir George directed them to\nhalt, and, after thanking them for what they had done, he requested them\nto rest themselves on the grass till refreshments could be brought from\nthe Hermitage, after partaking of which they had best move homewards, as\nit seemed in vain to attempt anything more till next day. He then took\nleave of them, and hurried home to the Hermitage, from whence a number\nof people were soon seen returning with the promised refreshments.\n\nHaving finished what was set before them, and sufficiently rested\nthemselves, most of them departed, having first declared their readiness\nto turn out the moment they were wanted. But when his friends proposed\nto David Williams his returning home, he resolutely refused, declaring\nhis determination to continue his search the whole night; and the poor\nman\u2019s distress seemed so great, that a number of the people agreed to\naccompany him. Robert, on being applied to, furnished them, from the\nHermitage, with a quantity of torches and lanterns; and the people\nthemselves, having got others from the cottages in the neighbourhood,\ndivided into bands, and, fixing on John Maxwell\u2019s house for intelligence\nto be sent to, parted in different ways on their search.\n\nAt first all were extremely active, and no place the least suspicious\nwas passed by; but as the night advanced their exertions evidently\nflagged, and many of them began to whisper to each other that it was in\nvain to expect doing any good in the midst of darkness; and, as the idea\ngained ground, the people gradually separated from each other, and\nreturned to their homes, promising to be ready early in the morning to\nrenew the search.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 now, David,\u201d said John Maxwell, \u201clet\u2019s be gaun on.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo to my house,\u201d cried David;\u2014\u201cnot to my ain house. I canna face Matty,\nand them no found yet.\u201d\n\n\u201cAweel, then,\u201d said John, \u201csuppose ye gang hame wi\u2019 me, and fling yersel\ndown for a wee; an\u2019 then we\u2019ll be ready to start again at gray\ndaylight.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 what will Matty think in the meantime?\u201d answered David. \u201cBut gang\non, gang on, however,\u201d he added, \u201can\u2019 I\u2019se follow ye.\u201d\n\nJohn Maxwell, glad that he had got him this length, now led the way,\noccasionally making a remark to David, which was very briefly answered,\nso that John, seeing him in that mood, gave up speaking to him, till,\ncoming at length to a bad step, and warning David of it, to which he got\nno answer, he hastily turned round and found that he was gone. He\nimmediately went back, calling to David as loud as he could, but all to\nno purpose. It then occurred to him that David had probably changed his\nmind, and had gone homewards; and, at any rate, if he had taken another\ndirection, that it was in vain for him to attempt following him, the\nlight he carried being now nearly burnt out. He therefore made the best\nof his way to his own house.\n\nIn the meantime, poor David Williams, who could neither endure the\nthought of going to his own house nor to his brother-in-law\u2019s, and had\npurposely given him the slip, continued to wander up and down without\nwell knowing where he was, or where he was going to, when he suddenly\nfound himself, on coming out of the wood, close to the cottage inhabited\nby a widow named Elie Anderson.\n\n\u201cI wad gie the world for a drink o\u2019 water,\u201d said he to himself; \u201cbut the\npuir creature will hae lain down lang syne, an\u2019 I\u2019m sweer to disturb\nher;\u201d and as he said this, he listened at the door, and tried to see in\nat the window, but he could neither see nor hear anything, and was\nturning to go away, when he thought he saw something like the reflection\nof a light from a hole in the wall, on a tree which was opposite. It was\ntoo high for him to get at it without something to stand upon; but after\nsearching about, he got part of an old hen-coop, and placing it to the\nside of the house, he mounted quietly on it. He now applied his eye to\nthe hole where the light came through, and the first sight which met his\nhorrified gaze was the body of his eldest daughter, lying on a table\nquite dead,\u2014a large incision down her breast, and another across it!\n\nDavid Williams could not tell how he forced his way into the house; but\nhe remembered bolts and bars crashing before him,\u2014his seizing Elie\nAnderson, and dashing her from him with all his might; and that he was\nstanding gazing on his murdered child when two young ones put out their\nhands from beneath the bed-clothes.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s faither,\u201d said the one.\n\n\u201cOh, faither, faither,\u201d said the other, \u201cbut I\u2019m glad ye\u2019re come, for\nNanny\u2019s been crying sair, sair, an\u2019 she\u2019s a\u2019 bluiding.\u201d\n\nDavid pressed them to his heart in a perfect agony, then catching them\nup in his arms, he rushed like a maniac from the place, and soon\nafterwards burst into John Maxwell\u2019s cottage,\u2014his face pale, his eye\nwild, and gasping for breath.\n\n\u201cGod be praised,\u201d cried John Maxwell, \u201cthe bairns are found! But where\u2019s\nNanny?\u201d\n\nPoor David tried to speak, but could not articulate a word.\n\n\u201cMaybe ye couldna carry them a\u2019?\u201d said John; \u201cbut tell me whaur Nanny\nis, and I\u2019se set out for her momently.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe needna, John, ye needna,\u201d said David; \u201cit\u2019s ower late, it\u2019s ower\nlate!\u201d\n\n\u201cHow sae? how sae?\u201d cried John; \u201csurely naething mischancy has happened\nto the lassie?\u201d\n\n\u201cJohn,\u201d said David, \u201cgrasping his hand, she\u2019s murdered\u2014my bairn\u2019s\nmurdered, John!\u201d\n\n\u201cGude preserve us a\u2019,\u201d cried John; \u201can\u2019 wha\u2019s dune it?\u201d\n\n\u201cElie Anderson,\u201d answered David; \u201cthe poor innocent lies yonder a\u2019 cut\nto bits;\u201d and the unhappy man broke into a passion of tears.\n\nJohn Maxwell darted off to Saunders Wilson\u2019s. \u201cRise, Saunders!\u201d cried\nhe, thundering at the door; \u201chaste ye and rise!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter now?\u201d said Saunders.\n\n\u201cElie Anderson\u2019s murdered David\u2019s Nanny; sae haste ye, rise, and yoke\nyour cart, that we may tak her to the towbuith.\u201d\n\nUp jumped Saunders Wilson, and up jumped his wife and his weans, and in\na few minutes the story was spread like wildfire. Many a man had lain\ndown so weary with the long search they had made, that nothing they\nthought would have tempted them to rise again; but now they and their\nfamilies sprung from their beds, and hurried, many of them only\nhalf-dressed, to John Maxwell\u2019s, scarcely believing that the story could\nbe true. Amongst the first came Geordie Turnbull, who proposed that a\nnumber of them should set off immediately, without waiting till Saunders\nWilson was ready, as Elie Anderson might abscond in the meantime; and\naway he went, followed by about a dozen of the most active. They soon\nreached her habitation, where they found the door open and a light\nburning.\n\n\u201cAy, ay,\u201d said Geordie, \u201cshe\u2019s aff, nae doubt, but we\u2019ll get her yet.\nNa, faith,\u201d cried he, entering, \u201cshe\u2019s here still; but, gudesake, what a\nsight\u2019s this!\u201d continued he, gazing on the slaughtered child. The others\nnow entered, and seemed filled with horror at what they saw.\n\n\u201cHaste ye,\u201d cried Geordie, \u201cand fling a sheet or something ower her,\nthat we mayna lose our wits a\u2019thegither. And now, ye wretch,\u201d turning to\nElie Anderson, \u201cyour life shall answer for this infernal deed. Here,\u201d\ncontinued he, \u201cbring ropes and tie her, and whenever Saunders comes up,\nwe\u2019ll off wi\u2019 her to the towbuith.\u201d\n\nRopes were soon got, and she was tied roughly enough, and then thrown\ncarelessly into the cart; but notwithstanding the pain occasioned by her\nthigh-bone being broken by the force with which David Williams dashed\nher to the ground, she answered not one word to all their threats and\nreproaches, till the cart coming on some very uneven ground, occasioned\nher such exquisite pain, that, losing all command over herself, she\nbroke out into such a torrent of abuse against those who surrounded her,\nthat Geordie Turnbull would have killed her on the spot, had they not\nprevented him by main force.\n\nShortly afterwards they arrived at the prison; and having delivered her\nto the jailor, with many strict charges to keep her safe, they\nimmediately returned to assist in the search for the bodies of the other\nchildren, who, they had no doubt, would be found in or about her house.\n\nWhen they arrived there, they found an immense crowd assembled, for the\nstory had spread everywhere; and all who had lost children, accompanied\nby their friends and neighbours and acquaintances, had repaired to the\nspot, and had already commenced digging and searching all round. After\nworking in this way for a long while, without any discovery being made,\nit was at length proposed to give up the search and return home, when\nRobin Galt, who was a mason, and who had been repeatedly pacing the\nground from the kitchen to the pig-sty, and from the pig-sty to the\nkitchen, said, \u201cFrien\u2019s, I\u2019ve been considering, and I canna help\nthinking that there maun be a space no discovered atween the sty and the\nkitchen, an\u2019 I\u2019m unco fond to hae that ascertained.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe\u2019ll sune settle that,\u201d says Geordie Turnbull. \u201cWhereabouts should it\nbe?\u201d\n\n\u201cJust there, I think,\u201d says Robin.\n\nGeordie immediately drove a stone or two out, so that he could get his\nhand in.\n\n\u201cDoes onybody see my hand frae the kitchen?\u201d asked he.\n\n\u201cNo a bit o\u2019t,\u201d was the answer.\n\n\u201cNor frae the sty?\u201d\n\n\u201cNor frae that either.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen there maun be a space, sure enough,\u201d cried Geordie, drawing out\none stone after another, till he had made a large hole in the wall. \u201cAn\u2019\nnow,\u201d said he, \u201cgie me a light;\u201d and he shoved in a lantern, and looked\ninto the place. \u201cThe Lord preserve us a\u2019!\u201d cried he, starting back.\n\n\u201cWhat is\u2019t\u2014what is\u2019t?\u201d cried the people, pressing forward on all sides.\n\n\u201cLook an\u2019 see!\u2014look an\u2019 see!\u201d he answered; \u201cthey\u2019re a there\u2014a\u2019 the\nmurdered weans are there, lying in a raw!\u201d\n\nThe wall was torn down in a moment; and, as he had said, the bodies of\nthe poor innocents were found laid side by side together. Those who\nentered first gazed on the horrid scene without speaking, and then\nproceeded to carry out the bodies, and to lay them on the green before\nthe house. It was then that the grief of the unhappy parents broke\nforth; and their cries and lamentations, as they recognised their\nmurdered little ones, roused the passions of the crowd to absolute\nfrenzy.\n\n\u201cHanging\u2019s ower gude for her,\u201d cried one.\n\n\u201cLet\u2019s rive her to coupens,\u201d exclaimed another.\n\nA universal shout was the answer; and immediately the greater part of\nthem set off for the prison, their numbers increasing as they ran, and\nall burning with fury against the unhappy author of so much misery.\n\nThe wretched woman was at this moment sitting with an old crony who had\nbeen admitted to see her, and to whom she was confessing what had\ninfluenced her in acting as she had done.\n\n\u201cYe ken,\u201d said she, \u201cI haena jist been mysel since a rascal that had a\ngrudge at me put aboot a story of my having made awa wi\u2019 John Anderson,\nwi\u2019 the help o\u2019 arsenic. I was ta\u2019en up and examined aboot it, and\nafterwards tried for it, and though I was acquitted, the neebours aye\nlooked on me wi\u2019 an evil eye, and avoided me. This drave me to drinking\nand other bad courses, and it ended in my leaving that part of the\nkintra, and coming here. But the thing rankled in my mind, and many a\ntime hae I sat thinkin\u2019 on it, till I scarcely kent where I was, or what\nI was doing. Weel, ae day, as I was sitting at the roadside, near the\nHermitage, and very low about it, I heard a voice say, \u2018Are you thinking\non John Anderson, Elie? Ay, woman,\u2019 said Charlotte Beaumont, for it was\nher, \u2018what a shame in you to poison your own gudeman!\u2019 and she pointed\nher finger, and hissed at me. When I heard that,\u201d continued Elie, \u201cthe\nwhole blood in my body seemed to flee up to my face, an\u2019 my very een\nwere like to start frae my head; an\u2019 I believe I wad hae killed her on\nthe spot, hadna ane o\u2019 Sir George\u2019s servants come up at the time; sae I\nsat mysel doun again, an\u2019 after a lang while, I reasoned mysel, as I\nthought, into the notion that I shouldna mind what a bairn said; but I\nhadna forgotten\u2019t for a\u2019 that.\n\n\u201cWeel, ae day that I met wi\u2019 her near the wood, I tell\u2019t her that it\nwasna right in her to speak yon gate, an\u2019 didna mean to say ony mair,\nhadna the lassie gane on ten times waur nor she had done before, and sae\nangered me, that I gied her a wee bit shake, and then she threatened me\nwi\u2019 what her faither wad do, and misca\u2019ed me sae sair, that I struck\nher, and my passion being ance up, I gaed on striking her till I killed\nher outright. I didna ken for a while that she was dead; but when I\nfound that it was really sae, I had sense enough left to row her in my\napron, an\u2019 to tak her hame wi\u2019 me; an\u2019 when I had barred the door, I\nlaid her body on a chair, and sat down on my knees beside it, an\u2019 grat\nan\u2019 wrung my hands a\u2019 night lang.\n\n\u201cThen I began to think what would be done to me if it was found out; an\u2019\nthought o\u2019 pittin\u2019 her into a cunning place, which the man who had the\nhouse before me, and who was a great poacher, had contrived to hide his\ngame in; and when that was done, I was a thought easier, though I\ncouldna forgie mysel for what I had done, till it cam into my head that\nit had been the means o\u2019 saving her frae sin, and frae haein\u2019 muckle to\nanswer for; an\u2019 this thought made me unco happy. At last I began to\nthink that it would be right to save mair o\u2019 them, and that it would\natone for a\u2019 my former sins; an\u2019 this took sic a hold o\u2019 me, that I was\naye on the watch to get some ane or ither o\u2019 them by themselves, to\ndedicate them to their Maker, by marking their bodies wi\u2019 the holy\ncross:\u2014but oh!\u201d she groaned, \u201cif I hae been wrang in a\u2019 this!\u201d\n\nThe sound of the people rushing towards the prison was now distinctly\nheard; and both at once seemed to apprehend their object.\n\n\u201cIs there no way of escape, Elie,\u201d asked her friend, wringing her hands.\n\nElie pointed to her broken thigh, and shook her head. \u201cBesides,\u201d said\nshe, \u201cI know my hour is come.\u201d\n\nThe mob had now reached the prison, and immediately burst open the\ndoors. Ascending to the room where Elie was confined, they seized her by\nthe hair, and dragged her furiously downstairs. They then hurried her to\nthe river, and, with the bitterest curses, plunged her into the stream;\nbut their intention was not so soon accomplished as they had expected;\nand one of the party having exclaimed that a witch would not drown, it\nwas suggested, and unanimously agreed to, to burn her. A fire was\ninstantly lighted by the waterside, and when they thought it was\nsufficiently kindled, they threw her into the midst of it. For some time\nher wet clothes protected her, but when the fire began to scorch her,\nshe made a strong exertion, and rolled herself off. She was immediately\nseized and thrown on again; but having again succeeded in rolling\nherself off, the mob became furious, and called for more wood for the\nfire; and by stirring it on all hands, they raised it into a tremendous\nblaze. Some of the most active now hastened to lay hold of the poor\nwretch, and to toss her into it; but in their hurry one of them having\ntrod on her broken limb, caused her such excessive pain, that when\nGeordie Turnbull stooped to assist in lifting her head, she suddenly\ncaught him by the thumb with her teeth, and held him so fast, that he\nfound it impossible to extricate it. She was therefore laid down again,\nand in many ways tried to force open her mouth, but without other effect\nthan increasing Geordie\u2019s agony; till at length one of them seizing a\npointed stick from the fire, and thrusting it into an aperture\noccasioned by the loss of some of her teeth, the pressure of its sharp\npoint against the roof of her mouth, and the smoke setting her coughing,\nforced her to relax her hold, when the man\u2019s thumb was got out of her\ngrasp terribly lacerated. Immediately thereafter she was tossed in the\nmidst of the flames, and forcibly held there by means of long prongs;\nand the fire soon reaching the vital parts, the poor wretch\u2019s screams\nand imprecations became so horrifying, that one of the bystanders,\nunable to bear it any longer, threw a large stone at her head, which,\nhitting her on the temples, deprived her of sense and motion.\n\nTheir vengeance satisfied, the people immediately dispersed, having\nfirst pledged themselves to the strictest secrecy. Most of them returned\nhome, but a few went back to Elie Anderson\u2019s, whose house, and\neverything belonging to her, had been set on fire by the furious\nmultitude. They then retired, leaving a few men to watch the remains of\nthe children, till coffins could be procured for them. \u201cNever in a\u2019 my\ndays,\u201d said John Maxwell, when speaking of it afterwards, \u201cdid I weary\nfor daylight as I did that night. When the smoke smothered the fire, and\nit was quite dark, we didna mind sae muckle; but when a rafter or a bit\no\u2019 the roof fell in, and a bleeze raise, then the firelight shining on\nthe ghastly faces of the puir wee innocents a\u2019 laid in a row,\u2014it was\nmair than we could weel stand; and it was mony a day or I was my ainsel\nagain.\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\nNext morning the parents met, and it being agreed that all their little\nones should be interred in one grave, and that the funeral should take\nplace on the following day, the necessary preparations were accordingly\nmade. In the meantime, Matty went over to her brother John Maxwell, to\ntell him, if possible, to persuade David Williams not to attend the\nfuneral, as she was sure he could not stand it. \u201cHe hadna closed his\nee,\u201d she said, \u201csince that terrible night, and had neither ate nor\ndrank, but had just wandered up and down between the house and the\nfields, moaning as if his heart would break.\u201d John Maxwell promised to\nspeak to David, but when he did so, he found him so determined on\nattending, that it was needless to say any more on the subject.\n\nOn the morning of the funeral, David Williams appeared very composed;\nand John Maxwell was saying to some of the neighbours that he thought he\nwould be quite able to attend, when word was brought that Geordie\nTurnbull had died that morning of lock-jaw, brought on, it was supposed,\nas much from the idea of his having been bitten by a witch, or one that\nwas not canny, as from the injury done to him.\n\nThis news made an evident impression on David Williams, and he became so\nrestless and uneasy, and felt himself so unwell, that he at one time\ndeclared he would not go to the funeral; but getting afterwards somewhat\nmore composed, he joined the melancholy procession, and conducted\nhimself with firmness and propriety from the time of their setting out\ntill all the coffins were lowered into the grave. But the first spadeful\nof earth was scarcely thrown in, when the people were startled by his\nbreaking into a long and loud laugh;\u2014\n\n\u201cThere she\u2019s!\u2014there she\u2019s!\u201d he exclaimed; and, darting through the\nastonished multitude, he made with all his speed to the gate of the\nchurchyard.\n\n\u201cOh! stop him,\u2014will naebody stop him?\u201d cried his distracted wife; and\nimmediately a number of his friends and acquaintances set off after him,\nthe remainder of the people crowding to the churchyard wall, whence\nthere was an extensive view over the surrounding country. But quickly as\nthose ran who followed him, David Williams kept far a-head of them,\nterror lending him wings,\u2014till at length, on slackening his pace,\nWilliam Russel, who was the only one near, gained on him, and\nendeavoured, by calling in a kind and soothing manner, to prevail on him\nto return. This only made him increase his speed, and William would have\nbeen thrown behind farther than ever, had he not taken a short cut,\nwhich brought him very near him.\n\n\u201cThank God, he will get him now!\u201d cried the people in the churchyard;\nwhen David Williams, turning suddenly to the right, made with the utmost\nspeed towards a rising ground, at the end of which was a freestone\nquarry of great depth. At this sight a cry of horror arose from the\ncrowd, and most fervently did they pray that he might yet be overtaken;\nand great was their joy when they saw that, by the most wonderful\nexertion, William Russel had got up so near as to stretch out his arm to\ncatch him; but at that instant his foot slipped, and ere he could\nrecover himself, the unhappy man, who had now gained the summit, loudly\nshouting, sprung into the air.\n\n\u201cGod preserve us!\u201d cried the people, covering their eyes that they might\nnot see a fellow-creature dashed in pieces; \u201cit is all over!\u201d\n\n\u201cThen help me to lift his poor wife,\u201d said Isabel Lawson. \u201cAnd now stan\u2019\nback, and gie her a\u2019 the air, that she may draw her breath.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe\u2019s drawn her last breath already, I\u2019m doubting,\u201d said Janet Ogilvie,\nan old skilful woman; and her fears were found to be too true.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 what will become o\u2019 the poor orphans?\u201d said Isabel.\n\nShe had scarcely spoken, when Sir George Beaumont advanced, and, taking\none of the children in each hand, he motioned the people to return\ntowards the grave.\n\n\u201cThe puir bairns are provided for now,\u201d whispered one to another, as\nthey followed to witness the completion of the mournful ceremony. It was\nhastily finished in silence, and Sir George having said a few words to\nhis steward, and committed the orphans to his care, set out on his way\nto the Hermitage, the assembled multitude all standing uncovered as he\npassed, to mark their respect for his goodness and humanity.\n\nAs might have been expected, the late unhappy occurrences greatly\naffected Lady Beaumont\u2019s health, and Sir George determined to quit the\nHermitage for a time; and directions were accordingly given to prepare\nfor their immediate removal. While this was doing, the friend who had\nbeen with Elie Anderson in the prison happened to call at the Hermitage,\nand the servants crowded about her, eager to learn what had induced Elie\nto commit such crimes. When she had repeated what Elie had said, a young\nwoman, one of the servants, exclaimed, \u201cI know who\u2019s been the cause of\nthis; for if Bet,\u201d\u2014\u2014and she suddenly checked herself.\n\n\u201cThat must mean Betsy Pringle,\u201d said Robert, who was her sweetheart, and\nindeed engaged to her; \u201cso you will please let us hear what you have to\nsay against her, or own that you\u2019re a slanderer.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have no wish to make mischief,\u201d said the servant; \u201cand as what I said\ncame out without much thought, I would rather say no more; but I\u2019ll not\nbe called a slanderer neither.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen say what you have to say,\u201d cried Robert; \u201cit\u2019s the only way to\nsettle the matter.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, then,\u201d said she, \u201csince I must do it, I shall. Soon after I came\nhere, I was one day walking with the bairns and Betsy Pringle, when we\nmet a woman rather oddly dressed, and who had something queer in her\nmanner, and, when she had left us, I asked Betsy who it was. \u2018Why,\u2019 said\nBetsy, \u2018I don\u2019t know a great deal about her, as she comes from another\npart of the country; but if what a friend of mine told me lately is\ntrue, this Elie Anderson, as they call her, should have been hanged.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Hanged!\u2019 cried Miss Charlotte; \u2018and why should she be hanged, Betsy?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Never you mind, Miss Charlotte,\u2019 said Betsy, \u2018I\u2019m speaking to Fanny\nhere.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You can tell me some other time,\u2019 said I.\n\n\u201c\u2018Nonsense,\u2019 cried Betsy, \u2018what can a bairn know about it? Weel,\u2019\ncontinued she, \u2018it was believed that she had made away with John\nAnderson, her gudeman.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018What\u2019s a gudeman, Betsy?\u2019 asked Miss Charlotte.\n\n\u201c\u2018A husband,\u2019 answered she.\n\n\u201c\u2018And what\u2019s making away with him, Betsy?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018What need you care?\u2019 said Betsy.\n\n\u201c\u2018You may just as well tell me,\u2019 said Miss Charlotte; \u2018or I\u2019ll ask Elie\nAnderson herself all about it, the first time I meet her.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018That would be a good joke,\u2019 said Betsy, laughing; \u2018how Elie Anderson\nwould look to hear a bairn like you speaking about a gudeman, and making\naway with him; however,\u2019 she continued, \u2018that means killing him.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Killing him!\u2019 exclaimed Miss Charlotte. \u2018Oh, the wretch; and how did\nshe kill him, Betsy?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You must ask no more questions, miss,\u2019 said Betsy, and the subject\ndropped.\n\n\u201c\u2018Betsy,\u2019 said I to her afterwards, you should not have mentioned these\nthings before the children; do you forget how noticing they are?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Oh, so they are,\u2019 said Betsy, \u2018but only for the moment; and I\u2019ll wager\nMiss Charlotte has forgotten it all already.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut, poor thing,\u201d Fanny added, \u201cshe remembered it but too well.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll not believe this,\u201d cried Robert.\n\n\u201cLet Betsy be called, then,\u201d said the housekeeper, \u201cand we\u2019ll soon get\nat the truth.\u201d Betsy came, was questioned by the housekeeper, and\nacknowledged the fact.\n\n\u201cThen,\u201d said Robert, \u201cyou have murdered my master\u2019s daughter, and you\nand I can never be more to one another than we are at this moment;\u201d and\nhe hastily left the room.\n\nBetsy gazed after him for an instant, and then fell on the floor. She\nwas immediately raised up and conveyed to bed, but recovering soon\nafter, and expressing a wish to sleep, her attendant left her. The\nunhappy woman, feeling herself unable to face her mistress after what\nhad happened, immediately got up, and, jumping from the window, fled\nfrom the Hermitage. The first accounts they had of her were contained in\na letter from herself to Lady Beaumont, written on her death-bed,\nwherein she described the miserable life she had led since quitting the\nHermitage, and entreating her ladyship\u2019s forgiveness for the unhappiness\nwhich she had occasioned.\n\n\u201cLet what has happened,\u201d said Lady Beaumont, \u201cbe a warning to those who\nhave the charge of them, to _beware of what they say before children_;\u2014a\nsentiment which Sir George considered as so just and important, that he\nhad it engraven on the stone which covered the little innocents, that\ntheir fate and its cause might be had in everlasting remembrance.\u201d\u2014\u201c_The\nOdd Volume._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n AN ORKNEY WEDDING.\n\n BY JOHN MALCOLM.\n\n To me more dear, congenial to my heart,\n One native charm, than all the gloss of art.\u2014_Goldsmith._\n\n\nGentle reader! you, I doubt not, have seen many strange sights, and have\npassed through a variety of eventful scenes. Perhaps you have visited\nthe Thames Tunnel, and there threaded your way under ground and under\nwater, or you may have witnessed Mr Green\u2019s balloon ascent, and seen him\ntake an airing on horseback among the clouds.\n\nPerhaps, too, you have been an observer of human life in all its\nvarieties and extremes: one night figuring away at Almack\u2019s with\naristocratic beauty, and the next footing it with a band of gipsies in\nEpping Forest. But, pray tell me, have you ever seen an Orkney Wedding?\nIf not, as I have just received an invitation to one, inclusive of a\nfriend, you shall, if it so please you, accompany me to that scene of\nrural hospitality.\n\nIn conformity with the custom of the country, I have sent off to the\nyoung couple a pair of fowls and a leg of mutton, to play their parts\nupon the festive board; and as every family contributes in like manner,\na general pic-nic is formed, which considerably diminishes the expense\nincident to the occasion; although, as the festivities are frequently\nkept up for three or four days by a numerous assemblage of rural beauty\nand fashion, the young people must contrive to live upon love, if they\ncan, during the first year of their union, having little else left upon\nwhich to subsist, except the fragments of the mighty feast.\n\nWell, then, away we go, and about noon approach the scene of\nfestivity,\u2014a country-seat built in the cottage style, thatched with\nstraw, and flanked with a barn and a well-filled corn-yard, enclosed\nwith a turf-dyke.\n\nThe wedding company are now seen making their way towards the place of\nrendezvous; and the young women, arrayed in white robes of emblematic\npurity, exhibit a most edifying example of economy. With their upper\ngarments carried to a height to which the fashion of short petticoats\nnever reached even at Paris, they trip it away barefooted through the\nmud, until they reach the banks of a purling stream, about a quarter of\na mile distant from the wedding-house. Here their feet, having been\npreviously kissed by the crystal waters, and covered with cotton\nstockings, which in whiteness would fain vie with the skin they\nenviously conceal, are inserted into shoes, in whose mirror of glossy\nblack the enamoured youth obtains a peep of his own charms, while\nstooping down to adjust their ties into a love-knot.\n\nImmediately in front of the outer-door, or principal entrance of the\nhouse, and answering the double purpose of shelter and ornament, stands\na broad square pile, composed of the most varied materials, needless to\nbe enumerated, and vulgarly denominated a _midden_, around the base of\nwhich some half-dozen of pigs are acting the part of miners, in search\nof its hidden treasures. It is separated from the house by a sheet of\nwater, tinged with the fairest hues of heaven and earth, viz., blue and\ngreen, and over which we pass by a bridge of stepping-stones.\n\nAnd now, my friend, before entering the house, it may be as well to\nconsider what character you are to personate during the entertainment;\nfor the good people in these islands, like their neighbours of the\nmainland of Scotland, take that friendly interest in other people\u2019s\naffairs, which the thankless world very unkindly denominates impertinent\ncuriosity.\n\nIf I pass you off as a lawyer, you will immediately be overwhelmed with\nstatements of their quarrels and grievances; for they are main fond of\nlaw, and will expend the hard-earned savings of years in litigation,\nalthough the subject-matter of dispute should happen to be only a goose.\nYou must not, therefore, belong to the bar, since, in the present case,\nconsultations would produce no fees.\n\nI think I shall therefore confer upon you the degree of M.D., which will\ndo as well for the occasion as if you had obtained it by purchase at the\nUniversity of Aberdeen; although I am not sure that it also may not\nsubject you to some trouble in the way of medical advice.\n\nAnd now having safely passed over the puddle, and tapped gently at the\ndoor, our arrival is immediately announced by a grand musical chorus,\nproduced by the barking of curs, the cackling of geese, the quacking of\nducks, and the grunting and squeaking of pigs. After this preliminary\nsalutation, we are received by the bridegroom, and ushered, with many\nkind welcomes, into the principal hall, through a half open door, at one\nend of which we are refreshed with a picture of rural felicity, namely,\nsome sleek-looking cows, _ruminating_ in philosophical tranquillity on\nthe subject of diet.\n\nIn the middle of the hall is a large blazing turf fire, the smoke of\nwhich escapes in part through an aperture in the roof, while the\nremainder expands in the manner of a pavilion over the heads of the\nguests.\n\nA door at the other end of the hall opens into the withdrawing-room, the\nprincipal furniture of which consists of two large chests filled with\noat and barley meal and home-made cheeses, a concealed bed, and a chest\nof drawers. Both rooms have floors inlaid with earth, and roofs of a\ndark soot colour, from which drops of a corresponding hue occasionally\nfall upon the bridal robes of the ladies, with all the fine effect\narising from contrast, and ornamental on the principle of the patch upon\nthe cheek of beauty.\n\nSeparated from the dwelling-house only by a puddle dotted with\nstepping-stones stands the barn, which, from its length and breadth, is\nadmirably adapted for the purposes of a ball-room.\n\nUpon entering the withdrawing-room, which the good people with admirable\nmodesty call _the ben_, we take our seats among the elders and chiefs of\nthe people, and drink to the health of the young couple in a glass of\ndelicious Hollands, which, unlike Macbeth\u2019s \u201cAmen,\u201d does not stick in\nour throats, although we are well aware that it never paid duty, but was\nslily smuggled over sea in a Dutch lugger, and safely stowed, during\nsome dark night, in the caves of the more remote islands.\n\nThe clergyman having now arrived, the company assembled, and the\nceremony of marriage being about to take place, the parties to be united\nwalk in, accompanied by the best man and the bride\u2019s maid,\u2014those\nimportant functionaries, whose business it is to pull off the gloves\nfrom the right hands of their constituents, as soon as the order is\ngiven to \u201cjoin hands,\u201d\u2014but this they find to be no easy matter, for at\nthat eventful part of the ceremony their efforts are long baffled, owing\nto the tightness of the gloves. While they are tugging away to no\npurpose, the bridegroom looks chagrined, and the bride is covered with\nblushes; and when at last the operation is accomplished, and\nperseverance crowned with success, the confusion of the scene seems to\nhave infected the parson, who thus blunders through the ceremony:\n\n\u201cBridegroom,\u201d quoth he, \u201cdo you take the woman whom you now hold by the\nhand, to be your lawful married husband?\u201d\n\nTo which interrogation the bridegroom having nodded in the affirmative,\nthe parson perceives his mistake, and calls out, \u201cWife, I mean.\u201d \u201cWife,\nI mean,\u201d echoes the bridegroom; and the whole company are in a titter.\n\nBut, thank heaven, the affair is got over at last; and the bride being\nwell saluted, a large rich cake is broken over her head, the fragments\nof which are the subject of a scramble among the bystanders, by whom\nthey are picked up as precious relics, having power to produce\nlove-dreams.\n\nAnd now the married pair, followed by the whole company, set off to\nchurch, to be _kirked_, as the phrase is. A performer on the violin (not\nquite a Rossini) heads the procession, and plays a variety of\nappropriate airs, until he reaches the church-door. As soon as the party\nhave entered and taken their seats, the parish-clerk, in a truly\nimpressive and orthodox tone of voice, reads a certain portion of\nScripture, wherein wives are enjoined to be obedient to their husbands.\nThe service is concluded with a psalm, and the whole party march back,\nheaded as before by the musician.\n\nUpon returning from church, the company partake of a cold collation,\ncalled the _hansel_, which is distributed to each and all by the bride\u2019s\nmother, who for the time obtains the elegant designation of\n_hansel-wife_. The refreshments consist of cheese, old and new, cut down\nin large slices, or rather junks, and placed upon oat and barley\ncakes,\u2014some of the former being about an inch thick, and called\n_snoddies_.\n\nThese delicate viands are washed down with copious libations of new ale,\nwhich is handed about in a large wooden vessel, having three handles,\nand ycleped a _three-lugged cog_.[18] The etherial beverage is seasoned\nwith pepper, ginger, and nutmeg, and thickened with eggs and pieces of\ntoasted biscuit.\n\nFootnote 18:\n\n Also called _the Bride\u2019s cog_.\u2014ED.\n\nThese preliminaries being concluded, the company return to the barn,\nwhere the music strikes up, and the dancing commences with what is\ncalled the Bride\u2019s Reel; after which, two or three young men take\npossession of the floor, which they do not resign until they have danced\nwith every woman present; they then give place to others, who pass\nthrough the same ordeal, and so on. The dance then becomes more varied\nand general. Old men and young ones, maids, matrons, and grandmothers,\nmingle in its mazes. And, oh! what movements are there,\u2014what freaks of\nthe \u201cfantastic toe,\u201d\u2014what goodly figures and glorious gambols in a\ndance;\u2014compared to which the waltz is but the shadow of joy, and the\nquadrille the feeble effort of Mirth upon her last legs.\n\nCasting an eye, however, upon the various performers, I cannot but\nobserve that the old people seem to have monopolised all the airs and\ngraces; for, while the young maidens slide through the reel in the most\nquiet and unostentatious way, and then keep bobbing opposite to their\npartners in all the monotony of the back-step, their more gifted\ngrandmothers figure away in quite another style. With a length of waist\nwhich our modern belles do not wish to possess, and an underfigure,\nwhich they cannot if they would, even with the aid of pads, but which is\nnevertheless the true court-shape, rendering the hoop unnecessary, and\nwhich is moreover increased by the swinging appendages of huge scarlet\npockets, stuffed with bread and cheese, behold them sideling up to their\npartners in a kind of _echellon_ movement, spreading out their\npetticoats like sails, and then, as if seized with a sudden fit of\nbashfulness, making a hasty retreat rearwards. Back they go at a round\ntrot; and seldom do they stop until their career of retiring modesty\nends in a somersault over the sitters along the sides of the room.\n\nThe old men, in like manner, possess similar advantages over the young\nones; the latter being sadly inferior to their seniors in address and\nattitudes. Nor is this much to be wondered at, the young gentlemen\nhaving passed most of their summer vacations at Davis\u2019 Straits, where\ntheir society consisted chiefly of bears; whereas the old ones are men\nof the world, having in early life entered the Company\u2019s service (I do\nnot mean that of the East Indies, but of Hudson\u2019s Bay), where their\nmanners must no doubt have been highly polished by their intercourse\nwith the Squaws, and all the beauty and fashion of that interesting\ncountry.\n\nSuch of them as have sojourned there are called north-westers, and are\ndistinguished by that modest assurance, and perfect ease and\nself-possession, only to be acquired by mixing frequently and freely\nwith the best society. Indeed, one would suppose that their manners were\nformed upon the model of the old French school; and _queues_ are in\ngeneral use among them\u2014not, however, those of the small pigtail kind,\nbut ones which in shape and size strongly resemble the Boulogne sausage.\n\nAnd now, amidst these ancients, I recognise my old and very worthy\nfriend, Mr James Houston, kirk-officer and sexton of the parish, of whom\na few words, perhaps, may not be unacceptable.\n\nHis degree of longitude may be about five feet from the earth, and in\nlatitude he may extend at an average to about three. His countenance,\nwhich is swarthy, and fully as broad as it is long, although not\naltogether the model which an Italian painter would select for his\nApollo, would yet be considered handsome among the Esquimaux; or, as\nJames calls them, the _Huskinese_. His hair, which (notwithstanding an\nage at which Time generally saves us the expense of the powder-tax) is\njet black, is of a length and strength that would not shrink from\ncomparison with that of a horse\u2019s tail, and hangs down over his broad\nshoulders in a fine and generous flow. The coat which he wears upon\nthis, as upon all other occasions, is cut upon the model of the spencer;\nits colour, a \u201cheavenly blue,\u201d varied by numerous dark spots, like\nclouds in a summer sky; while his nether bulk is embraced by a pair of\ntight buckskin \u201cunmentionables.\u201d\n\nExtending from the bosom down to the knee he wears a leather apron. This\npart of his dress is never dispensed with, except at church; and though\nI have not been able to ascertain its precise purpose with perfect\ncertainty, I am inclined to think it is used as a perpetual pinafore, to\npreserve his garments from the pollution of soup and grease-drops at\ntable.\n\nThe principal materials of his dress are, moreover, prepared for use by\nhis own hands: Mr Houston being at once sole proprietor and operative of\na small manufactory, consisting of a single loom; when not employed at\nwhich, or in spreading the couch of rest in the churchyard, he enjoys a\nkind of perpetual _otium cum dignitate_.\n\nHis chief moveables, in addition to the loom, consist of three Shetland\nponies and a small Orkney plough, by the united aid of which he is\nenabled to scratch up the surface of a small estate, which supplies him\nwith grain sufficient for home consumption, but not for exportation.\n\nHis peculiar and more shining accomplishments consist in the art of\nmimicking the dance of every man and woman in the parish, which he does\nwith a curious felicity, and in executing short pieces of music on that\nsweetest of lyres, the Jew\u2019s harp.\n\nLike most of his profession, he is a humorist; and though he has long\n\u201cwalked hand-in-hand with death,\u201d nobody enjoys life with a keener\nrelish at the festive board or the midnight ball, which he finds\ndelightful relaxations from his _grave_ occupations during the day; and\nyet even these latter afford him a rare and consolatory joy denied to\nother men,\u2014I mean that of meeting with his old friends, after they have\nbeen long dead, and of welcoming, with a grin of recognition, the skulls\nof his early associates, as he playfully pats them with his spade, and\ntosses them into the light of day.\n\nBut it is in his capacity of kirk-officer that Mr Houston appears to the\ngreatest advantage, while ushering the clergyman to the pulpit, and\nmarching before him with an air truly magnificent, and an erectness of\ncarriage somewhat beyond the perpendicular, he performs his important\nfunction of opening and shutting the door of the pulpit, and takes his\nseat under an almost overwhelming sense of dignity, being for the time a\nkind of lord high constable, with whom is entrusted the execution of the\nlaw. And that he does not bear the sword in vain is known to their cost,\nby all the litigious and churchgoing dogs of the parish; for no sooner\ndo they begin to growl and tear each other, with loud yells, which they\ngenerally do, so as to chime in with the first notes of the first psalm,\nthan starting up with a long staff,\u2014the awe-inspiring baton of\noffice,\u2014he belabours the yelping curs with such blessed effect as to\nrestore them to a sense of propriety, and prevent them from mingling\ntheir unhallowed chorus with that of the melodious choir.\n\nHaving given this brief outline of Mr Houston, we shall proceed through\nthe remaining part of the scene. A large and very substantial dinner\nforms an agreeable variety in the entertainments of the day; and in the\nevening the scene of elegant conviviality is transferred to the\nball-room, where dancing again commences with renovated spirit. The\nperpetual motion, also, seems at last to be discovered in that of the\n_three-lugged cog_, which circulates unceasing as the sun;\u2014like that,\ndiffusing life and gladness in its growing orbit round the room, and\nkissed in its course by so many fair lips, bears off upon its edges much\nof their balmy dew, affording a double-refined relish to its inspiring\ndraughts.\n\nAt length the supper is announced, and a rich repast it is: quarters of\nmutton, boiled and roasted, flocks of fat hens, in marshalled ranks,\nflanked with roasted geese, luxuriously swimming in a savoury sea of\nbutter, form the _\u00e9lite_ of the feast; from which all manner of\nvegetables are entirely excluded, being considered as much too humble\nfor such an occasion.\n\nThe company do ample justice to the hospitality of their entertainers;\nand even the bride, considering the delicacy of her situation, has\nalready exceeded all bounds of moderation. This, however, is entirely\nowing to her high sense of politeness; for she conceives that it would\nbe rude in her to decline eating so long as she is asked to do so by the\nvarious carvers. But now I really begin to be alarmed for her: already\nhas she dispatched six or seven services of animal food, and is even now\nessaying to disjoint the leg and wing of a goose; but, thank Heaven!\u2014in\nattempting to cut through the bone, she has upset her plate, and\ntransferred its contents into her lap; which circumstance, I trust, she\nwill consider a providential warning to eat no more.\n\nAnd now, before leaving the wedding, we will have a little conversation\nwith some of my country friends, who are fond of chatting with those\nwhom they call _the gentry_; and who, being particularly partial to a\npompous phraseology, and addicted to the use of words, of which they\neither do not understand the meaning at all, or very imperfectly, are\nall of the Malaprop school, and often quite untranslatable. A fair\nspecimen of their style may be had from my friend Magnus Isbister, who\nhas taken his seat upon my left hand, but at such a distance from the\ntable that his victuals are continually dropping betwixt his plate and\nhis mouth. I will speak to him.\n\n\u201cI am glad to see you here, Magnus; and looking so well, that I need not\ninquire after your health.\u201d\n\n_Magnus._ \u201cWhy, thanks to the Best, sir, I\u2019m brave and easy that way;\nbut sairly hadden down wi\u2019 the laird, wha\u2019s threatenin\u2019 to raise my rent\nthat\u2019s ower high already; but he was aye a _raxward_ man,\u2014and, between\nyou and me, he\u2019s rather greedy.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s a hard case, Magnus; you should speak to the factor, and explain\nyour circumstances to him.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cOh, sir, I hae been doin\u2019 that already; but he got into a\n_sevandable_ passion, an\u2019 said something about \u2018his eye and Betty\nMartin;\u2019\u2014I\u2019m sure I ken naething about her; but ye maun ken he\u2019s a\n_felonious_ arguer, an\u2019 ower deep for the like o\u2019 us puir _infidel\nbodies_.\u201d\n\n\u201cHad you not better sit nearer to the table, Magnus? You are losing your\nvictuals by keeping at such a distance.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cNa, na, sir; I doubt ye\u2019re mockan\u2019 me noo; but I ken what gude\nmanners is better than do ony siccan a thing.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere is your son at present?\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cWhy, thanks be praised, sir, he\u2019s doing bravely. He follows the\n_swindling_ trade awa in the south, whaur they tell me the great Bishops\no\u2019 Lunnon are proclaiming war wi\u2019 the Papists.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat they are, Magnus, and ever will do.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cCan ye tell me, sir, if it\u2019s true that the king\u2019s intending to\npart wi\u2019 his ministers? I\u2019m thinking it would be a\u2019 the better for the\nlike o\u2019 us boons folk, and wad free us frae the tithes.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou misunderstand the thing, Magnus; the king\u2019s ministers are not those\nof the Church, but of the State.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cOh\u2014is that it? Weel, I never kent that before. But can ye tell\nme, sir, wha that gentleman is upon your ither side?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe is a young Englishman, who has come north to see this country.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cIs he indeed, sir? And, by your leave, what _ack o\u2019 parliament_\ndoes he drive?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe is, I believe, a doctor of medicine.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cJust so, sir; I wonder if he could tell what would be good for\nme?\u201d\n\n\u201cI thought you told me you were in good health?\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cWeel, as I said before, I\u2019m brave and easy that way, indeed; but\nyet I\u2019m whiles fashed wi\u2019 the _rheumaticisms_, and sometimes I\u2019m very\n_domalis_.\u201d\n\n\u201cDomalis!\u2014what\u2019s that, Magnus?\u201d\n\n_Mag._ \u201cWeel, never might there be the waur o\u2019 that; I thought you,\nthat\u2019s been at college, wad hae kent that;\u2014domalis is just \u2018_flamp_\u2019\n(listless).\u201d\n\n\u201cI would advise you to keep clear of the doctors, Magnus; believe me,\nyou don\u2019t require them at present;\u2014but come, favour me with a toast.\u201d\n\n_Mag._ (_Filling his glass._) \u201cWeel, sir, I\u2019se do my best to gie ye a\ngude ane (_scratching his head_);\u2014weel, sir, \u2018Here\u2019s luck.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cAn excellent toast, Magnus, which I drink with all my heart; and, in\nreturn \u2018Here\u2019s to your health and happiness, and that of the bride and\nbridegroom, and the rest of this pleasant company, and a good night to\nyou all.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE GHOST WITH THE GOLDEN CASKET.\n\n BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.\n\n Is my soul tamed\n And baby-rid with the thought that flood or field\n Can render back, to scare men and the moon,\n The airy shapes of the corses they enwomb?\n And what if \u2019tis so\u2014shall I lose the crown\n Of my most golden hope, \u2019cause its fair circle\n Is haunted by a shadow?\n\n\nFrom the coast of Cumberland the beautiful old castle of Caerlaverock is\nseen standing on the point of a fine green promontory, bounded by the\nriver Nith on one side, by the deep sea on another, by the almost\nimpassable morass of Solway on a third; while, far beyond, you observe\nthe three spires of Dumfries, and the high green hills of Dalswinton and\nKeir. It was formerly the residence of the almost princely names of\nDouglas, Seaton, Kirkpatrick, and Maxwell: it is now the dwelling-place\nof the hawk and the owl; its courts are a lair for cattle, and its walls\nafford a midnight shelter to the passing smuggler, or, like those of the\ncity doomed in Scripture, are places for the fishermen to dry their\nnets. Between this fine old ruin and the banks of the Nith, at the foot\nof a grove of pines, and within a stone-cast of tide-mark, the remains\nof a rude cottage are yet visible to the curious eye; the bramble and\nthe wild plum have in vain tried to triumph over the huge gray granite\nblocks, which composed the foundations of its walls. The vestiges of a\nsmall garden may still be traced, more particularly in summer, when\nroses and lilies, and other relics of its former beauty, begin to open\ntheir bloom, clinging, amid the neglect and desolation of the place,\nwith something like human affection, to the soil. This rustic ruin\npresents no attractions to the eye of the profound antiquary, compared\nto those of its more stately companion, Caerlaverock Castle; but with\nthis rude cottage and its garden, tradition connects a tale so wild and\nso moving, as to elevate it, in the contemplation of the peasantry,\nabove all the princely feasts and feudal atrocities of its neighbour.\n\nIt is now some fifty years since I visited the parish of Caerlaverock;\nbut the memory of its people, its scenery, and the story of the Ghost\nwith the Golden Casket, are as fresh with me as matters of yesterday. I\nhad walked out to the river bank one sweet afternoon of July, when the\nfishermen were hastening to dip their nets in the coming tide, and the\nbroad waters of the Solway sea were swelling and leaping against bank\nand cliff, as far as the eye could reach. It was studded over with\nboats, and its more unfrequented bays were white with water-fowl. I sat\ndown on a small grassy mound between the cottage ruins and the old\ngarden plot, and gazed, with all the hitherto untasted pleasure of a\nstranger, on the beautiful scene before me. On the right, and beyond the\nriver, the mouldering relics of the ancient religion of Scotland\nascended, in unassimilating beauty, above the humble kirk of New Abbey\nand its squalid village; farther to the south rose the white sharp\ncliffs of Barnhourie; while on the left stood the ancient Keeps of\nCumlongan and Torthorald, and the Castle of Caerlaverock. Over the whole\nlooked the stately green mountain of Criffel, confronting its more\nstately but less beautiful neighbour, Skiddaw; while between them flowed\nthe deep wide sea of Solway, hemmed with cliff, and castle, and town.\n\nAs I sat looking on the increasing multitudes of waters, and watching\nthe success of the fishermen, I became aware of the approach of an old\nman, leading, as one will conduct a dog in a string, a fine young milch\ncow, in a halter of twisted hair, which, passing through the ends of two\npieces of flat wood, fitted to the animal\u2019s cheek-bones, pressed her\nnose, and gave her great pain whenever she became disobedient. The cow\nseemed willing to enjoy the luxury of a browse on the rich pasture which\nsurrounded the little ruined cottage; but in this humble wish she was\nnot to be indulged; for the aged owner, coiling up the tether, and\nseizing her closely by the head, conducted her past the tempting herbage\ntowards a small and close-cropt hillock, a good stone-cast distant. In\nthis piece of self-denial the animal seemed reluctant to sympathise\u2014she\nsnuffed the fresh green pasture, and plunged, and startled, and nearly\nbroke away. What the old man\u2019s strength seemed nearly unequal to was\naccomplished by speech:\u2014\n\n\u201cBonnie leddy, bonnie leddy,\u201d said he, in a soothing tone, \u201cit canna be,\nit maunna be; hinnie! hinnie! what would become of my three-bonnie\ngrandbairns, made fatherless and mitherless by that false flood afore\nus, if they supped milk, and tasted butter, that came from the\ngreensward of this doomed and unblessed spot?\u201d\n\nThe animal appeared to comprehend something in her own way from the\nspeech of her owner: she abated her resistance; and, indulging only in a\npassing glance at the rich deep herbage, passed on to her destined\npasture.\n\nI had often heard of the singular superstitions of the Scottish\npeasantry, and that every hillock had its song, every hill its ballad,\nand every valley its tale. I followed with my eye the old man and his\ncow: he went but a little way, till, seating himself on the ground,\nretaining still the tether in his hand, he said,\u2014\n\n\u201cNow, bonnie leddy, feast thy fill on this good greensward; it is\nhalesome and holy, compared to the sward at the doomed cottage of auld\nGibbie Gyrape\u2014leave that to smugglers\u2019 nags: Willie o\u2019 Brandyburn and\nroaring Jock o\u2019 Kempstane will ca\u2019 the Haunted Ha\u2019 a hained bit\u2014they are\ngodless fearnoughts.\u201d\n\nI looked at the person of the peasant. He was a stout hale old man, with\na weather-beaten face, furrowed something by time, and perhaps by\nsorrow. Though summer was at its warmest, he wore a broad chequered\nmantle, fastened at the bosom with a skewer of steel; a broad bonnet,\nfrom beneath the circumference of which straggled a few thin locks, as\nwhite as driven snow, shining like amber, and softer than the finest\nflax; while his legs were warmly cased in blue-ribbed boot-hose. Having\nlaid his charge to the grass, he looked leisurely around him, and\nespying me,\u2014a stranger, and dressed above the manner of the\npeasantry,\u2014he acknowledged my presence by touching his bonnet; and, as\nif willing to communicate something of importance, he struck the\ntethered stake in the ground and came to the old garden fence.\n\nWishing to know the peasant\u2019s reason for avoiding the ruins, I thus\naddressed him:\u2014\n\n\u201cThis is a pretty spot, my aged friend, and the herbage looks so fresh\nand abundant, that I would advise thee to bring thy charge hither; and\nwhile she continues to browse, I would gladly listen to the history of\nthy white locks, for they seem to have been bleached in many tempests.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, ay,\u201d said the peasant, shaking his white head with a grave smile;\n\u201cthey have braved sundry tempests between sixteen and sixty; but\ntouching this pasture, sir, I know of none who would like their cows to\ncrop it: the aged cattle shun the place;\u2014the bushes bloom, but bear no\nfruit,\u2014the birds never build in the branches,\u2014the children never come\nnear to play,\u2014and the aged never choose it for a resting-place; but,\npointing it out as they pass to the young, tell them the story of its\ndesolation. Sae ye see, sir, having nae gude-will to such a spot of\nearth myself, I like little to see a stranger sitting in such an\nunblessed place; and I would as good as advise ye to come ower wi\u2019 me to\nthe cowslip knoll\u2014there are reasons mony that an honest man shouldna sit\nthere.\u201d\n\nI arose at once, and seating myself beside the peasant on the cowslip\nknoll, desired to know something of the history of the spot from which\nhe had just warned me. The old man looked on me with an air of\nembarrassment.\n\n\u201cI am just thinking,\u201d said he, \u201cthat, as ye are an Englishman, I\nshouldna acquaint ye wi\u2019 such a story. Ye\u2019ll mak it, I\u2019m doubting, a\nmatter of reproach and vaunt when ye gae hame, how Willie Borlan o\u2019\nCaerlaverock told ye a tale of Scottish iniquity, that cowed a\u2019 the\nstories in southern book or history.\u201d\n\nThis unexpected obstacle was soon removed.\n\n\u201cMy sage and considerate friend,\u201d I said, \u201cI have the blood in my bosom\nthat will keep me from revealing such a tale to the scoffer and the\nscorner. I am something of a Caerlaverock man\u2014the grandson of Marion\nStobie of Dookdub.\u201d\n\nThe peasant seized my hand\u2014\u201cMarion Stobie! bonnie Marion Stobie o\u2019\nDookdub\u2014whom I wooed sae sair, and loved sae lang!\u2014Man, I love ye for\nher sake; and well was it for her braw English bridegroom that William\nBorlan\u2014frail and faded now, but strong and in manhood then\u2014was a\nthousand miles from Caerlaverock, rolling on the salt sea, when she was\nbrided. Ye have the glance of her ee,\u2014I could ken it yet amang ten\nthousand, gray as my head is. I will tell the grandson of bonnie Marion\nStobie ony tale he likes to ask for; and the story of the Ghost and the\nGowd Casket shall be foremost.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou may imagine then,\u201d said the old Caerlaverock peasant, rising at\nonce with the commencement of his story from his native dialect into\nvery passable English\u2014\u201cyou may imagine these ruined walls raised again\nin their beauty,\u2014whitened, and covered with a coating of green broom;\nthat garden, now desolate, filled with herbs in their season, and with\nflowers, hemmed round with a fence of cherry and plumtrees; and the\nwhole possessed by a young fisherman, who won a fair subsistence for his\nwife and children from the waters of the Solway sea: you may imagine it,\ntoo, as far from the present time as fifty years. There are only two\npersons living now, who remember when the Bonne Homme Richard\u2014the first\nship ever Richard Faulder commanded\u2014was wrecked on the Pelock sands: one\nof these persons now addresses you, the other is the fisherman who once\nowned that cottage,\u2014whose name ought never to be named, and whose life\nseems lengthened as a warning to the earth, how fierce God\u2019s judgments\nare. Life changes\u2014all breathing things have their time and their season;\nbut the Solway flows in the same beauty\u2014Criffel rises in the same\nmajesty\u2014the light of morning comes, and the full moon arises now, as\nthey did then;\u2014but this moralizing matters little. It was about the\nmiddle of harvest\u2014I remember the day well; it had been sultry and\nsuffocating, accompanied by rushings of wind, sudden convulsions of the\nwater, and cloudings of the sun:\u2014I heard my father sigh and say, \u2018Dool,\ndool to them found on the deep sea to-night; there will happen strong\nstorm and fearful tempest!\u2019\n\n\u201cThe day closed, and the moon came over Skiddaw: all was perfectly clear\nand still; frequent dashings and whirling agitations of the sea were\nsoon heard mingling with the hasty clang of the water-fowls\u2019 wings, as\nthey forsook the waves, and sought shelter among the hollows of the\nrocks. The storm was nigh. The sky darkened down at once; clap after\nclap of thunder followed; and lightning flashed so vividly, and so\nfrequent, that the wide and agitated expanse of Solway was visible from\nside to side\u2014from St Bees to Barnhourie. A very heavy rain, mingled with\nhail, succeeded; and a wind accompanied it, so fierce, and so high, that\nthe white foam of the sea was showered as thick as snow on the summit of\nCaerlaverock Castle.\n\n\u201cThrough this perilous sea, and amid this darkness and tempest, a bark\nwas observed coming swiftly down the middle of the sea; her sails rent,\nand her decks crowded with people. The \u2018carry,\u2019 as it is called, of the\ntempest was direct from St Bees to Caerlaverock; and experienced men\ncould see that the bark would be driven full on the fatal shoals of the\nScottish side; but the lightning was so fierce that few dared venture to\nlook on the approaching vessel, or take measures for endeavouring to\npreserve the lives of the unfortunate mariners. My father stood on the\nthreshold of his door, and beheld all that passed in the bosom of the\nsea. The bark approached fast, her canvas rent to shreds, her masts\nnearly levelled with the deck, and the sea foaming over her so deep, and\nso strong, as to threaten to sweep the remains of her crew from the\nlittle refuge the broken masts and splintered beams still afforded them.\nShe now seemed within half a mile of the shore, when a strong flash of\nlightning, that appeared to hang over the bark for a moment, showed the\nfigure of a lady richly dressed, clinging to a youth who was pressing\nher to his bosom.\n\n\u201cMy father exclaimed, \u2018Saddle me my black horse, and saddle me my gray,\nand bring them down to the Dead-man\u2019s bank,\u2019\u2014and, swift in action as he\nwas in resolve, he hastened to the shore, his servants following with\nhis horses. The shore of Solway presented then, as it does now, the same\nvarying line of coast; and the house of my father stood in the bosom of\na little bay, nearly a mile distant from where we sit. The remains of an\nold forest interposed between the bay at Dead-man\u2019s bank, and the bay at\nour feet; and mariners had learned to wish, that if it were their doom\nto be wrecked, it might be in the bay of douce William Borlan, rather\nthan that of Gilbert Gyrape, the proprietor of that ruined cottage. But\nhuman wishes are vanities, wished either by sea or land. I have heard my\nfather say, he could never forget the cries of the mariners, as the bark\nsmote on the Pellock bank, and the flood rushed through the chasms made\nby the concussion; but he could far less forget the agony of a lady\u2014the\nloveliest that could be looked upon, and the calm and affectionate\ncourage of the young man who supported her, and endeavoured to save her\nfrom destruction. Richard Faulder, the only man who survived, has often\nsat at my fireside, and sung me a very rude, but a very moving ballad,\nwhich he made on this young and unhappy pair; and the old mariner\nassured me he had only added rhymes, and a descriptive line or two, to\nthe language in which Sir William Musgrave endeavoured to soothe and\nsupport his wife.\u201d\n\nIt seemed a thing truly singular, that at this very moment two young\nfishermen, who sat on the margin of the sea below us, watching their\nhalve-nets, should sing, and with much sweetness, the very song the old\nman had described. They warbled verse and verse alternately; and rock\nand bay seemed to retain and then release the sound. Nothing is so sweet\nas a song by the seaside on a tranquil evening.\n\n\n SIR WILLIAM MUSGRAVE.\n\n _First Fisherman._\n\n \u201cO lady, lady, why do you weep?\n Tho\u2019 the wind be loosed on the raging deep,\n Tho\u2019 the heaven be mirker than mirk may be,\n And our frail bark ships a fearful sea,\u2014\n Yet thou art safe\u2014as on that sweet night\n When our bridal candles gleamed far and bright.\u201d\u2014\n There came a shriek, and there came a sound,\n And the Solway roared, and the ship spun round.\n\n _Second Fisherman._\n\n \u201cO lady, lady, why do you cry?\n Though the waves be flashing top-mast high,\n Though our frail bark yields to the dashing brine,\n And heaven and earth show no saving sign,\n There is One who comes in the time of need,\n And curbs the waves as we curb a steed.\u201d\u2014\n The lightning came, with the whirlwind blast,\n And cleaved the prow, and smote down the mast.\n\n _First Fisherman._\n\n \u201cO lady, lady, weep not nor wail,\n Though the sea runs howe as Dalswinton vale,\n Then flashes high as Barnhourie brave,\n And yawns for thee, like the yearning grave\u2014\n Tho\u2019 twixt thee and the ravening flood\n There is but my arm and this splintering wood,\n The fell quicksand, or the famished brine,\n Can ne\u2019er harm a face so fair as thine.\u201d\n\n _Both._\n\n \u201cO lady, lady, be bold and brave,\n Spread thy white breast to the fearful wave,\n And cling to me with that white right hand,\n And I\u2019ll set thee safe on the good dry land.\u201d\n A lightning flash on the shallop strook,\n The Solway roared, and Caerlaverock shook;\n From the sinking ship there were shriekings cast,\n That were heard above the tempest\u2019s blast.\n\nThe young fishermen having concluded their song, my companion proceeded.\n\n\u201cThe lightning still flashed vivid and fast, and the storm raged with\nunabated fury; for, between the ship and the shore, the sea broke in\nfrightful undulation, and leaped on the greensward several fathoms deep\nabreast. My father, mounted on one horse, and holding another in his\nhand, stood prepared to give all the aid that a brave man could to the\nunhappy mariners; but neither horse nor man could endure the onset of\nthat tremendous surge. The bark bore for a time the fury of the element;\nbut a strong eastern wind came suddenly upon her, and crushing her\nbetween the wave and the freestone bank, drove her from the entrance of\nmy father\u2019s little bay towards the dwelling of Gibbie Gyrape, and the\nthick forest intervening, she was out of sight in a moment. My father\nsaw, for the last time, the lady and her husband looking shoreward from\nthe side of the vessel, as she drifted along; and as he galloped round\nthe head of the forest, he heard for the last time the outcry of some,\nand the wail and intercession of others. When he came before the\nfisherman\u2019s house, a fearful sight presented itself: the ship, dashed to\natoms, covered the shore with its wreck, and with the bodies of the\nmariners\u2014not a living soul escaped, save Richard Faulder, whom the fiend\nwho guides the spectre shallop of the Solway had rendered proof to the\nperils of the deep. The fisherman himself came suddenly from his\ncottage, all dripping and drenched, and my father addressed him:\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018O, Gilbert, Gilbert, what a fearful sight is this! Has Heaven blessed\nthee with making thee the means of saving a human soul?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Nor soul nor body have I saved,\u2019 said the fisherman, doggedly. \u2018I have\ndone my best; the storm proved too stark, and the lightning too fierce\nfor me; their boat alone came near with a lady and a casket of gold, but\nshe was swallowed up with the surge.\u2019\n\n\u201cMy father confessed afterwards that he was struck with the tone in\nwhich these words were delivered, and made answer\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018If thou hast done thy best to save souls to-night, a bright reward\nwill be thine;\u2014if thou hast been fonder for gain than for working the\nmariners\u2019 redemption, thou hast much to answer for.\u2019\n\n\u201cAs he uttered these words, an immense wave rolled landward, as far as\nthe place where they stood; it almost left its foam on their faces, and\nsuddenly receding, deposited at their feet the dead body of the lady. As\nmy father lifted her in his arms, he observed that the jewels which had\nadorned her hair\u2014at that time worn long\u2014had been forcibly rent away; the\ndiamonds and gold that enclosed her neck, and ornamented the bosom of\nher rich satin dress, had been torn off,\u2014the rings removed from her\nfingers,\u2014and on her neck, lately so lily-white and pure, there appeared\nthe marks of hands\u2014not laid there in love and gentleness, but with a\nfierce and deadly grasp.\n\n\u201cThe lady was buried with the body of her husband, side by side, in\nCaerlaverock burial-ground. My father never openly accused Gilbert the\nfisherman of having murdered the lady for her riches, as she reached the\nshore, preserved from sinking, as was supposed, by her long, wide, and\nstiff satin robes;\u2014but from that hour till the hour of his death, my\nfather never broke bread with him\u2014never shook him or his by the hand,\nnor spoke with them in wrath or in love. The fisherman from that time,\ntoo, waxed rich and prosperous; and from being the needy proprietor of a\nhalve-net, and the tenant at will of a rude cottage, he became, by\npurchase, lord of a handsome inheritance, proceeded to build a bonny\nmansion, and called it Gyrape-ha\u2019; and became a leading man in a flock\nof a purer kind of Presbyterians, and a precept and example to the\ncommunity.\n\n\u201cBut though the portioner of Gyrape-ha\u2019 prospered wondrously, his claims\nto parochial distinction, and the continuance of his fortune, were\ntreated with scorn by many, and with doubt by all; though nothing open\nor direct was said, yet looks, more cutting at times than the keenest\nspeech, and actions still more expressive, showed that the hearts of\nhonest men were alienated\u2014the cause was left to his own interpretation.\nThe peasant scrupled to become his servant; sailors hesitated to receive\nhis grain on board, lest perils should find them on the deep; the beggar\nceased to solicit alms; the drover and horse-couper\u2014an unscrupulous\ngeneration\u2014found out a more distant mode of concluding bargains than by\nshaking his hand; his daughters, handsome and blue-eyed, were neither\nwooed nor married; no maiden would hold tryst with his sons, though\nmaidens were then as little loth as they are now; and the aged peasant,\nas he passed his new mansion, would shake his head and say\u2014\u2018The voice of\nspilt blood will be lifted up against thee; and a spirit shall come up\nfrom the waters, and cause the corner-stone of thy habitation to tremble\nand quake.\u2019\n\nIt happened, during the summer which succeeded this unfortunate\nshipwreck, that I accompanied my father to the Solway, to examine his\nnets. It was near midnight, the tide was making, and I sat down by his\nside and watched the coming of the waters. The shore was glittering in\nstarlight as far as the eye could reach. Gilbert, the fisherman, had\nthat morning removed from his cottage to his new mansion; the former was\ntherefore untenanted, and the latter, from its vantage-ground on the\ncrest of the hill, threw down to us the sound of mirth, and music, and\ndancing,\u2014a revelry common in Scotland on taking possession of a new\nhouse. As we lay quietly looking on the swelling sea, and observing the\nwater-fowl swimming and ducking in the increasing waters, the sound of\nthe merriment became more audible. My father listened to the mirth,\nlooked to the sea, looked to the deserted cottage, and then to the new\nmansion, and said\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018My son, I have a counsel to give thee; treasure it in thy heart, and\npractise it in thy life: the daughters of _him_ of Gyrape-ha\u2019 are fair,\nand have an eye that would wile away the wits of the wisest. Their\nfather has wealth,\u2014I say nought of the way he came by it,\u2014they will have\ngolden portions doubtless. But I would rather lay thy head aneath the\ngowans in Caerlaverock kirkyard (and son have I none beside thee), than\nsee thee lay it on the bridal pillow with the begotten of that man,\nthough she had Nithsdale for her dowry. Let not my words be as seed sown\non the ocean. I may not now tell thee why this warning is given. Before\nthat fatal shipwreck, I would have said Prudence Gyrape, in her kirtle,\nwas a better bride than some who have golden dowers. I have long thought\nsome one would see a sight; and often, while holding my halve-net in the\nmidnight tide, have I looked for something to appear, for where blood is\nshed there doth the spirit haunt for a time, and give warning to man.\nMay I be strengthened to endure the sight!\u2019\n\n\u201cI answered not, being accustomed to regard my father\u2019s counsel as a\nmatter not to be debated, as a solemn command: we heard something like\nthe rustling of wings on the water, accompanied by a slight curling\nmotion of the tide. \u2018God haud His right hand about us!\u2019 said my father,\nbreathing thick with emotion and awe, and looking on the sea with a gaze\nso intense that his eyes seemed to dilate, and the hair of his forehead\nto project forward, and bristle into life. I looked, but observed\nnothing, save a long line of thin and quivering light, dancing along the\nsurface of the sea: it ascended the bank, on which it seemed to linger\nfor a moment, and then entering the fisherman\u2019s cottage, made roof and\nrafter gleam with a sudden illumination. \u2018I\u2019ll tell thee what, Gibbie\nGyrape,\u2019 said my father, \u2018I wouldna be the owner of thy heart, and the\nproprietor of thy right hand, for all the treasures in earth and ocean.\u2019\n\n\u201cA loud and piercing scream from the cottage made us thrill with fear,\nand in a moment the figures of three human beings rushed into the open\nair, and ran towards us with a swiftness which supernatural dread alone\ncould inspire. We instantly knew them to be three noted smugglers who\ninfested the country; and rallying when they found my father maintain\nhis ground, they thus mingled their fears and the secrets of their\ntrade, for terror fairly overpowered their habitual caution.\n\n\u201c\u2018I vow by the night tide, and the crooked timber,\u2019 said Willie\nWeethause, \u2018I never beheld sic a light as yon since our distillation\npipe took fire, and made a burnt instead of a drink offering of our\nspirits; I\u2019ll uphold it comes for nae good\u2014a warning maybe\u2014sae ye may\ngang on, Wattie Bouseaway, wi\u2019 yer wickedness; as for me, I\u2019se gang hame\nand repent.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Saulless bodie!\u2019 said his companion, whose natural hardihood was\nconsiderably supported by his communion with the brandy cup\u2014\u2018saulless\nbodie, for a flaff o\u2019 fire and a maiden\u2019s shadow, would ye foreswear the\ngallant trade? Saul to gude! but auld Miller Morison shall turn yer\nthrapple into a drain-pipe to wyse the waste water from his mill, if ye\nturn back now, and help us nae through wi\u2019 as strong an importation as\never cheered the throat, and cheeped in the crapin. Confound the\nfuzhionless bodie! he glowers as if this fine starlight were something\nfrae the warst side o\u2019 the world, and thae staring een o\u2019 his are busy\nshaping heaven\u2019s sweetest and balmiest air into the figures of wraiths\nand goblins.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Robert Telfer,\u2019 said my father, addressing the third smuggler, \u2018tell\nme naught of the secrets of your perilous trade; but tell me what you\nhave seen, and why ye uttered that fearful scream, that made the\nwood-doves start from Caerlaverock pines.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019ll tell ye what, goodman,\u2019 said the mariner, \u2018I have seen the fires\nof heaven running as thick along the sky, and on the surface of the\nocean, as ye ever saw the blaze on a bowl o\u2019 punch at a merry-making,\nand neither quaked nor screamed; but ye\u2019ll mind the light that came to\nthat cottage to-night was one for some fearful purport, which let the\nwise expound; sae it lessened nae one\u2019s courage to quail for sic an\napparition? \u2019Od, if I thought living soul would ever make the start I\ngied an upcast to me, I\u2019d drill his breast-bane with my dirk like a\nturnip-lantern.\u2019\n\n\u201cMy father mollified the wrath of this maritime desperado, by assuring\nhim that he beheld the light go from the sea to the cottage, and that he\nshook with terror, for it seemed no common light.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ou, then,\u2019 said hopeful Robin, \u2018since it was ane o\u2019 our ain cannie sea\napparitions, I care less about it. I took it for some landward sprite!\nAnd now I think on\u2019t, where were my een? Did it no stand amang its ain\nlight, with its long hanks of hair dripping and drenched; with a casket\nof gold in ae hand, and the other guarding its throat? I\u2019ll be bound\nit\u2019s the ghost o\u2019 some sonsie lass that has had her neck nipped for her\ngold; and had she stayed till I emptied the bicker o\u2019 brandy, I would\nhave asked a cannie question or twa.\u2019\n\n\u201cWillie Weethause had now fairly overcome his consternation, and began\nto feel all his love return for the \u2018gallant trade,\u2019 as his comrade\ncalled it.\n\n\u201c\u2018The tide serves, lads! the tide serves; let us slip our drap o\u2019 brandy\ninto the bit bonnie boat, and tottle awa amang the sweet starlight as\nfar as the Kingholm or the town quarry\u2014ye ken we have to meet Bailie\nGardevine and Laird Soukaway o\u2019 Ladlemouth.\u2019\n\n\u201cThey then returned, not without hesitation and fear, to the old\ncottage; carried their brandy to the boat; and as my father and I went\nhome, we heard the dipping of their oars in the Nith, along the banks of\nwhich they sold their liquor, and told their tale of fear, magnifying\nits horror at every step, and introducing abundance of variations.\n\n\u201cThe story of the Ghost with the Golden Casket flew over the country\nside with all its variations, and with many comments. Some said they saw\nher, and some thought they saw her; and those who had the hardihood to\nkeep watch on the beach at midnight had their tales to tell of terrible\nlights and strange visions. With one who delighted in the marvellous,\nthe spectre was decked in attributes that made the circle of auditors\ntighten round the hearth; while others, who allowed to a ghost only a\ncertain quantity of thin air to clothe itself in, reduced it in their\ndescription to a very unpoetic shadow, or a kind of better sort of\nwill-o\u2019-the-wisp, that could for its own amusement counterfeit the human\nshape. There were many others who, like my father, beheld the singular\nillumination appear at midnight on the coast; saw also something sailing\nalong with it in the form of a lady in bright garments, her hair long\nand wet, and shining in diamonds; and heard a struggle, and the shriek\nas of a creature drowning.\n\n\u201cThe belief of the peasantry did not long confine the apparition to the\nsea coast; it was seen sometimes late at night far inland, and following\nGilbert the fisherman, like a human shadow\u2014like a pure light\u2014like a\nwhite garment\u2014and often in the shape and with the attributes in which it\ndisturbed the carousal of the smugglers. I heard douce Davie Haining\u2014a\nGod-fearing man, and an elder of the Burgher congregation, and on whose\nword I could well lippen, when drink was kept from his head\u2014I heard him\nsay that as he rode home late from the Roodfair of Dumfries\u2014the night\nwas dark, there lay a dusting of snow on the ground, and no one appeared\non the road but himself; he was lilting and singing the canny end of the\nauld sang, \u2018There\u2019s a cutty stool in our kirk,\u2019 which was made on some\nfoolish quean\u2019s misfortune, when he heard the sound of horses\u2019 feet\nbehind him at full gallop, and ere he could look round, who should flee\npast, urging his horse with whip and spur, but Gilbert the fisherman!\n\u2018Little wonder that he galloped,\u2019 said the elder, \u2018for a fearful form\nhovered around him, making many a clutch at him, and with every clutch\nuttering a shriek most piercing to hear. But why should I make a long\nstory of a common tale? The curse of spilt blood fell on him, and on his\nchildren, and on all he possessed; his sons and daughters died; his\nflocks perished; his grain grew, but never filled the ear; and fire came\nfrom heaven, or rose from hell, and consumed his house and all that was\ntherein. He is now a man of ninety years; a fugitive and a vagabond on\nthe earth, without a house to put his white head in, and with the\nunexpiated curse still clinging to him.\u2019\n\nWhile my companion was making this summary of human wretchedness, I\nobserved the figure of a man, stooping to the earth with extreme age,\ngliding through among the bushes of the ruined cottage, and approaching\nthe advancing tide. He wore a loose great-coat, patched to the ground,\nand fastened round his waist by a belt and buckle; the remains of\nstockings and shoes were on his feet; a kind of fisherman\u2019s cap\nsurmounted some remaining white hairs, while a long peeled stick\nsupported him as he went. My companion gave an involuntary shudder when\nhe saw him\u2014\n\n\u201cLo and behold, now, here comes Gilbert the fisherman! Once every\ntwenty-four hours does he come, let the wind and the rain be as they\nwill, to the nightly tide, to work o\u2019er again, in imagination, his old\ntragedy of unrighteousness. See how he waves his hand, as if he welcomed\nsome one from the sea; he raises his voice, too, as if something in the\nwater required his counsel; and see how he dashes up to the middle, and\ngrapples with the water as if he clutched a human being!\u201d\n\nI looked on the old man, and heard him call in a hollow and broken\nvoice\u2014\n\n\u201cAhoy! the ship ahoy,\u2014turn your boat\u2019s head ashore! And, my bonnie\nleddy, keep haud o\u2019 yer casket. Hech be\u2019t! that wave would have sunk a\nthree-decker, let a be a slender boat. See\u2014see an she binna sailing\nabune the water like a wild swan!\u201d\u2014and wading deeper in the tide as he\nspoke, he seemed to clutch at something with both hands, and struggle\nwith it in the water.\n\n\u201cNa, na\u2014dinna haud your white hands to me; ye wear ower mickle gowd in\nyour hair, and ower mony diamonds on your bosom, to \u2019scape drowning.\nThere\u2019s as mickle gowd in this casket as would have sunk thee seventy\nfathom deep.\u201d And he continued to hold his hands under the water,\nmuttering all the while.\n\n\u201cShe\u2019s half gane now; and I\u2019ll be a braw laird, and build a bonnie\nhouse, and gang crousely to kirk and market. Now I may let the waves\nwork their will; my wark will be ta\u2019en for theirs.\u201d\n\nHe turned to wade to the shore, but a large and heavy wave came full\ndash on him, and bore him off his feet, and ere any assistance reached\nhim, all human aid was too late; for nature was so exhausted with the\nfulness of years, and with his exertions, that a spoonful of water would\nhave drowned him. The body of this miserable old man was interred, after\nsome opposition from the peasantry, beneath the wall of the kirkyard;\nand from that time the Ghost with the Golden Casket was seen no more,\nand only continued to haunt the evening tale of the hind and the farmer.\n\n\n\n\n RANALD OF THE HENS:\n _A TRADITION OF THE WESTERN HIGHLANDS_.\n\n\nEarly in the sixteenth century, Macdonald of Clanranald married the\ndaughter of Fraser Lord Lovat, and from this connection some very\nunfortunate consequences to both these powerful families followed. Soon\nafter his marriage Clanranald died, and left but one lawful son, who was\nbred and educated at Castle Donie, the seat of Lovat, under the care of\nhis maternal grandfather. The name of the young chieftain was Ranald,\nand, unhappily for himself, he was distinguished by the appellation\n_Gaulta_, or Lowland, because Lovat\u2019s country was considered as\napproaching towards the manners, customs, and appearance of the\nLowlands, compared to his own native land of Moidart, one of the most\nbarren and mountainous districts in the Highlands.\n\nRanald was an accomplished youth, and promised to be an ornament to his\nfamily and his country; his disposition was amiable, and his personal\nappearance extremely handsome and prepossessing. While yet a stripling,\nhe visited his estate; and his people being desirous to give him the\nbest reception in their power, he found at every house great\nentertainments provided, and much expense incurred by the slaughter of\ncattle and other acts of extravagance, which appeared to Ranald very\nsuperfluous. He was a stranger to the customs of the country, and it\nwould seem that he had no friendly or judicious counsellor. In an evil\nhour, he remarked that he was extremely averse to this ruinous practice,\nwhich he was convinced the people could ill afford; and said that, for\nhis own part, he would be perfectly satisfied to dine on a fowl. Ranald\nhad an illegitimate brother (or, as some say, an uncle\u2019s son), who was\nborn and bred on the estate. He was many years older than the young\nClanranald, and was possessed of very superior abilities in his way. He\nwas active, brave, and ambitious, to which were added much address and\nshrewdness. Having always resided in Moidart, where he associated with\nthe people, and had rendered himself very popular, he had acquired the\nappellation of _Ian Muidartich_, or John of Moidart,\u2014a much more\nendearing distinction than _Gaulta_.\n\nThe remark Ranald had made as to the extravagance of his people gave\ngreat offence; and the preference he gave to a fowl was conceived to\nindicate a sordid disposition, unbecoming the representative of so great\na family. John Muidartich and his friends encouraged these ideas, and\nRanald was soon known by the yet more contemptuous appellation of\n\u201cRanald of the Hens.\u201d He soon left Moidart, and returned to his\ngrandfather\u2019s house. His brother (and now his opponent) remained in that\ncountry, and he used all the means in his power to strengthen his\ninterest. He married the daughter of Macdonald of Ardnamurchan, the head\nof a numerous and turbulent tribe, whose estate bordered on Moidart, and\nhis intention to oppose Ranald became daily more evident. Several\nattempts were made by mutual friends to effect a compromise, without any\npermanent result. At length a conference between the brothers was\nappointed at Inverlochy, where Ranald attended, accompanied by old Lovat\nand a considerable body of his clan; but especially a very large portion\nof the principal gentlemen of his name were present. John also appeared,\nand, to prevent any suspicion of violence, the number of his attendants\nwas but small, and his demeanour was pacific and unassuming.\n\nLovat made proposals on the part of his grandson, and with very little\nhesitation they were acceded to by John and his friends. All parties\nappeared to be highly pleased, and they separated,\u2014John and his small\nparty directing their course homeward, whilst Ranald accompanied his\naged relation to his own country, which was much more distant.\n\nJohn of Moidart, however, was all along playing a deep game: he ordered\na strong body of his father-in-law\u2019s people to lie in ambush in a\ncertain spot near the path by which Lovat and his men must necessarily\npass on their return home; and he took care to join them himself, by\ntravelling all night across the mountains.\n\nThe Frasers and young Clanranald appeared, and they were attacked by\ntheir wily foe. The combat was fearfully bloody and fatal. It is said\nthat no more than six of Lovat\u2019s party escaped, and not triple that\nnumber of their enemies\u2014Ranald, unquestionably the lawful representative\nof the family, fell covered with wounds, after having given proof that\nhe was possessed of the greatest bravery; and his memory is to this day\nrespected even among the descendants of those who destroyed him. John of\nMoidart obtained possession of the whole estate, and led a very\nturbulent life. Tradition says that he compromised the claims of\nMacdonald of Morar for a third part of his lands, which he yielded up to\nhim on relinquishing further right.\n\nThe conflict is distinguished by the designation of _Blar Leine_, or the\nBattle of the Shirts, the combatants having stripped themselves during\nthe action. It was fought at the eastern end of Loch Lochy, near the\nline of the Caledonian Canal, in July 1554.\u2014_Literary Gazette._\n\n\n\n\n THE FRENCH SPY.\n\n BY JOHN GALT.\n\n\nOne day\u2014in the month of August it was\u2014I had gone on some private\nconcernment of my own to Kilmarnock, and Mr Booble, who was then oldest\nbailie, naturally officiated as chief magistrate in my stead.\n\nThere had been, as the world knows, a disposition, on the part of the\ngrand monarque of that time, to invade and conquer this country, the\nwhich made it a duty incumbent on all magistrates to keep a vigilant eye\non the incomings and outgoings of aliens and other suspectable persons.\nOn the said day, and during my absence, a Frenchman, that could speak no\nmanner of English, somehow was discovered in the Cross Key Inn. What he\nwas, or where he came from, nobody at the time could tell, as I was\ninformed; but there he was, having come into the house at the door, with\na bundle in his hand, and a portmanteau on his shoulder, like a\ntraveller out of some vehicle of conveyance. Mrs Drammer, the landlady,\ndid not like his looks; for he had toozy black whiskers, was lank and\nwan, and moreover deformed beyond human nature, as she said, with a\nparrot nose, and had no cravat, but only a bit black riband drawn\nthrough two button-holes, fastening his ill-coloured sark-neck, which\ngave him altogether something of an unwholesome, outlandish appearance.\n\nFinding he was a foreigner, and understanding that strict injunctions\nwere laid on the magistrates by the king and government anent the\negressing of such persons, she thought, for the credit of her house, and\nthe safety of the community at large, that it behoved her to send word\nto me, then provost, of this man\u2019s visibility among us; but as I was not\nat home, Mrs Pawkie, my wife, directed the messenger to Bailie Booble\u2019s.\nThe bailie was, at all times, overly ready to claught at an alarm; and\nwhen he heard the news, he went straight to the council-room, and\nsending for the rest of the council, ordered the alien enemy, as he\ncalled the forlorn Frenchman, to be brought before him. By this time the\nsuspicion of a spy in the town had spread far and wide; and Mrs Pawkie\ntold me, that there was a pallid consternation in every countenance when\nthe black and yellow man\u2014for he had not the looks of the honest folks of\nthis country\u2014was brought up the street between two of the town officers,\nto stand an examine before Bailie Booble.\n\nNeither the bailie, nor those that were then sitting with him, could\nspeak any French language, and \u201cthe alien enemy\u201d was as little master of\nour tongue. I have often wondered how the bailie did not jalouse that he\ncould be no spy, seeing how, in that respect, he wanted the main\nfaculty. But he was under the enchantment of a panic, partly thinking\nalso, perhaps, that he was to do a great exploit for the government in\nmy absence.\n\nHowever, the man was brought before him, and there was he, and them all,\nspeaking loud out to one another as if they had been hard of hearing,\nwhen I, on coming home from Kilmarnock, went to see what was going on in\nthe council. Considering that the procedure had been in hand some time\nbefore my arrival, I thought it judicious to leave the whole business\nwith those present, and to sit still as a spectator; and really it was\nvery comical to observe how the bailie was driven to his wits\u2019-end by\nthe poor lean and yellow Frenchman, and in what a pucker of passion the\npanel put himself at every new interlocutor, none of which he could\nunderstand. At last, the bailie getting no satisfaction\u2014how could he?\u2014he\ndirected the man\u2019s portmanteau and bundle to be opened; and in the\nbottom of the forementioned package, there, to be sure, was found many a\nmystical and suspicious paper, which no one could read; among others,\nthere was a strange map, as it then seemed to all present.\n\n\u201cI\u2019 gude faith,\u201d cried the bailie, with a keckle of exultation, \u201chere\u2019s\nproof enough now. This is a plain map o\u2019 the Frith o\u2019 Clyde, all the way\nto the Tail of the Bank at Greenock. This muckle place is Arran; that\nround ane is the Craig of Ailsa; the wee ane between is Pladda.\nGentlemen, gentlemen, this is a sore discovery; there will be hanging\nand quartering on this.\u201d So he ordered the man to be forthwith committed\nas a king\u2019s prisoner to the tolbooth; and turning to me said\u2014\u201cMy Lord\nProvost, as ye have not been present throughout the whole of this\ntroublesome affair, I\u2019ll e\u2019en gie an account mysel to the Lord Advocate\nof what we have done.\u201d I thought, at the time, there was something fey\nand overly forward in this, but I assented; for I know not what it was\nthat seemed to me as if there was something neither right nor regular;\nindeed, to say the truth, I was no ill pleased that the bailie took on\nhim what he did; so I allowed him to write himself to the Lord Advocate;\nand, as the sequel showed, it was a blessed prudence on my part that I\ndid so. For no sooner did his lordship receive the bailie\u2019s terrifying\nletter, than a special king\u2019s messenger was sent to take the spy into\nEdinburgh Castle; and nothing could surpass the great importance that\nBailie Booble made of himself on the occasion, on getting the man into a\ncoach, and two dragoons to guard him into Glasgow.\n\nBut oh! what a dejected man was the miserable Bailie Booble, and what a\nlaugh rose from shop and chamber, when the tidings came out from\nEdinburgh that \u201cthe alien enemy\u201d was but a French cook coming over from\nDublin, with the intent to take up the trade of a confectioner in\nGlasgow, and that the map of the Clyde was nothing but a plan for the\noutset of a fashionable table\u2014the bailie\u2019s island of Arran being the\nroast beef, and the Craig of Ailsa the plum-pudding, and Pladda a\nbutterboat. Nobody enjoyed the jocularity of the business more than\nmyself; but I trembled when I thought of the escape that my honour and\ncharacter had with the Lord Advocate. I trow, Bailie Booble never set\nhimself so forward from that day to this.\u2014\u201c_The Provost._\u201d\n\n[Illustration: Fleuron]\n\n\n\n\n THE MINISTER\u2019S BEAT.\n\n A man he was to all the country dear.\n\n \u00b7 \u00b7 \u00b7 \u00b7 \u00b7\n\n Even children followed with endearing wile,\n And plucked his gown, to share the good man\u2019s smile.\u2014_Goldsmith._\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n\u201cI am just about to make a round of friendly visits,\u201d said the minister;\n\u201cand as far as our roads lie together, you will perhaps go with me. You\nare a bad visitor, I know, Mr Frank; but most of my calls will be where\nforms are unknown, and etiquette dispensed with.\u201d\n\nI am indeed a bad visitor, which, in the ordinary acceptation of the\nterm, means no visitor at all; but I own the temptation of seeing my\nworthy friend\u2019s reception, and the hope of coming in for a share of the\ncordial welcome he was sure to call forth, overcame my scruples;\nespecially as in cottages and farm-steadings there is generally\nsomething to be learned even during a morning call;\u2014some trait of\nunsophisticated nature to be smiled at, or some sturdy lesson of\npractical wisdom to be treasured for future use.\n\nWe had not ridden far when my companion, turning up a pretty rough\ncart-road leading to a large farmhouse on the right, said, with an arch\nsmile,\u2014\u201cI love what our superstitious forefathers would esteem a lucky\nbeginning even to a morning\u2019s ride, and am glad ours commences with a\nwedding visit. Peter Bandster has taken a wife in my absence, and I must\ngo and call him to account for defrauding me of the ploy. Have you heard\nanything, Mr Francis, about the bride?\u201d\n\nMore than I could wish, thinks I to myself; for my old duenna, who\nindemnifies herself for my lack of hospitality by assiduous\nfrequentation of all marriages, christenings, and gossipings abroad, had\ndeaved me for the last three weeks with philippics about this unlucky\nwedding. The folly of Peter in marrying above his own line; the\nignorance of the bride, who scarce knew lint-yarn from tow, or bere from\nbarley; her unpardonable accomplishments of netting purses and playing\non the spinnet; above all, her plated candlesticks, flounced gown, and\nfashionable bonnet, had furnished Hannah with inexhaustible matter for\nthat exercise of the tongue, which the Scots call \u201crhyming,\u201d and the\nEnglish \u201cringing the changes;\u201d to which, as to all other noises, custom\ncan alone render one insensible.\n\nI had no mind to damp the minister\u2019s benevolent feelings towards the\ncouple, and contented myself with answering, that I heard the bride was\nboth bonnie and braw. The good man shook his head. \u201cWe have an old\nproverb, and a true one,\u201d said he, \u201c\u2018a bonnie bride is sune buskit;\u2019 but\nI have known gawdy butterflies cast their painted wings, and become\nexcellent housewives in the end.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut there stands Peter\u2014no very blithe bridegroom, methinks!\u201d said I, as\nmy eye rested on the tall and usually jolly young farmer, musing\ndisconsolately in his cattle-yard over what appeared to be the body of a\ndead cow. He started on seeing the minister, as if ashamed of his sorrow\nor its cause, and came forward to meet us, struggling to adapt his\ncountenance a little better to his circumstances.\n\n\u201cWell, Peter,\u201d said the minister, frankly extending his hand, \u201cand so I\nam to wish you joy! I thought when I gave you your name, five-and-twenty\nyears ago, if it pleased God to spare me, to have given you your\nhelpmate also; but what signifies it by whom the knot is tied, if true\nlove and the blessing of God go with it? Nay, never hang your head,\nPeter; but tell me, before we beat up the young gudewife\u2019s quarters,\nwhat you were leaning over so wae-like when we rode forward.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, sir,\u201d cried Peter, reddening up, \u201cit wasna the value o\u2019 the beast,\nthough she was the best cow in my mother\u2019s byre, but the way I lost her,\nthat pat me a wee out o\u2019 tune. My Jessie (for I maunna ca\u2019 her gudewife,\nit seems, nor mistress neither) is an ill guide o\u2019 kye, ay, and what\u2019s\nwaur, o\u2019 lasses. We had a tea-drinking last night, nae doubt, as\nnew-married folk should; and what for no?\u2014I\u2019se warrant my mither had\nthem too in her daft days. But she didna keep the house asteer the hale\nnight wi\u2019 fiddles and dancin\u2019, and it neither New Year nor Hansel\nMonday; nor she didna lie in her bed till aught or nine o\u2019clock, as my\nJess does; na, nor yet\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cBut what has all this to do with the loss of your cow, Peter?\u201d\n\n\u201cOwer muckle, sir; ower muckle. The lasses and lads liket reels as weel\nas their mistress, and whisky a hantle better. They a\u2019 sleepit in, and\nmysel among the lave. Nae mortal ever lookit the airt that puir Blue\nBell was in, and her at the very calving; and this morning, when the\nbyre-door was opened, she was lying stiff and stark, wi\u2019 a dead calf\nbeside her. It\u2019s no the cow, sir (though it was but the last market I\nhad the offer o\u2019 fifteen pund for her), it\u2019s the thought that she was\nsae sair neglected amang me, and my Jess, and her tawpies o\u2019 lasses.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome, come, Peter,\u201d said the good minister, \u201cyou seem to have been as\nmuch to blame as the rest; and as for your young town bride, she maun\ncreep, as the auld wives say, before she can gang. Country thrift can no\nmore be learnt in a day than town breeding; and of that your wife, they\nsay, has her share.\u201d\n\n\u201cOwer muckle, may be,\u201d was the half-muttered reply, as he marshalled us\ninto the house. The \u201cben\u201d end of the old-fashioned farm-house, which,\nduring the primitive sway of Peter\u2019s mother, had exhibited the usual\ndecorations of an aumrie, a clock, and a pair of press-beds, with a\nclean swept ingle, and carefully sanded floor, had undergone a\nmetamorphosis not less violent than some of Ovid\u2019s or Harlequin\u2019s. The\n\u201caumrie\u201d had given place to a satin-wood work-table, the clock to a\nmirror, and the press-beds (whose removal no one could regret) to that\nobject of Hannah\u2019s direst vituperations\u2014the pianoforte; while the\nfire-place revelled in all the summer luxury of elaborately twisted\nshavings, and the once sanded floor was covered with an already soiled\nand faded carpet, to whose delicate colours Peter, fresh from the clay\nfurrows, and his two sheep-dogs dripping from the pond, had nearly\nproved equally fatal.\n\nIn this _sanctum sanctorum_ sat the really pretty bride, in all the\ndignity of outraged feeling which ignorance of life and a lavish perusal\nof romances could inspire, on witnessing the first cloud on her usually\ngood-natured husband\u2019s brow. She hastily cleared up her ruffled looks,\ngave the minister a cordial, though somewhat affected welcome, and\ndropped me a curtsey which twenty years\u2019 rustication enabled me very\ninadequately to return.\n\nThe good pastor bent on this new lamb of his fold a benignant yet\nsearching glance, and seemed watching where, amid the fluent small talk\nwhich succeeded, he might edge in a word of playful yet serious import\nto the happiness of the youthful pair. The bride was stretching forth\nher hand with all the dignity of her new station, to ring the bell for\ncake and wine, when Peter (whose spleen was evidently waiting for a\nvent), hastily starting up, cried out, \u201cMistress! if ye\u2019re ower grand to\nserve the minister yoursel, there\u2019s ane \u2019ill be proud to do\u2019t. There\nshall nae quean fill a glass for him in this house while it ca\u2019s me\nmaster. My mither wad hae served him on her bended knees, gin he wad hae\nlet her; and ye think it ower muckle to bring ben the bridal bread to\nhim! Oh, Jess, Jess! I canna awa wi\u2019 your town ways and town airs.\u201d\n\nThe bride coloured and pouted; but there gathered a large drop in her\neye, and the pastor hailed it as an earnest of future concession. He\ntook her hand kindly, and put it into Peter\u2019s not reluctant one.\n\u201c\u2018Spring showers make May flowers,\u2019 my dear lassie, says the old\nproverb, and I trust out o\u2019 these little clouds will spring your future\nhappiness. You, Jessy, have chosen an honest, worthy, kind-hearted,\ncountry husband, whose love will be well worth the sacrifice of a few\nsecond-hand graces. And you, Peter, have taken, for better and for\nworse, a lassie, in whose eye, in spite of foreign airs, I read a heart\nto be won by kindness. Bear and forbear, my dear bairns\u2014let each be\napter to yield than the other to exact. You are both travelling to a\nbetter country; see that ye fall not out by the way.\u201d\n\nThe bride by this time was sobbing, and Peter\u2019s heart evidently\nsoftened. So leaving the pair to seal their reconciliation in this\nfavourable mood, the good minister and I mounted our horses, and rode\noff without further parley.\n\nWe were just turning the corner of the loan to regain the high road,\nwhen a woman from a cottage in an adjoining field came running to\nintercept us. There was in her look a wildness bordering on distraction,\nbut it was evidently of no painful kind. She seemed like one not\nrecovered from the first shock of some delightful surprise, too much for\nthe frail fabric of mortality to bear without tottering to its very\nfoundations. The minister checked his horse, whose bridle she grasped\nconvulsively, panting partly from fatigue and more from emotion,\nendeavouring, but vainly, to give utterance to the tidings with which\nher bosom laboured. Twice she looked up, shook her head, and was silent;\nthen with a strong effort faltered out,\u2014\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s come back!\u2014the Lord be praised for it!\u201d\n\n\u201cWho is come back, Jenny?\u201d said the pastor, in the deepest tone of\nsympathy,\u2014\u201cIs it little Andrew, ye mean?\u201d\n\n\u201cAndrew!\u201d echoed the matron, with an expression of contempt, which at\nany other time this favourite grandchild would have been very far from\ncalling forth\u2014\u201cAndrew!\u2014Andrew\u2019s _father_, I mean my ain first-born son\nJamie, that I wore mournings for till they would wear nae langer, and\nthought lying fifty fathoms down in solid ice, in yon wild place\nGreenland, or torn to pieces wi\u2019 savage bears, like the mocking bairns\nin Scripture,\u2014he\u2019s yonder!\u201d said she, wildly pointing to the house;\n\u201che\u2019s yonder, living, and living like; and oh, gin ye wad come, and\nmaybe speak a word in season to us, we might be better able to praise\nthe Lord, as is His due.\u201d\n\nWe turned our horses\u2019 heads, and followed her as she ran, or rather\nflew, towards the cottage with the instinct of some animal long\nseparated from its offspring. The little boy before mentioned ran out to\nhold our horses, and whispered as the minister stooped to stroke his\nhead, \u201cDaddy\u2019s come hame frae the sea.\u201d\n\nThe scene within the cottage baffles description. The old mother,\nexhausted with her exertion, had sunk down beside her son on the edge of\nthe bed on which he was sitting, where his blind and bed-rid father lay,\nand clasped his withered hands in speechless prayer. His lips continued\nto move, unconscious of our presence, and ever and anon he stretched\nforth a feeble arm to ascertain the actual vicinity of his long-mourned\nson. On a low stool, before the once gay and handsome, but now\nfrost-nipt and hunger-worn mariner, sat his young wife, her hand firmly\nclasped in his, her fixed eye riveted on his countenance, giving no\nother sign of life than a convulsive pressure of the former, or a big\ndrop descending unwiped from the latter; while her unemployed hand was\nplucking quite mechanically the badge of widowhood from her duffle\ncloak, which (having just reached home as her husband knocked at his\nfather\u2019s door) was yet lying across her knee.\n\nThe poor sailor gazed on all around him with somewhat of a bewildered\nair, but most of all upon a rosy creature between his knees, of about a\nyear and a half old, born just after his departure, and who had only\nlearned the sad word \u201cDaddy,\u201d from the childish prattle of his older\nbrother Andrew, and his sisters. Of these, one had been summoned, wild\nand barelegged, from the herding, the other, meek and modest, from the\nvillage school. The former, idle and intractable, half shrunk in fear of\nher returned parent\u2019s well-remembered strictness; the other, too young\nnot to have forgotten his person, only wondered whether this was the\nFather in heaven of whom she had heard so often. She did not think it\ncould be so, for there was no grief or trouble there, and this father\nlooked as if he had seen much of both.\n\nSuch was the group to whose emotions, almost too much for human nature,\nour entrance gave a turn.\n\n\u201cJamie,\u201d said the good pastor (gently pressing the still united hands of\nthe mariner and his faithful Annie), \u201cyou are welcome back from the\ngates of death and the perils of the deep. Well is it said, that they\nwho go down to the sea in ships see more of the wonders of the Lord than\nother men; but it was not from storm and tempests alone that you have\nbeen delivered,\u2014cold and famine, want and nakedness\u2014wild beasts to\ndevour, and darkness to dismay;\u2014these have been around your dreary\npath\u2014but He that was with you was mightier than all that were against\nyou; and you are returned a living man to tell the wondrous tale. Let us\npraise the Lord, my friends, for His goodness, and His wonderful works\nto the children of men.\u201d We all knelt down and joined in the brief but\nfervent prayer that followed. The stranger\u2019s heartfelt sigh of sympathy\nmingled with the pastor\u2019s pious orisons, with the feeble accents of\ndecrepitude, the lisp of wondering childhood, the soul-felt piety of\nrescued manhood, and the deep, unutterable gratitude of a wife and\nmother\u2019s heart!\n\nFor such high-wrought emotions prayer is the only adequate channel. They\nfound vent in it, and were calmed and subdued to the level of ordinary\nintercourse. The minister kindly addressed Jamie, and drew forth, by his\njudicious questions, the leading features of that marvellous history of\nperil and privations, endured by the crew of a Greenland ship detained a\nwinter in the ice, with which all are now familiar, but of which a Parry\nor a Franklin can perhaps alone appreciate the horrors. They were\nrelated with a simplicity that did them ample justice.\n\n\u201cI never despaired, sir,\u201d said the hardy mariner; \u201cwe were young and\nstout. Providence, aye when at the warst, did us some gude turn, and\nthis kept up our hearts. We had mostly a\u2019 wives or mithers at hame, and\nkent that prayers wadna be wanting for our safety; and little as men may\nthink o\u2019 them on land, or even at sea on a prosperous voyage,\u2014a winter\nat the Pole makes prayers precious. We had little to do but sleep; and\noh, the nights were lang! I was aye a great dreamer; and, ye maunna be\nangry, sir (to the minister), the seeing Annie and the bairns amaist\nilka time I lay down, and aye braw and buskit, did mair to keep up my\nhopes than a\u2019 the rest. I never could see wee Jamie, though,\u201d said he,\nsmiling, and kissing the child on his knee; \u201cI saw a cradle weel enough,\nbut the face o\u2019 the bit creature in\u2019t I never could mak out, and it\nvexed me; for whiles I thought my babe was dead, and whiles I feared it\nhad never been born; but God be praised he\u2019s here, and no that unlike\nmysel neither.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnnie!\u201d said the minister, gently loosing her renewed grasp of Jamie\u2019s\nhand, \u201cyou are forgetting your duty as a gudewife\u2014we maun drink to\nJamie\u2019s health and happiness ere we go\u2014we\u2019ll steal a glass or two out of\nold Andrew\u2019s cordial bottle; a drop of this day\u2019s joy will be better to\nhim than it a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cAtweel, that\u2019s true,\u201d said the old father, with a distinctness of\nutterance, and acuteness of hearing, he had not manifested for many\nmonths. The bottle was brought, the health of the day went round; I\nshook the weather-beaten sailor warmly by the hand, and begging leave to\ncome and hear more of his story at a fitter season, followed the\nminister to the door.\n\n\u201cAndrew,\u201d said he, giving the little patient equerry a bright new\nsixpence, \u201ctell your daddy I gave you this for being a dutiful son to\nyour mother when he was at the sea.\u201d\n\nThe child\u2019s eye glistened as he ran into the cottage to execute the\nwelcome command, and we rode off, our hearts too full for much\ncommunication.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nThe day was advancing. These two scenes had encroached deeply on the\nprivileged hours for visiting, and the minister, partly to turn the\naccount of our thoughts into a less agitating channel, partly to balance\nthe delights of the last hour with their due counterpoise of alloy,\nsuggested the propriety of going next to pay, at the house of his\npatron, the laird of the parish, the visit of duty and ceremony, which\nhis late return, and a domestic affliction in the family, rendered\nindispensable. There were reasons which made my going equally proper and\ndisagreeable; and formal calls being among the many evils which are\nlightened by participation, I gladly availed myself of the shelter of\nthe minister\u2019s name and company.\n\nMr Morison, of Castle Morison, was one of those spoiled children of\nfortune, whom in her cruel kindness she renders miserable. He had never\nknown contradiction, and a straw across his path made him chafe like a\nresisted torrent; he had never known sorrow, and was, consequently, but\nhalf acquainted with joy; he was a stranger to compassion, and\nconsequently himself an object of pity to all who could allow for the\nforce of early education in searing and hardening the human heart. He\nhad, as a boy, made his mother tremble; it is little to be wondered that\nin manhood he was the tyrant of his wife and children. Mrs Morison\u2019s\nspirit, originally gentle, was soon broken; and if her heart was not\nequally so, it was because she learned reluctantly to despise her\ntyrant, and found compensation in the double portion of affection\nbestowed on her by her son and daughters. For the latter, Mr Morison\nmanifested only contempt. There was not a horse in his stable, nor a dog\nin his kennel, which did not engross more of his attention; but like the\nfoxes and hares which it was the business of these favourite animals to\nhunt down, girls could be made to afford no bad sport in a rainy day. It\nwas no wonder, that with them fear usurped the place of reverence for\nsuch a parent. If they did not hate him, they were indebted to their\nmother\u2019s piety and their own sweet dispositions; and if they neither\nhated nor envied their only brother, it was not the fault of him, who,\nby injudicious distinctions and blind indulgence, laid the foundation\nfor envy and all uncharitableness in their youthful bosoms. In that of\nhis favourite, they had the usual effect of generating self-will and\nrebellion; and while Jane and Agnes, well knowing nothing they did would\nbe thought right, rarely erred from the path of duty, Edmund, aware that\nhe could scarce do wrong, took care his privileges should not rust for\nwant of exercise.\n\nBut though suffered in all minor matters to follow the dictates of\ncaprice, to laugh at his tutor, lame the horse, and break rules (to all\nothers those of the Medes and Persians), with impunity, he found himself\nsuddenly reined up in his headlong career by an equally capricious\nparent, precisely at the period when restraint was nearly forgotten, and\npeculiarly irksome. It was tacitly agreed by both parties, that the heir\nof Castle Morison could only go into the army; but while the guards or a\ndragoon regiment was the natural enough ambition of Edmund, Morison was\nsuddenly seized with a fit of contradiction, which he chose to style\neconomy, and talked of a marching regiment, with, perhaps an extra \u00a3100\nper annum to the undoubted heir of nearly ten thousand a-year. Neither\nwould yield\u2014the one had taught, the other learned, stubbornness; and\nEdmund, backed by the sympathy of the world, and the clamours of his\ncompanions, told his father he had changed his mind, and was going to\nIndia with a near relation, about to proceed to Bombay in a high\nofficial character.\n\nMorison had a peculiar prejudice against the East, and a personal pique\ntowards the cousin to whose patronage Edmund had betaken himself. His\nrage was as boundless as his former partiality, and the only consolation\nhis poor wife felt when her darling son left his father\u2019s house, alike\nimpenitent and unblest, was, that her boy\u2019s disposition was originally\ngood, and would probably recover the ascendant; and that it was out of\nthe power of her husband to make his son a beggar as well as an exile.\nThe estate was strictly entailed, and the knowledge of this, while it\nembittered Morison\u2019s sense of his son\u2019s disobedience, no doubt\nstrengthened the feeling of independence so natural to headstrong youth.\n\nWhile Morison was perverting legal ingenuity, in vain hopes of being\nable to disinherit his refractory heir, his unnatural schemes were\nanticipated by a mightier agent. An epidemic fever carried off, in one\nshort month (about two years after his quitting England), the\nunreconciled, but no longer unconciliatory exile, and his young and\nbeautiful bride, the daughter of his patron, his union with whom had\nbeen construed, by the causeless antipathy of his father, into a fresh\ncause of indignation. Death, whose cold hand loosens this world\u2019s grasp,\nand whose deep voice stills this world\u2019s strife, only tightens the bonds\nof nature, and teaches the stormiest spirits to \u201cpart in peace.\u201d Edmund\nlived to write to his father a few lines of undissembled and\nunconditional penitence; to own, that if the path of duty had been\nrugged, he had in vain sought happiness beyond it, and to entreat that\nthe place he had forfeited in his father\u2019s favour might be transferred\nto his unoffending child.\n\nAll this had been conveyed to Mr Monteith and myself by the voice of\nrumour some days before, and we had been more shocked than surprised to\nlearn that Morison\u2019s resentment had survived its object, and that he\ndisclaimed all intention of ever seeing or receiving the infant boy who,\nit was gall to him to reflect, must inherit his estate. Mrs Morison had\nexerted, to soften his hard heart, all the little influence she now\npossessed. Her tender soul yearned towards her Edmund\u2019s child; and\nsometimes the thought of seeking a separation, and devoting herself to\nrear it, crossed her despairing mind. But her daughters were a tie still\nmore powerful to her unhappy home. She could neither leave them,\nunprotected, to its discomforts, nor conscientiously advise their\ndesertion of a parent, however unworthy; so she wandered, a paler and\nsadder inmate than before of her cold and stately mansion; and her fair,\nsubdued-looking daughters shuddered as they passed the long-locked doors\nof their brother\u2019s nursery and schoolroom.\n\nThe accounts of young Morison\u2019s death had arrived since the good\npastor\u2019s departure, and it was with feelings of equal sympathy towards\nthe female part of the family, and sorrow for the unchristian frame of\nits head, that he prepared for our present visit. As we rode up the old\nstraight avenue, I perceived a postchaise at the door, and instead of\nshrinking from this probable accession of strangers, felt that any\naddition to the usually constrained and gloomy family circle must be a\nrelief. On reaching the door, we were struck with a very unusual\nappendage to the dusty and travel-stained vehicle, in the shape of an\nancient, venerable-looking Asiatic, in the dress of his country, beneath\nwhose ample muslin folds he might easily have been mistaken for an old\nfemale nurse, a character which, in all its skill and tenderness, was\namply sustained by this faithful and attached Oriental. His broken\nEnglish and passionate gestures excited our attention, already awakened\nby the singularity of his costume and appearance; and as we got close to\nhim, the big tears which rolled over his sallow and furrowed cheeks,\npowerfully called forth our sympathy, and told, better than words, his\nforcible exclusion from the splendid mansion which had reluctantly\nadmitted within its precincts the child dearer to him than country and\nkindred!\n\nOur visit (had it borne less of a pastoral character) had all the\nappearance of being very ill-timed. There were servants running to and\nfro in the hall, and loud voices in the dining-room; and from a little\nparlour on one side the front door, issued female sobs, mingled with\ninfant wailings in an unknown dialect.\n\n\u201cThank God!\u201d whispered the minister, \u201cthe bairn is fairly in the house.\nProvidence and nature will surely do the rest.\u201d\n\nIt was not a time to intrude abruptly, so we sent in our names to Mr\nMorison, and during our pretty long detention on horseback, could not\navoid seeing in at the open window of the parlour before-mentioned, a\nscene which it grieved us to think was only witnessed by ourselves.\n\nMrs Morison was sitting in a chair (on which she had evidently sunk down\npowerless), with her son\u2019s orphan boy on her knee, the bright dark eyes\nof the little wild unearthly-looking creature fixed in steadfast gaze on\nher pale matronly countenance. \u201cNo cry, Mama Englise,\u201d said the child,\nas her big tears rolled unheeded on his bosom\u2014\u201cBilly Edmund will be\nwelly welly good.\u201d His youngest aunt, whose keen and long-repressed\nfeelings found vent in sobs of mingled joy and agony, was covering his\nlittle hands with showers of kisses, while the elder (his father\u2019s\nfavourite sister) was comparing behind him the rich dark locks that\nclustered on his neck with the locket which, since Edmund\u2019s departure,\nhad dwelt next her heart.\n\nA message from the laird summoned us from this affecting sight, and,\namid the pathetic entreaties of the old Oriental, that we would restore\nhis nursling, we proceeded to the dining-room, made aware of our\napproach to it by the still-storming, though half-suppressed\nimprecations of its hard-hearted master. He was pacing in stern and\nmoody agitation through the spacious apartment. His welcome was\nevidently extorted, and his face (to use a strong Scripture expression)\nset as a flint against the voice of remonstrance and exhortation, for\nwhich he was evidently prepared. My skilful coadjutor went quite another\nway to work.\n\n\u201cMr Morison,\u201d said he, apparently unconscious of the poor man\u2019s pitiable\nstate of mind, \u201cI came to condole, but I find it is my lot to\ncongratulate. The Lord hath taken away with the one hand, but it has\nbeen to give with the other. His blessing be with you and your son\u2019s\nson, whom He hath sent to be the staff and comfort of your age!\u201d This\nwas said with his usual benign frankness, and the hard heart, which\nwould have silenced admonition, and scorned reproof, scarce knew how to\nrepulse the voice of Christian congratulation. He walked about,\nmuttering to himself\u2014\u201cNo son of mine\u2014bad breed! Let him go to those who\ntaught his father disobedience, and his mother artifice!\u2014anywhere they\nplease; there is no room for him here.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you seen your grandchild yet, Mr Morison?\u201d resumed the minister,\nnothing daunted by the continued obduracy of the proud laird. \u201cLet me\nhave the joy of putting him into your arms. You must expect to be a good\ndeal overcome; sweet little fellow, there is a strong likeness!\u201d\n\nA shudder passed across the father\u2019s hard frame, and he recoiled as from\nan adder, when worthy Mr Monteith, gently grasping his arm, sought to\ndraw him, still sullen, though more faintly resisting, towards the other\nroom. A shrill cry of infant agony rose from the parlour as we crossed\nthe hall, and nature never perhaps exhibited a stronger contrast than\npresented itself between the cruel old man, struggling to escape from\nthe presence of his grandchild, and the faithful ancient domestic\nshrieking wildly to be admitted into it.\n\nAs I threw open the door for the entrance of the former, little Edmund,\nwhose infant promises of good behaviour had soon given way before the\ncontinued society of strangers, was stamping in all the impotence of\nbaby rage (and in this unhallowed mood too faithful a miniature of both\nfather and grandfather), and calling loudly for the old Oriental. With\nthe first glance at the door his exclamations redoubled. We began to\nfear the worst effect from this abrupt introduction; but no sooner had\nthe beautiful boy (beautiful even in passion) cast a second bewildered\nglance on his still erect and handsome grandfather, than, clapping his\nlittle hands, and calling out, \u201cMy Bombay papa!\u201d he flew into his arms!\n\nThe servants, concluding the interdict removed by their master\u2019s\nentrance into the apartment, had ceased to obstruct the efforts of the\nold Hindoo to fly to his precious charge; and while the astonished and\nfairly overwhelmed Morison\u2019s neck was encircled by the infant grasp of\nhis son\u2019s orphan boy, his knees were suddenly embraced by that son\u2019s\ndevoted and gray-haired domestic.\n\nOne arm of little Edmund was instantly loosened from his grandfather\u2019s\nshoulder, and passed round the neck of the faithful old Oriental, who\nkissed alternately the little cherub hand of his nursling, and the\nhitherto iron one of the proud laird. It softened, and the hard heart\nwith it! It was long since love\u2014pure unsophisticated love, and\nspontaneous reverence\u2014had been Morison\u2019s portion, and they were\nproportionally sweet. He buried his face in his grandson\u2019s clustering\nringlets. We heard a groan deep as when rocks are rending, and the earth\nheaves with long pent-up fires. It was wildly mingling with childish\nlaughter and hysteric bursts of female tenderness, as, stealing\ncautiously and unheeded from the spot, we mounted our horses and rode\naway.\n\n\u201cGod be praised!\u201d said the minister, with a deep-drawn sigh, when,\nemerging from the gloomy avenue, we regained the cheerful beaten track.\n\u201cThis has been a day of strange dispensations, Mr Francis\u2014we have seen\nmuch together to make us wonder at the ways of Providence, to soften,\nand, I hope, improve our hearts. But, after such solemn scenes, mine\n(and yours, I doubt not, also) requires something to cheer and lighten\nit; and I am bound where, if the sight of virtuous happiness can do it,\nI am sure to succeed. Do let me persuade you to be my companion a little\nlonger, and close this day\u2019s visitation at the humble board of, I\u2019ll\nventure to say, the happiest couple in Scotland. I am engaged to\nchristen the first-born of honest Willie Meldrum and his bonnie Helen,\nand to dine, of course, after the ceremony. Mrs Monteith and the bairns\nwill be there to meet me; and, as my friend, you\u2019ll be \u2018welcome as the\nflowers in May.\u2019\u201d\n\nAfter some slight scruples about intruding on this scene of domestic\nenjoyment, easily overruled by the hearty assurances of the divine, and\nmy own natural relish for humble life, we marched towards the farmhouse\nof Blinkbonnie; and during our short ride the minister gave me, in a few\nwords, the history of its inmates.\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know, Mr Francis, if you remember a bonny orphan lassie, called\nHelen Ormiston, whom my wife took some years back into the family to\nassist her in the care of the bairns. Helen was come of no ungentle kin;\nbut poverty had sat down heavily on her father and mother, and sunk them\ninto an early grave; and it was a godsend to poor Helen to get service\nin a house where poverty would be held no reproach to her. If ye ever\nsaw the creature, ye wadna easily forget her. Many bonnier, blither\nlassies are to be seen daily; but such a look of settled serenity and\ndowncast modesty ye might go far to find. It quite won my wife\u2019s heart\nand mine, and more hearts than ours, as I shall tell you presently. As\nfor the bairns, they just doated on Helen, and she on them; and my poor\nyoungest, that is now with God, during all her long, long decline, was\nlittle if ever off her knee. No wonder, then, that Helen grew pale and\nthin, ate little, and slept less. I first set it down to anxiety, and,\nwhen the innocent bairn was released, to grief; and from these, no\ndoubt, it partly arose. But when all was over, and when weeks had passed\naway, when even my poor wife dried her mother\u2019s tears, and I could say,\n\u2018God\u2019s will be done,\u2019 still Helen grew paler and thinner, and refused to\nbe comforted; so I saw there was more in it than appeared, and I bade\nher open her heart to me; and open it she did, with a flood of tears\nthat would have melted a stone.\n\n\u201c\u2018Sir,\u2019 said she, \u2018I maun go away. I think it will kill me to leave you\nand Mrs Monteith, and the dear bairns in the nursery, and wee Jeanie\u2019s\ngrave in the kirkyard; but stay I canna, and I will tell you why. It is\nmonths, ay, amaist years, since Willie Meldrum, auld Blinkbonnie\u2019s son,\nfell in fancy wi\u2019 me, and a sair sair heart, I may say, I have had ever\nsin syne. His auld hard father, they tell me, swears (wi\u2019 sic oaths as\nwad gar ye grue to hear them) that he will cut him off wi\u2019 a shilling if\never he thinks o\u2019 me; and oh! it wad be a puir return for the lad\u2019s\nkindness to do him sic an ill turn! so I maun awa out of the country\ntill the auld man dies, or Willie taks a wife to his mind, for I\u2019ve seen\nower muckle o\u2019 poverty, Mr Monteith, to be the cause o\u2019t to ony man,\nthough I whiles think it wad be naething to me, that\u2019s sae weel used\ntill\u2019t mysel.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Helen,\u2019 said I, \u2018when did Willie Meldrum find opportunities to gain\nyour heart? I never saw him in the house in my life.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Oh, sir!\u2019 said she, \u2018gin I could hae bidden in the house, he wad never\nhae seen me either; but I was forced to walk out wi\u2019 the bairns, and\nthere was nae place sae quiet and out o\u2019 the gate, but Willie was sure\nto find me out. If I gaed down the burn, Willie was aye fishing; if I\ngaed up the loan, there was aye something to be dune about the kye. At\nthe kirk door, Willie was aye at hand to spier for your honour, and gie\nthe bairns posies; and after our sair distress, when I was little out\nfor mony a day, I couldna slip out ae moonlight night, to sit a moment\nupon Jeanie\u2019s grave, but Willie was there like a ghaist aside me, and\nmade my very heart loup to my mouth!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018And do you return his good-will, Helen?\u2019 said I, gravely.\n\n\u201c\u2018Oh, sir,\u2019 said the poor thing, trembling, \u2018I darena tell you a lie. I\ntried to be as proud and as shy as a lassie should be to ane abune her\ndegree, and that might do sae muckle better, puir fallow! I tried to\nlook anither gate when I saw him, and mak mysel deaf when he spoke o\u2019\nhis love; but oh! his words were sae true and kindly, that I doubt mine\nwerena aye sae short and saucy as they sud hae been. It\u2019s hard for a\ntocherless, fatherless lassie to be cauldrife to the lad that wad tak\nher to his heart and hame; but oh! it wad be harder still, if she was to\nrequite him wi\u2019 a father\u2019s curse! It\u2019s ill eneuch to hae nae parents o\u2019\nmy ain, without makin\u2019 mischief wi\u2019 ither folk\u2019s. The auld man gets\ndourer and dourer ilka day, and the young ane dafter and dafter\u2014sae ye\nmaun just send me aff the country to some decent service, till Willie\u2019s\na free man, or a bridegroom.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018My dear Helen,\u2019 said I, \u2018you are a good upright girl, and I will\nforward your honest intentions. If it be God\u2019s will that Willie and you\ncome together, the hearts of men are in His hand. If otherwise, yours\nwill never at least reproach you with bringing ruin on your lover\u2019s\nhead.\u2019\n\n\u201cSo I sent Helen, Mr Francis, to my brother\u2019s in the south country,\nwhere she proved as great a blessing and as chief a favourite as she had\nbeen with us. I saw her some months afterwards; and though her bloom had\nnot returned, she was tranquil and contented, as one who has cast her\nlot into the lap of Heaven.\n\n\u201cWell, to make a long story short, Willie, though he was unreasonable\nenough, good, worthy lad as he is, to take in dudgeon Helen\u2019s going away\n(though he might have guessed it was all for his good), was too proud,\nor too constant, to say he would give her up, or bind himself never to\nmarry her, as his father insisted. So the old man, one day, after a\nviolent altercation, made his will, and left all his hard-won siller to\na rich brother in Liverpool, who neither wanted nor deserved it. Willie,\nupon this quarrel, had left home very unhappy, and stayed away some\ntime, and during his absence old Blinkbonnie was taken extremely ill.\nWhen he thought himself dying, he sent for me (I had twice called in\nvain before), and you may be sure I did my best not to let him depart in\nso unchristian a frame towards his only child. I did not deny his right\nto advise his son in the choice of a wife; but I told him he might\nsearch the world before he found one more desirable than Helen, whose\nbeauty and sense would secure his son\u2019s steadiness, and her frugality\nand sobriety double his substance. I told him how she had turned a deaf\near to all his son\u2019s proposals of a clandestine marriage and made\nherself the sacrifice to his own unjust and groundless prejudices. Dying\nmen are generally open to conviction; and I got a fresh will made in\nfavour of his son, with a full consent to his marriage honourably\ninserted among its provisions. This he deposited with me, feeling no\ngreat confidence in the lawyer who had made his previous settlement, and\ndesired me to produce it when he was gone.\n\n\u201cIt so happened that I was called to a distance before his decease, and\ndid not return till some days after the funeral. Willie had flown home\non hearing of his father\u2019s danger, and had the comfort to find him\ncompletely softened, and to receive from his nearly speechless parent\nmany a silent demonstration of returned affection. It was, therefore, a\ndoubly severe shock to him, on opening the first will (the only one\nforthcoming in my absence), to find himself cut off from everything,\nexcept the joint lease of the farm, and instead of five thousand pounds,\nnot worth a shilling in the world. His first exclamation, I was told,\nwas, \u2018It\u2019s hard to get baith scorn and skaith\u2014to lose baith poor Helen\nand the gear. If I had lost it for her, they might hae ta\u2019en it that\nlikit!\u2019\n\n\u201cAbout a week after, I came home and found on my table a letter from\nHelen. She had heard of Willie\u2019s misfortune, and in a way the most\nmodest and engaging, expressed herself ready, if I thought it would\nstill be acceptable, to share his poverty and toil with him through\nlife. \u2018I am weel used to work,\u2019 said she, \u2018and, but for you, wad hae\nbeen weel used to want. If Willie will let me bear a share o\u2019 his\nburden, I trust in God we may warsle through thegither; and, to tell you\nthe truth,\u2019 added she, with her usual honesty, \u2018I wad rather things were\nordered as they are, than that Willie\u2019s wealth should shame my poverty.\u2019\n\n\u201cI put this letter in one pocket, and his father\u2019s will in the other,\nand walked over to Blinkbonnie. Willie was working with the manly\nresolution of one who has no other resource. I told him I was glad to\nsee him so little cast down.\n\n\u201c\u2018Sir,\u2019 said he, \u2018I\u2019ll no say but I am vexed that my father gaed to his\ngrave wi\u2019 a grudge against me, the mair sae, as when he squeezed my hand\non his death-bed I thought a\u2019 was forgotten. But siller is but warld\u2019s\ngear, and I could thole the want o\u2019t, an\u2019 it had nae been for Helen\nOrmiston, that I hoped to hae gotten to share it wi\u2019 me. She may sune do\nbetter now, wi\u2019 that bonnie face and kind heart o\u2019 hers!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018It is indeed a kind heart, Willie,\u2019 answered I: \u2018if ever I doubted it,\nthis would have put me to shame!\u2019\u2014\u2014So saying, I reached him the letter,\nand oh, that Helen could have seen the flush of grateful surprise that\ncrossed his manly brow as he read it! It passed away, though, quickly,\nand he said, with a sigh, \u2018Very kind, Mr Monteith, and very like hersel;\nbut I canna take advantage o\u2019 an auld gude will, now that I canna reward\nit as it deserves!\u2019\u201d\n\n\u2018And what if ye could, Willie?\u2019 said I, \u2018as far, at least, as worldly\nwealth can requite true affection? There is your father\u2019s will, made\nwhen it pleased God to touch his heart, and you are as rich a man as you\nwere when Helen Ormiston first refused to make you a beggar.\u2019\n\n\u201cWillie was not insensible to this happy change in his prospects; but\nhis kind heart was chiefly soothed by his father\u2019s altered feelings, and\nat the honourable mention of Helen\u2019s name he fairly began to greet.\n\n\u201cThe sequel is easily told; but I think the jaunt I made to Tweeddale\nwith Willie, to bring back Helen Ormiston in triumph, was the proudest\njourney of my life.\n\n\u201cA year ago I married them at the manse, amid much joy, but abundance of\ntears in the nursery. To-day, when, according to an old promise, I am to\nchristen my name-son Charlie, I expect to be fairly deaved with the\nclamorous rejoicings of my young fry, who, I verily believe, have not\nslept this week for thinking of it. But\u201d (pulling out his watch), \u201cit is\nnear four o\u2019clock: sad quality hour for Blinkbonnie! The hotch-potch\nwill be turned into porridge, and the how-towdies burnt to sticks, if we\ndon\u2019t make haste!\u201d\n\n\nI wish, my dear reader, you could see the farm of Blinkbonnie, lying as\nit does on a gently sloping bank, sheltered from the north by a wooded\ncrag or knoll, flanked upon the east by a group of venerable ashes,\nenlivened and perfumed on the west by a gay luxuriant garden, and open\non the south to such a sea-view, as none but dwellers on the Firth of\nForth have any idea of. Last Saturday, it was the very _beau ideal_ of\nrural comfort and serenity. The old trees were reposing, after a course\nof somewhat boisterous weather, in all the dignity and silence of years.\nThe crows, their usual inhabitants, having gone on their Highland\nexcursion, those fantastic interlopers, Helen\u2019s peacocks (a present from\nthe children at the manse), were already preparing for their \u201csiesta\u201d on\nthe topmost boughs. Beneath the spreading branches the cows were\ndreaming delightfully, in sweet oblivion of the heats of noon. In an\nadjoining paddock, graceful foals, and awkward calves, indulged in their\nrival gambols; while shrieks of joy from behind the garden hedge, told\nthese were not the only happy young things in creation.\n\nWe deposited our horses in a stable, to whose comforts they bore\ntestimony by an approving neigh, and made our way by a narrow path,\nbordered with sweet-brier and woodbine, to the front of the house. Its\ntall, good-looking young master came hastily to meet us, and I would not\nhave given his blushing welcome, and the bashful scrape that accompanied\nit, for all the most elaborate courtesies of Chesterfield.\n\nNo sooner were our footsteps heard approaching, than out poured the\nminister\u2019s whole family from the little honey-suckled porch, with\nglowing faces and tangled hair, and frocks, probably white some hours\nbefore, but which now claimed affinity with every bush in the garden.\n\nMrs Monteith gently joined in the chorus of reproaches to papa for being\nso late; but the look with which she was answered seemed to satisfy her,\nas it usually did, that he could not be in fault. We were then ushered\ninto the parlour, whose substantial comforts, and exquisite consistency,\nspoke volumes in favour of its mistress. Opulence might be traced in the\nexcellent quality of the homely furniture\u2014in the liberal display of\nantique china (particularly the choice and curious christening-bowl)\u2014but\nthere was nothing incongruous, nothing out of keeping, nothing to make\nyou for a moment mistake this first-rate farmhouse parlour for a clumsy,\nill-fancied drawing-room. A few pots of roses, a few shelves of books,\nbore testimony to Helen\u2019s taste and education; but there were neither\nexotics nor romances in the collection; and the piece of furniture\nevidently dearest in her eyes was the cradle, in which reposed, amid all\nthe din of this joyous occasion, the yet unchristened hero of the day.\nIt is time to speak of Helen herself, and she was just what, from her\nstory, I knew she must be. The actors, in some striking drama of human\nlife, often disappoint us by their utter dissimilitude to the pictures\nof our mind\u2019s eye, but Helen was precisely the perfection of a gentle,\nmodest, self-possessed Scottish lassie,\u2014the mind, in short, of Jeanie\nDeans, with the personal advantages of poor Effie. Her dress was as\nsuitable as anything else. Her gown, white as snow, and her cap of the\nnicest materials, were neither of them on the pattern of my lady\u2019s; but\nthey had a matronly grace of their own, worth a thousand second-hand\nfashions; and when Helen, having awakened her first-born, delivered him,\nwith sweet maternal solicitude, into the outstretched arms of the\nminister\u2019s proud and favoured youngest girl, I thought I never saw a\npicture worthier the pencil of Correggio. It was completed, when,\nbending in all the graceful awkwardness of a novice over the group,\nWillie received his boy into his arms, and vowed before his pastor and\nhis God to discharge a parent\u2019s duty, while a parent\u2019s transport\nsparkled in his eyes.\n\nI have sat, as Shakspeare says, \u201cat good men\u2019s feasts ere now\u201d\u2014have ate\nturtle at the lord mayor\u2019s and venison at peers\u2019 tables, and _souffl\u00e9s_\nat diplomatic dinners\u2014have ate sturgeon at St Petersburg, and mullet at\nNaples; mutton in Wales, and grouse in the Highlands; roast-beef with\nJohn Bull, and _volauxvents_ at Beauvilliers\u2019; but I have no hesitation\nin saying that the hotch-potch and how-towdies of Blinkbonnie excelled\nthem all. How far the happy human faces of all ages round the table\ncontributed to enhance the gusto, I do not pretend to decide; but I can\ntell Mr V\u00e9ry that, among all his _consomm\u00e9s_, there is nothing like a\njudicious mixture of youth and beauty, with manliness, integrity, and\nvirtue.\u2014_Blackwood\u2019s Magazine._\n\n\n\n\n A SCOTTISH GENTLEWOMAN OF THE LAST CENTURY.\n\n BY SUSAN EDMONSTONE FERRIER.\n\n\n\u201cThough last, not least of nature\u2019s works, I must now introduce you to a\nfriend of mine,\u201d said Mr Douglas, as they bent their steps towards the\nCastlehill of Edinburgh. \u201cMrs Violet Macshake is an aunt of my mother\u2019s,\nwhom you must often have heard of, and the last remaining branch of the\nnoble race of Girnachgowl.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am afraid she is rather a formidable person, then?\u201d said Mary.\n\nHer uncle hesitated.\n\n\u201cNo, not formidable,\u2014only rather particular, as all old people are; but\nshe is very good-hearted.\u201d\n\n\u201cI understand; in other words, she is very disagreeable. All\nill-tempered people, I observe, have the character of being\ngood-hearted, or else all good-hearted people are ill-tempered\u2014I can\u2019t\ntell which.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is more than reputation with her,\u201d said Mr Douglas, somewhat\nangrily; \u201cfor she is, in reality, a very good-hearted woman, as I\nexperienced when a boy at college. Many a crown-piece and half-guinea I\nused to get from her. Many a scold, to be sure, went along with them;\nbut that, I daresay, I deserved. Besides, she is very rich, and I am her\nreputed heir; therefore gratitude and self-interest combine to render\nher extremely amiable in my estimation.\u201d\n\nThey had now reached the airy dwelling where Mrs Macshake resided, and\nhaving rung, the door was at length most deliberately opened by an\nancient, sour-visaged, long-waisted female, who ushered them into an\napartment, the _coup d\u2019\u0153il_ of which struck a chill to Mary\u2019s heart. It\nwas a good-sized room, with a bare sufficiency of small-legged\ndining-tables, and lank hair-cloth chairs, ranged in high order round\nthe walls. Although the season was advanced, and the air piercing cold,\nthe grate stood smiling in all the charms of polished steel; and the\nmistress of the mansion was seated by the side of it in an arm-chair,\nstill in its summer position. She appeared to have no other occupation\nthan what her own meditations afforded; for a single glance sufficed to\nshow that not a vestage of book or work was harboured there. She was a\ntall, large-boned woman, whom even Time\u2019s iron hand had scarcely bent,\nas she merely stooped at the shoulders. She had a drooping snuffy nose,\na long turned-up chin, small, quick, gray eyes, and her face projected\nfar beyond her figure, with an expression of shrewd, restless curiosity.\nShe wore a mode (not _a-la-mode_) bonnet, and cardinal of the same; a\npair of clogs over her shoes, and black silk mittens on her arms.\n\nAs soon as she recognized Mr Douglas, she welcomed him with much\ncordiality, shook him long and heartily by the hand,\u2014patted him on the\nback,\u2014looked into his face with much seeming satisfaction; and, in\nshort, gave all the demonstrations of gladness usual with gentlewomen of\na certain age. Her pleasure, however, appeared to be rather an\n_impromptu_ than a habitual feeling; for as the surprise wore off, her\nvisage resumed its harsh and sarcastic expression, and she seemed eager\nto efface any agreeable impression her reception might have excited.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 wha thought o\u2019 seein\u2019 you e\u2019noo?\u201d said she, in a quick gabbling\nvoice; \u201cwhat\u2019s brought you to the toun? Are ye come to spend your honest\nfaither\u2019s siller, ere he\u2019s weel cauld in his grave, puir man?\u201d\n\nMr Douglas explained, that it was upon account of his niece\u2019s health.\n\n\u201cHealth!\u201d repeated she, with a sardonic smile, \u201cit wad mak a howlet\nlaugh to hear the wark that\u2019s made about young fowk\u2019s health noo-a-days.\nI wonder what ye\u2019re a\u2019 made o\u2019,\u201d grasping Mary\u2019s arm in her great bony\nhand; \u201ca wheen puir feckless windle-straes\u2014ye maun awa to England for\nyer healths. Set ye up! I wonder what came o\u2019 the lasses i\u2019 my time,\nthat but to bide hame? And whilk o\u2019 ye, I sud like to ken, will e\u2019er\nlive to see ninety-sax, like me?\u2014Health! he! he!\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have not asked after any of your Glenfern friends,\u201d said Mr\nDouglas, hoping to touch a more sympathetic chord.\n\n\u201cTime eneugh\u2014will ye let me draw my breath, man?\u2014fowk canna say a\u2019 thing\nat ance. An\u2019 ye but to hae an English wife, too?\u2014A Scotch lass wadna\nser\u2019 ye. An\u2019 yer wean, I\u2019se warran\u2019, it\u2019s ane o\u2019 the warld\u2019s\nwonders\u2014it\u2019s been unco lang o\u2019 comin\u2019\u2014he! he!\u201d\n\n\u201cHe has begun life under very melancholy auspices, poor fellow!\u201d said Mr\nDouglas, in allusion to his father\u2019s death.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 wha\u2019s faut was that?\u2014I ne\u2019er heard tell the like o\u2019t, to hae the\nbairn kirsened an\u2019 its grandfather deein\u2019! But fowk are neither born,\nnor kirsened, nor do they wad or dee as they used to do\u2014a\u2019thing\u2019s\nchanged.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou must indeed have witnessed many changes,\u201d observed Mr Douglas,\nrather at a loss how to utter anything of a conciliatory nature.\n\n\u201cChanges!\u2014weel a wat, I sometimes wonder if it\u2019s the same warld, an\u2019 if\nit\u2019s my ain head that\u2019s upon my shouthers.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut with these changes you must also have seen many improvements?\u201d said\nMary, in a tone of diffidence.\n\n\u201cImpruvements!\u201d turning sharply round upon her, \u201cwhat ken ye about\nimpruvements, bairn? A bonnie impruvement to see tylors and sclaters\nleevin\u2019 whaur I mind Jukes and Yerls. An\u2019 that great glowerin\u2019 New Town\nthere,\u201d pointing out of her windows, \u201cwhaur I used to sit and look at\nbonnie green parks, and see the kye milket, and the bits o\u2019 bairnies\nrowin\u2019 an\u2019 tumblin\u2019, an\u2019 the lasses trampin\u2019 in their tubs;\u2014what see I\nnoo, but stane and lime, and stour and dirt, and idle chiels, and\ndunket-out madams prancing.\u2014Impruvements, indeed!\u201d\n\nHere a long pinch of snuff caused a pause in the old lady\u2019s harangue;\nbut after having duly wiped her nose with her coloured handkerchief, and\nshook off all the particles that might be presumed to have lodged upon\nher cardinal, she resumed:\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 nae word o\u2019 ony o\u2019 your sisters gaun to get men yet? They tell me\nthey\u2019re but coorse lasses; an\u2019 wha\u2019ll tak ill-faured, tocherless queans,\nwhen there\u2019s walth o\u2019 bonny faces an\u2019 lang purses i\u2019 the market?\u2014he,\nhe!\u201d Then resuming her scrutiny of Mary,\u2014\u201cAn\u2019 I\u2019se warran\u2019 ye\u2019ll be\nlookin\u2019 for an English sweetheart too;\u2014that\u2019ll be what\u2019s takin\u2019 ye awa\nto England!\u201d\n\n\u201cOn the contrary,\u201d said Mr Douglas, seeing Mary was too much frightened\nto answer for herself\u2014\u201con the contrary, Mary declares she will never\nmarry any but a true Highlander\u2014one who wears the dirk and plaid, and\nhas the \u2018second sight.\u2019 And the nuptials are to be celebrated with all\nthe pomp of feudal times; with bagpipes and bonfires, and gatherings of\nclans, and roasted sheep, and barrels of whisky, and\u201d\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cWeel a wat an\u2019 she\u2019s i\u2019 the right there,\u201d interrupted Mrs Mackshake,\nwith more complacency than she had yet shown. \u201cThey may ca\u2019 them what\nthey like, but there\u2019s nae waddin\u2019s noo. Wha\u2019s the better o\u2019 them but\ninnkeepers and chaise-drivers? I wadna count mysel married i\u2019 the\nhidlin\u2019s way they gang aboot it noo.\u201d\n\nMr Douglas, who was now rather tired of the old lady\u2019s reminiscences,\navailed himself of the opportunity of a fresh pinch to rise and take\nleave.\n\n\u201cOu, what\u2019s takin\u2019 ye awa, Archie, in sic a hurry? Sit doon there,\u201d\nlaying her hand upon his arm, \u201can\u2019 rest ye, and tak a glass o\u2019 wine; or\nmaybe,\u201d turning to Mary, \u201cye wad rather hae a drap broth to warm ye.\nWhat gars ye look sae blae, my bairn? I\u2019m sure it\u2019s no cauld; but ye\u2019re\njust like the lave; ye gang a\u2019 skiltin\u2019 about the streets half-naked,\nan\u2019 then ye maun sit and birsle yersels afore the fire at hame.\u201d\n\nThe wine being drunk, and the cookies discussed, Mr Douglas made another\nattempt to withdraw, but in vain.\n\n\u201cCanna ye sit still a wee, man, an\u2019 let me speir after my auld freens at\nGlenfern? Hoo\u2019s Grizzy, an\u2019 Jacky, an\u2019 Nicky?\u2014aye working awa at the\npills and the drogs?\u2014he, he! I ne\u2019er swallowed a pill, nor gaed a doit\nfor drogs, a\u2019 my days, an\u2019 see an ony of them\u2019ll run a race wi\u2019 me when\nthey\u2019re naur five score.\u201d\n\nMr Douglas here paid her some compliments upon her appearance, which\nwere pretty well received; and added that he was the bearer of a letter\nfrom his aunt Grizzy, which he would send along with a roebuck and a\nbrace of moor game.\n\n\u201cGin your roebuck\u2019s nae better than your last, atweel it\u2019s no worth the\nsending,\u2014puir fushionless dirt, no worth the chewing; weel a wat, I\nbegrudged my teeth on\u2019t. Your muirfowl was no that ill, but they\u2019re no\nworth the carrying; they\u2019re dang cheap i\u2019 the market e\u2019noo, so it\u2019s nae\ngreat compliment. Gin ye had brought me a leg o\u2019 good mutton, or a\ncaller sawmont, there would hae been some sense in\u2019t; but ye\u2019re ane o\u2019\nthe fowk that\u2019ll ne\u2019er harry yoursel wi\u2019 your presents; it\u2019s but the\npickle poother they cost you, an\u2019 I\u2019se warrant ye\u2019re thinking mair o\u2019\nyour ain diversion than o\u2019 my stamack when ye\u2019re at the shooting o\u2019\nthem, puir beasts.\u201d\n\nMr Douglas had borne the various indignities levelled against himself\nand his family with a philosophy that had no parallel in his life\nbefore; but to this attack upon his game he was not proof. His colour\nrose, his eyes flashed fire, and something resembling an oath burst from\nhis lips, as he strode indignantly towards the door.\n\nHis friend, however, was too nimble for him. She stepped before him, and\nbreaking into a discordant laugh, as she patted him on the back,\u2014\n\n\u201cSo, I see ye\u2019re just the auld man, Archie,\u2014aye ready to tak the\nstrumps, an ye dinna get a\u2019thing yer ain way. Mony a time I had to\nfleech ye oot o\u2019 the dorts when ye was a callant. Div ye mind hoo ye was\naffronted because I set ye doon to a cauld pigeon pie an\u2019 a tanker o\u2019\ntippenny, ae night to yer four-hours, afore some leddies? he, he, he!\nWeel a wat, your wife maun hae her ain adoos to manage ye, for ye\u2019re a\ncumstarie chield, Archie.\u201d\n\nMr Douglas still looked as if he was irresolute whether to laugh or be\nangry.\n\n\u201cCome, come, sit ye doon there till I speak to this bairn,\u201d said she, as\nshe pulled Mary into an adjoining bed-chamber, which wore the same\naspect of chilly neatness as the one they had quitted. Then pulling a\nlarge bunch of keys from her pocket, she opened a drawer, out of which\nshe took a pair of diamond ear-rings.\n\n\u201cHae, bairn,\u201d said she, as she stuffed them into Mary\u2019s hand; \u201cthey\nbelanged to your faither\u2019s grandmother. She was a good woman, an\u2019 had\nfour and twenty sons and dochters, an\u2019 I wuss ye nae waur fortin than\njust to hae as mony. But mind ye,\u201d shaking her bony finger, \u201cthey maun\na\u2019 be Scots. Gin I thocht ye wad marry ony pock-puddin\u2019, fient hait wad\nye gotten frae me. Noo, haud yer tongue, and dinna deave me wi\u2019 thanks,\u201d\nalmost pushing her into the parlour again; \u201cand sin\u2019 ye\u2019re gaun awa the\nmorn, I\u2019ll see nae mair o\u2019 ye e\u2019noo\u2014so fare ye weel. But, Archie, ye\nmaun come an\u2019 tak your breakfast wi\u2019 me. I hae muckle to say to you;\u2014but\nye maunna be sae hard upon my baps as ye used to be,\u201d with a facetious\ngrin to her mollified favourite, as they shook hands and\nparted.\u2014\u201c_Marriage: a Novel._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THE FAITHLESS NURSE:\n _A LEGENDARY TALE OF THE GREAT REBELLION_.\n\n\nMost of our readers who are citizens of \u201cour own romantic town,\u201d are\nfamiliarly acquainted with the valley which, winding among the Pentland\nHills, forms the path by which the waters of Glencorse seek their way to\nthose of the more celebrated Esk. It has long been the haunt of those\n\u201cpilgrims of his genius\u201d who loved to see with their own eyes the sacred\nscene chosen by the Pastoral Poet of Scotland for the display of lowly\nloves and rustic beauty; and it has now\u2014alas the day!\u2014acquired\nattractions for spirits of a far different sort; and who can see without\na sigh the triumphs of art domineering over and insulting the sweetest\ncharms of nature? It is not, however, to visit the stupendous and\nunseemly barrier which now chains up the gentle waters of the burn, nor\neven to seek the summer-breathing spot where Patie sung and Roger\nsighed, that we now request the attendance of our readers; but simply to\npoint out to their attention a party of three individuals, who, on a\nstill September evening, in the memorable year 1644, might have been\nseen slowly riding up the glen.\n\nTwo of the party were entitled in courtesy to be termed fair; but of\nthese twain, one would have been acknowledged lovely by the most\nuncourteous boor that ever breathed. She had hardly reached the earliest\nyears of womanhood, \u2019tis true, and the peachy bloom that mantled o\u2019er\nher cheek showed as yet only the dawn of future loveliness; but her fair\nbrow, on which, contrary to the fashion\u2014we had almost said _taste_\u2014of\nthe times, her auburn locks danced gracefully; the laughing lustre of\nher dark-blue eye, and the stinging sweetness of her pouting lip, aided\nby an expression of indomitable gentleness of heart and kindliness of\nmanner, lent a witchery to her countenance which few could gaze upon\nunmoved.\n\nThe other female had thrice the years of Lady Lilias Hay; but they had\nnot brought her one tithe of that maiden\u2019s beauty, and what little God\nhad given her, she had, long ere the day we saw her first, destroyed, by\nscrewing her features into an unvarying cast of prim solemnity, which,\nhad she practised it, would have blighted the cheek of Venus herself.\n\nThe \u201csquire of dames\u201d who accompanied the pair we have described was\nalso young, his chin as yet being guiltless of a hair. But there was a\nfirmness in his look, a dark something in his eye, that bespoke his\ncourage superior to his years; and a scar that trenched his open brow\nshowed that he had arrived at the daring, if not the wisdom of manhood.\n\nOn the present occasion, however, it was not a feeling of recklessness\nwhich characterised the demeanour of the youth. He was thoughtful and\nabstracted, riding silently by the side of the maiden, who more than\nonce attempted to dispel the gloom which hung over the gallant. It gave\nway, indeed, to the influence of her gentle voice; but it was for a\nmoment only, and the downcast eye and contracted brow ever and anon\nreturned when the accents of her voice had ceased.\n\n\u201cNay, prithee, cousin Maurice, do doff the visor of thy melancholy, and\nlet us behold thy merry heart unmasked. I could stake my little jennet\nhere to Elspeth\u2019s favourite \u201cbaudrons,\u201d that if Montrose should meet\nthee in this moody temperament, he will rather promote thee to a halter\nas a spy from the Committee of Estates, than to honourable command\nbefitting one who has bled beneath the eye, and been knighted by the\nhonour-giving hand of his royal master! Do laugh with me a little.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, my dearest Lilias, you seem in higher spirits to-day than is usual\nwith you. Cannot the surety of our parting to-morrow, and the\nuncertainty of our ever meeting again, throw even a passing cloud over\nyour gaiety?\u201d\n\n\u201cModestly put, my valiant cousin. I am well reminded of my unbecoming\nconduct. It must, of course, be night with me when you, bright sun of my\nhappiness, shall have withdrawn your beams from me.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, banter me not, sweet Lily. Have you never known an hour when the\nsweetest sights were irksome to the eye, and the softest strains of\nmusic fell harshly on the ear?\u201d\n\n\u201cPshaw! if you will neither smile nor talk, of what use are you by a\nlady\u2019s side? What say you to a race? Yonder stands the kirk of Saint\nCatherine. Will you try your roan that length? An you ride not so fast\nnow as you did from Cromwell at Longmarston Moor, I shall beat you.\n_Via!_\u201d\n\nAnd so saying, the light-hearted girl gave rein to her snowy palfrey,\nand flew up the glen toward the edifice she had mentioned, at a speed\nwhich Maurice Ogilvy had some difficulty in equalling, and which\nprevented him from overtaking her until she had reached the gate.\n\nAll who have visited\u2014and who has not?\u2014Roslin\u2019s \u201cproud chapelle,\u201d are\nfamiliar with the legend of Sir William St Clair, and his venturous\nboast to the Bruce, that he would find, on peril of his head, a dog that\nwould bring down the deer ere it could cross Glencorse burn;\u2014how the\ntrusty hound did redeem his own credit and his master\u2019s life, by seizing\nthe quarry in the very middle of the stream;\u2014and how, in gratitude to\nthe gentle saint by whose intercession this mighty feat was\naccomplished, he built a church on the bank of the stream, and dedicated\nit to Saint Catherine of the Howe. This virgin martyr was unfortunately\nno more successful than her sister saints in protecting her mansions\nfrom the desolating zeal of the earlier reformers. The church was\ndestroyed by a fanatical mob, and nothing now remains to record the\nkindness of Catherine, and the gratitude of the \u201chigh Saint Clair,\u201d but\na few uneven grassy heaps of deeper green than the surrounding verdure,\nand the name of the neighbouring farm town, which is yet called Kirkton.\nAt the time we are at present writing of, however, the roofless walls of\nthe building, though gray with the ruin of a hundred years, were still\nalmost entire, and the cemetery then and long after continued to be used\nby the neighbouring peasantry.\n\nWhen Maurice reached the church, he found that the Lady Lilias had\ndismounted. He too alighted, and sought her in the interior. She was\nseated on a fallen stone, and the deep melancholy which now shadowed her\nfair countenance was more in unison with the sombre aspect of the place\nand of the hour, than he had expected to find it. She arose at his\napproach, and addressed him.\n\n\u201cYou have something to tell me, Maurice, and you wished to do it alone.\nWe have now an opportunity. What has befallen us?\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, fair Lily, why should you think so? Is not the thought that\nto-morrow we must part of itself sufficient to dull my spirit and sadden\nmy countenance?\u201d\n\n\u201cPshaw! trifle not with me now. Your face has no secrets for one who has\nconned its ill-favoured features so frequently as I have done. Out with\nyour secret! Elspeth will be with us forthwith.\u201d\n\nMaurice seemed for some moments undecided how he should act, but at\nlength, with a look of no little embarrassment, replied,\u2014\n\n\u201cSweet Lilias, you shall be obeyed. You can only laugh at me; and thanks\nto your merry heart, that is a daily pastime of yours.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, nay\u2014say on; I will be as grave as Argyle.\u201d\n\n\u201cKnow then, that while I waited for you and Elspeth at the bottom of the\nglen, a remarkable thing befell me. I had alighted, and while Rupert was\ntrying to pick a scanty meal among the bent, I flung myself on the\nground, and endeavoured to beguile the time by thinking sometimes of\nyou, and sometimes of King Charles.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow! sir cousin, I am not always the companion of your reveries, it\nseems, then? Heigho! to think what a change a single day\u2019s matrimony has\naccomplished!\u201d\n\n\u201cUngenerous Lilias,\u201d said Maurice, taking her hand, \u201clisten to me.\nLifting my head accidentally, I was surprised to perceive a man and\nwoman walking away at some distance from me. The more attentively I\nlooked at these individuals, the more uneasy I became, until my terror\nwas completed by the figures slowly turning round and presenting to me\nthe identical features of you, dear Lilias, and myself.\u201d\n\n\u201cMaurice, Maurice! you amaze me!\u201d\n\n\u201cThough fully aware of the unearthly nature of these appearances, I\ncould not resist the desire I felt of following them. I did so, tracing\ntheir silent steps up the glen, until I saw them enter the churchyard\nwithout. I hastened after, but when I too entered the cemetery, the\nfigures had disappeared!\u201d\n\nThe lady\u2019s cheek grew pale as she listened to this narration, for in\nthose days the belief in such prognostications was universal; and the\ntime of day when Maurice had seen the wraiths, their retiring motion,\nand the fatal spot to which he had traced them, were all indicative of\nfast approaching doom. She clung around her husband\u2019s neck for a few\nmoments in silence, until the deep-seated conviction of safety while\nwith him, which forms so striking a characteristic of feminine\naffection, revived her spirits; and though the tear still hung on her\nsilken eyelash as she looked up in his face, there was a languid smile\non her cheek as she said,\u2014\n\n\u201cBeshrew you, Maurice, for frightening me so deeply on my wedding-day!\nCould you find no other time than this to see bogles?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell said, love,\u201d answered Maurice, who felt no little alarm at seeing\nthe effect which his story had produced on his wife: \u201c\u2019twas doubtless a\nmere delusion.\u201d\n\n\u201cEven should it prove true,\u201d replied Lilias, \u201cwe shall at least die\ntogether; and there is a tranquillising influence in that thought,\nMaurice, which would go far to make even death agreeable.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us leave this place,\u201d said Maurice, after the emotion which so\nbewitching a confusion excited had in some measure subsided; \u201cI fear\nElspeth will miss us.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat then?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou know that I have ever distrusted that woman. She and I are as\ndifferent from each other as day from darkness. She is a staunch\nCovenanter\u2014I a graceless Cavalier. She rails at love-locks, love-songs,\nand love-passages\u2014I adore them all. She prays for MacCallummore, and\nwould fain see his bonnet nod above the crown of King Charles, and the\ncaps of his merry men;\u2014I would rather see his head frowning on the\nNetherbow Port. While she opposed my suit to you, I only hated her; now\nthat she connives at it\u2014shall I confess it to you?\u2014I fear her.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, now you are unjust. While in the lawful exercise of woman\u2019s just\nprerogative,\u2014coquetry,\u2014I seemed to balance the contending claims of Sir\nMungo Campbell and yourself for this poor hand, Elspeth doubtlessly\nfavoured the cause of her kinsman (all Campbell\u2019s being of course\ncousins); but our sovereign will once unequivocally declared, she became\nall submission, and has not even attempted to impugn the decision which\nwe, somewhat foolishly perhaps, have pronounced in your favour. Besides,\nMaurice,\u201d continued Lilias, leaving off the mock-heroic tone in which\nshe had hitherto spoken for one more akin to natural feeling, \u201cElspeth\nCampbell was my nurse, has a mother\u2019s affection for me, and therefore\nwould not, I am confident, engage in any scheme inimical to my\nhappiness.\u201d\n\n\u201cStill she is a Covenanter, and a Campbell,\u201d replied Maurice, \u201cand as\nsuch, her dearest wish, even for your own sake, must be to see you the\nwife of him who is both the one and the other.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d rejoined Lilias, colouring highly as she spoke, \u201cthat at least\nyou have put out of her power: and yet I regret that I trusted her not\nin that matter. It was a secret for a woman, and a nursing mother.\u201d\n\n\u201cFear not, she shall know in time. I know, I feel it is unmanly, the\ndread I entertain; but I cannot quell it. I wish we had not agreed to\nmake this Logan House the trysting-place of my gallant friends: my\nfather\u2019s dwelling had been the safer place.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; and so have set my worthy guardian, Gillespie Grumach, and his\nobsequious friend Sir Mungo, on our track. Come, come, your alarm is\nunbecoming. At dawn we leave Logan House. The madcap disguise which you\nhave prevailed on me to adopt will prevent any recognition till you have\nconsigned me to my noble kinswoman of Huntly; and you\u2014but I wrong\nyou\u2014fear not for yourself.\u201d\n\n\u201cKindly spoken, my love,\u2014would to Heaven you indeed were in Strathbogie,\nand I among the gallant Grahams! But here comes Elspeth, looking as\ndemure as if she were afraid that the idolatrous sacrifice of the mass,\nlike the leprosy of old, might still stick to those time-worn walls, and\ninfect her godly heart. Let us go.\u201d\n\nLilias looked earnestly on the countenance of her nurse as they met; for\nthough she had not acknowledged so much to Maurice, her heart had\nmisgiven her as she listened to his discourse. Whether it might proceed\nfrom the melancholy truth, that suspicion once excited against an\nindividual cannot be entirely quieted by any innocence whatever, or\nwhether the countenance of Elspeth really afforded ground for the doubt\nof her mistress, we are unable to determine, but certainly the latter\nimagined at least that she could detect alarm, solicitude, and fear,\nlurking amid the apparent placidity of her nurse\u2019s features.\n\nNothing was said, however; and the party, remounting their horses,\nshortly afterwards arrived at their destination for the night, namely,\nthe Peel or Tower of Logan House. This edifice, which crowns the summit\nof a small knoll or brae on the northern side of Glencorse water, was\none of the many places built for the safety of the population against\nany sudden but short-lived attack, and, from the walls, which are still\nleft, must have been of considerable strength. It was, at the time we\nspeak of, entire, and consisted of two storeys; the lower being devoted\nto the accommodation of the servants of the house, and that of the\nfamily bestial, while the upper was divided into the few apartments then\nthought sufficient for the accommodation of the gentles.\n\nAs they rode into the courtyard, Maurice was struck by the want of\nattendance which the place betrayed. At that day the laudable customs of\nthe \u201cqueen\u2019s old courtier\u201d had not entirely gone into desuetude, and\nevery holding, however small, was filled with a number of retainers,\nthat in the present day would be deemed excessive. At Logan House,\nhowever, things were very different. A stripling\u2014half-man,\nhalf-boy\u2014seemed the only representative of male vassalage, and the\nwoman-servants, though more numerous, did not amount to anything near\nthe average number which in those days divided amongst themselves, with\ncommendable chariness, the duties of a household.\n\nThe faggots, however, blazed cheerfully in the upper apartment, and food\nand wine having been prepared in abundance, Maurice for a moment forgot\nhis suspicions, and Lilias regained her sprightliness. They conversed\ngaily together of days gone by, and of courts and masques and pageants\nwhich they had seen, to the evident discomfort of Elspeth, who not only\nthought her presence becoming in her character of nurse, but somewhat\nnecessary in the existing condition, as she imagined, of the youthful\npair. Maurice soon saw her uneasiness, and wickedly resolved to make it\na means of pastime to himself and Lilias.\n\n\u201cDo you recollect, sweet Lily, when the good King Charles kissed your\ncheek in Holyroodhouse, and vowed, on a king\u2019s word, to find a husband\nfor you?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do; and how a malapert page sounded in my ear that he would save his\nMajesty the trouble.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd have I not kept my word\u2014ha, lady mine? The great Argyle and all his\nmen will hardly, I think, undo the links that bind us to each other;\u201d\nand inspired, as it seemed, by the pleasant thought, the youth took the\nlady\u2019s hand in his, and pressed it warmly and frequently to his lips.\n\nElspeth looked on in amazement at the familiarity of intercourse in\nwhich the lady indulged her cousin, and which was equally repugnant to\nher natural and acquired feelings on the subject.\n\n\u201cPshaw! you foolish man, desist!\u201d cried Lilias, blushing and laughing at\nthe same time, when Maurice attempted to substitute her rosy lips for\nthe hand he had been so fervently kissing. \u201cWhat will Elspeth think?\u201d\n\n\u201cThink, Lady Lilias!\u201d said Elspeth bitterly; \u201cthink! I cannot think; but\nI can feel for the impropriety\u2014the sinful levity\u2014into which, for the\nfirst time, I see my mistress fallen.\u201d\n\nThe fair neck of Lilias crimsoned as she listened to the taunt. For a\nmoment a frown gathered on her brow, before which the nurse\u2019s\ncountenance fell; but it died away in a moment, and, with a beseeching\nsmile, which lay nestled among rosy blushes, she stretched out her hand\nand said,\u2014\n\n\u201cForgive me, Elspeth, we are married!\u201d\n\nThis brief annunciation had a striking effect on the individual to whom\nit was addressed. She clasped together her withered hands, and continued\nfor a few moments gazing wildly in the faces of the startled pair,\nseemingly anxious to discover there some contradiction of what she had\njust heard; and then uttering a loud long shriek, dashed her face\nagainst the wooden board, and groaned audibly.\n\nThe terrified Lilias tried to raise the old woman\u2019s head from the table,\nbut she for some time resisted the kindly effort. At length, raising her\npale and now haggard features to those of the lady, she exclaimed,\u2014\n\n\u201cUnsay, child of my affection, the dreadful tidings you have told;\u2014tell\nme not that I have murdered the daughter of my mistress. Often when the\n_taish_ was on me have I seen the dirk in your bosom. Little did I dream\nthat my own hand should guide it there. Oh! say you are not married.\u201d\n\nLilias, who knew the violent temper of her nurse, and imagined her\npresent ravings proceeded from offended pride at not having been made\nprivy to the marriage, now attempted to soothe her feelings.\n\n\u201cNay, my dear Elspeth, take not on so; you know Sir Maurice and I have\nlong loved each other; to-morrow morning he rides to join Montrose, who\nhas conquered for the king at Tippermuir. I tremble to be left behind,\nand have therefore resolved to accompany him; in these circumstances,\nwas it not fitting that he should have a husband\u2019s title to protect me?\n\u2019Twas but this morning we were wedded; and I ever meant to tell you\nhere.\u201d\n\n\u201cHere, said you?\u201d replied the old woman, shuddering. \u201cBut I am\nguiltless. You were ordained to be the destruction of each other before\nthe world was. James Graham will look long and wearily for your coming,\nI fear. Hush! the Campbells are about the house; and _he_ is coming to\nseek you here.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho?\u2014Sir Mungo Campbell?\u201d said Lilias and her husband, in the same\nbreath.\n\n\u201cEven he,\u201d replied Elspeth; \u201che brings the warrant of the Estates to\napprehend Sir Maurice, and has orders from the Marquis of Argyle to\nsecure your own person.\u201d\n\n\u201cTreacherous, infamous wretch!\u201d\u2014\u201cCruel, unkind Elspeth!\u201d burst again\nsimultaneously from the lips of Maurice and his bride.\n\n\u201cUpbraid me not, Lady Lilias; alas! what must fall will fall. Oh, that\nyou had trusted me. I fondly hoped that Sir Mungo Campbell might yet be\nyour husband, and that I should see you the proud and happy mistress of\nCastle Lorn; but married!\u2014he will water this floor with our blood!\u201d\n\nAnd again the wretched old woman, overcome with remorse and terror,\nshrieked aloud. Then, as if stung by some instantaneous and overpowering\nfeeling, she hastily quitted the apartment. The betrayed and devoted\npair gazed for a few minutes at each other in silent sadness. There was\nmore of grief than terror in these mournful looks; for it was for the\ncalamity of the other that each heart bled. At length the lady sunk,\nweeping, into his arms.\n\n\u201cOh, Maurice, Maurice, bitterly are our fears fulfilled! We are lost!\nThere is no escape from the bloodhounds who have beset us.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, nay, my love,\u201d replied the knight, feigning the tranquillity he\ndid not feel; \u201cthink not so. I must have heard the arrival of the party,\nhad we been yet surrounded. There still is time to escape from the net\nprepared for us. Once on horseback, between the darkness of the night,\nand the wild nature of these hills, we may manage to escape.\u201d\n\nEre Lilias could make answer to this cheering discourse, Elspeth entered\nthe apartment.\n\n\u201cHaste!\u201d she exclaimed in an emphatic whisper, \u201ca moment yet is left.\nSir Mungo has not arrived. Leave, oh leave, this fearful place!\u201d and she\nwrung her hands impatiently.\n\nThe lovers lost no time in obeying this invitation. Two large\nriding-cloaks were supplied by Elspeth, in order to conceal their forms,\nif they should unhappily be met by Sir Mungo; while, still more to\ndefeat detection, it was agreed that Lilias should mount the nurse\u2019s\npony.\n\n\u201cAnd you, Elspeth,\u201d said the lady, with a kind-heartedness which no\npersonal danger could destroy, \u201cwhat shall become of you?\u201d\n\n\u201cFear not for me,\u201d replied Elspeth chokingly; \u201cI fear nothing\u2014fly!\u201d\n\nMaurice now led his lady to the open plain, and here saw, with sorrow,\nthat the moon, which shone dazzlingly bright, would destroy almost every\nhope of escaping the recognition of Sir Mungo Campbell, should that\nindividual meet them; and this was, alas! too soon to happen. They had\nonly turned the angle of the building, with the intention of taking the\nhillward path, when they saw a band of armed men, at the head of whom\nstood one whom hatred and fear at once enabled both to pronounce the man\nthey sought to shun.\n\n\u201cWho comes there?\u201d cried Sir Mungo, harshly.\n\n\u201cFriends to King Charles,\u201d replied Maurice, undauntedly.\n\n\u201cThat may well be,\u201d replied Campbell, \u201cand yet deep foes to Scotland.\nSir Maurice Ogilvy, I arrest thee of high treason!\u201d\n\n\u201cWin me, and wear me, Roundhead!\u201d cried the knight; and, throwing off\nthe cloak which cumbered him, he drew his sword with one hand, while\nwith the other he plucked Lilias from her seat, and placed her before\nhim. Then giving the rowel to his horse, he dashed among the astonished\nHighlanders, who either fell before, or yielded a passage to the gallant\nsteed.\n\nA wild yell arose amid the stillness of the night, as the Campbells\nperceived the rapid pace at which Maurice rode, and which, if continued\nfor a few minutes, must soon place him beyond the chance of capture, and\nmatchlocks and pistols were employed in vain to interrupt his career.\nBut, alas! Heaven had decreed the triumph of the guilty. Urged to his\nutmost speed, Rupert would soon have saved his master, and his yet more\nprecious load, when, his foot striking against a piece of earthfast\nrock, he stumbled\u2014made a futile effort to recover himself\u2014and at last\nfell on his side. Sir Maurice instantly sprung to his feet, but Lilias\nlay apparently lifeless on the turf. He kneeled down, and raised her in\nhis arms, but she replied not to his eager questionings. He could feel\nno pulse, to tell him of returning life; and to his despair, he\nperceived the blood flowing profusely from her white brow.\n\n\u201cShe is gone!\u201d cried he, bitterly. \u201cNow, Campbell, for thy heart;\u201d and\nas he spoke, he lifted his weapon from the grass. He had hardly regained\nit, when he was surrounded by the Highlanders.\n\n\u201cYield thee, Sir Maurice, or thou diest.\u201d\n\n\u201cNever to one of thy detested clan will Maurice Ogilvy give up his\nsword. Send back your murderers, Campbell, and let us settle here our\nlong arrear of hatred.\u201d\n\n\u201cOnce more I bid thee yield.\u201d\n\n\u201cAgain do I defy thee.\u201d\n\n\u201cThy blood be on thy head then. Smite the braggart to the dust.\u201d\n\nThe word was barely uttered when the upraised arm of one who stood\nbehind the youth buried a dirk in his bosom. He reeled to the earth,\ntried with dimming eye to scan the features of Lilias as she lay still\nprostrate on the ground, and then casting his eyes upwards, murmured\nout, \u201cBear witness, Heaven, I die true to love, and faithful to the\nking!\u201d A moment more, and he was silent.\n\nCampbell next proceeded to raise the body of Lilias from the ground. It\nseemed as if her deep-rooted aversion to this person was so vital as\neven to govern her while in a state of insensibility; for no sooner had\nhis fingers touched her waist, than she started from the ground, and,\ndrawing her hands across her eyes, gazed wildly around. A moment\nsufficed to show her the cureless ruin which had befallen her hopes and\nhappiness, and, bursting from the grasp of her hated suitor, and\nexclaiming in a voice hoarse in agony, \u201cStand off, monster! I am his\nwife!\u201d she threw herself with reckless violence on the prostrate corpse.\nEven the heart of Campbell was touched by her extreme misery, and some\nminutes elapsed ere he could give directions for her removal. That was\nnow needless. In her frantic despair, poor Lilias regarded death as an\nenviable blessing; the dagger of Maurice afforded her the ready means of\nescaping at once from all her worldly woe, and her cruel captors only\nraised her to discover that her heart\u2019s blood was now mingling on the\nsame turf with that of him who had alone possessed her living love.\n\nOn the following morning, the wandering shepherds of the neighbourhood\nperceived a new-made grave in the churchyard of Saint Catherine, and a\nwretched being in female attire seated beside it. Hers was a grief \u201ctoo\ndeep for tears\u201d\u2014a sorrow too mighty for mortal alleviation. She spoke to\nno one, replied to no one, but continued, with her head resting on her\nlap, to spend the livelong day by the side of the unfortunates whom her\nwell-meant treachery had stretched so untimely there. As the winter\nadvanced, she grew weaker and weaker, but still she abstained not from\nher daily vigil. Even when, from debility, she was unable to walk, she\nprevailed on some one to carry her to the lonely cemetery; and her dying\nwords to her pitying neighbours were\u2014\u201cBury me at the feet of Lady\nLilias\u2014remember, at the feet.\u201d\u2014_Edinburgh Literary Gazette._\n\n\n\n\n TRADITIONS OF THE CELEBRATED MAJOR WEIR.\n\n BY ROBERT CHAMBERS, LL.D.\n\n\nIn one of the most ancient streets of Edinburgh, called the West Bow,\nstood the house formerly inhabited by Major Weir, whose name is scarcely\nmore conspicuous in the Criminal Records of Scotland, than it is\nnotorious in the mouth of popular tradition. The awful tenement was\nsituated in a small court at the back of the main street, accessible by\na narrow entry leading off to the east, about fifty yards from the top\nof the Bow. It was a sepulchral-looking fabric, with a peculiarly\ndejected and dismal aspect, as if it were conscious of the bad character\nwhich it bore among the neighbouring houses.\n\nIt is now about one hundred and fifty years since Major Weir, an old\nsoldier of the civil war, and the bearer of some command in the City\nGuard of Edinburgh, closed a most puritanical life, by confessing\nhimself a sorcerer, and being burnt accordingly at the stake. The\nscandal in which this involved the Calvinistic party seems to have been\nmet, on their part, by an endeavour to throw the whole blame upon the\nshoulders of Satan; and this conclusion, which was almost justified by\nthe mystery and singularity of the case, has had the effect of\nconnecting the criminal\u2019s name inalienably with the demonology of\nScotland.\n\nSundry strange reminiscences of Major Weir and his house are preserved\namong the old people of Edinburgh, and especially by the venerable\ngossips of the West Bow. It is said he derived that singular gift of\nprayer by which he surprised all his acquaintance, and procured so\nsanctimonious a reputation, from his walking-cane! This implement, it\nappears, the Evil One, from whom he procured it, had endowed with the\nmost wonderful properties and powers. It not only inspired him with\nprayer, so long as he held it in his hand, but it acted in the capacity\nof a Mercury, in so far as it could go an errand, or run a message. Many\nwas the time it went out to the neighbouring shops for supplies of snuff\nto its master! And as the fact was well known, the shopkeepers of the\nBow were not startled at the appearance of so strange a customer.\nMoreover, it often \u201canswered the door,\u201d when people came to call upon\nthe Major, and it had not unfrequently been seen running along before\nhim, in the capacity of link-boy, as he walked down the Lawnmarket. Of\ncourse, when the Major was burnt, his wooden lieutenant and valet was\ncarefully burnt with him, though it does not appear in the Justiciary\nRecords that it was included in the indictment, or that Lord Dirleton\nsubjected it, in common with its master, to the ceremony of a sentence.\n\nIt is also said that the spot on which the Major was burnt,\u2014namely, the\nsouth-east corner of the esplanade on the Castle-Hill,\u2014continued ever\nafter scathed and incapable of vegetation. But we must beg to suggest\nthe possibility of this want of verdure being occasioned by the\ncircumstance of the esplanade being a hard gravel-walk. We are very\nunwilling to find scientific reasons for last-century miracles,\u2014to\nwithdraw the veil from beautiful deceptions,\u2014or to dispel the halo which\nfancy may have thrown around the incidents of a former day. But a regard\nfor truth obliges us to acknowledge, that the same miracle, attributed\nto the burning-place of Wishart, at St Andrews, may be accounted for in\na similar way, the spot being now occupied by what the people\nthereabouts denominate, in somewhat homely phrase, \u201ca mussel midden.\u201d\n\nFor upwards of a century after Major Weir\u2019s death, he continued to be\nthe bugbear of the Bow, and his house remained uninhabited. His\napparition was frequently seen at night flitting, like a black and\nsilent shadow, about the purlieus of that singular street. His house,\nthough known to be deserted by everything human, was sometimes observed\nat midnight to be full of lights, and heard to emit strange sounds, as\nof dancing, howling, and, what is strangest of all, spinning. It was\nbelieved, too, that every night, when the clock of St Giles tolled\ntwelve, one of the windows sprung open, and the ghost of a tall woman in\nwhite, supposed to be the Major\u2019s equally terrible sister, came forward,\nand bent her long figure thrice over the window, her face every time\ntouching the wall about three feet down, and then retired, closing the\nwindow after her with an audible clang.\n\nSome people had occasionally seen the Major issue from the low \u201cclose,\u201d\nat the same hour, mounted on a black horse without a head, and gallop\noff in a whirlwind of flame. Nay, sometimes the whole of the inhabitants\nof the Bow together were roused from their sleep at an early hour in the\nmorning, by the sound as of a coach-and-six, first rattling up the\nLawnmarket, and then thundering down the Bow, stopping at the head of\nthe terrible \u201cclose\u201d for a few minutes, and then rattling and thundering\nback again,\u2014being neither more nor less than Satan come in one of his\nbest equipages, to take home to his abode the ghosts of the Major and\nhis sister, after they had spent a night\u2019s leave of absence in their\nterrestrial dwelling. In support of these beliefs, circumstances, of\ncourse, were not awanting. One or two venerable men of the Bow, who had,\nperhaps, on the night of the 7th September 1736, popped their\nnight-capped heads out of their windows, and seen Captain Porteous\nhurried down their street to execution, were pointed out by children as\nhaving actually witnessed some of the dreadful doings alluded to. One\nworthy, in particular, declared he had often seen coaches parading up\nand down the Bow at midnight, drawn by six black horses without heads,\nand driven by a coachman of the most hideous appearance, whose flaming\neyes, placed at an immense distance from each other in his forehead, as\nthey gleamed through the darkness, resembled nothing so much as the\nnight-lamps of a modern vehicle.\n\nAbout forty years ago, when the shades of superstition began universally\nto give way in Scotland, Major Weir\u2019s house came to be regarded with\nless terror by the neighbours, and an attempt was made by the proprietor\nto find a person who would be bold enough to inhabit it. Such a person\nwas procured in William Patullo, a poor man of dissipated habits, who,\nhaving been at one time a soldier and a traveller, had come to disregard\nin a great measure the superstitions of his native country, and was now\nglad to possess a house upon the low terms offered by the landlord, at\nwhatever risk. Upon it being known in the town that Major Weir\u2019s house\nwas about to be re-inhabited, a great deal of curiosity was felt by\npeople of all ranks as to the result of the experiment; for there was\nscarcely a native of the city who had not felt since his boyhood an\nintense interest in all that concerned that awful fabric, and yet\nremembered the numerous terrible stories which he had heard told\nrespecting it. Even before entering upon his hazardous undertaking,\nWilliam Patullo was looked upon with a flattering sort of interest\u2014an\ninterest similar to that which we feel respecting a culprit under\nsentence of death, a man about to be married, or a regiment on the march\nto active conflict. It was the hope of many that he would be the means\nof retrieving a valuable possession from the dominion of darkness. But\nSatan soon let them know that he does not ever tamely relinquish the\noutposts of his kingdom.\n\nOn the very first evening after Patullo and his spouse had taken up\ntheir abode in the house, a circumstance took place which effectually\ndeterred them and all others from ever again inhabiting it. About one in\nthe morning, as the worthy couple were lying awake in their bed, not\nunconscious of a considerable degree of fear, a dim uncertain light\nproceeding from the gathered embers of their fire, and all being silent\naround them, they suddenly saw a form like that of a calf, but without\nthe head, come through the lower panel of the door and enter the room. A\nspectre more horrible, or more spectre-like conduct, could scarcely have\nbeen conceived. The phantom immediately came forward to the bed; and\nsetting its fore-feet upon the stock, looked steadfastly in all its\nawful headlessness at the unfortunate pair, who were of course almost\nready to die with fright. When it had contemplated them thus for a few\nminutes, to their great relief it at length took away its intolerable\nperson, and slowly retiring, gradually vanished from their sight. As\nmight be expected, they deserted the house next morning; and from that\ntime forward, no other attempt was ever made to embank this part of the\nworld of light from the aggressions of the world of darkness.\n\n * * * * *\n\nIn the course of our experience we have met with many houses in \u201cAuld\nReekie\u201d which have the credit of being haunted. There is one at this day\n[1829] in Buchanan\u2019s Court, Lawnmarket, in the same \u201cland\u201d in which the\ncelebrated editor of the _Edinburgh Review_ first saw the light. It is a\nflat, and has been shut up from time immemorial. The story goes, that\none night, as preparations were making for a supper party, something\noccurred which obliged the family, as well as all the assembled guests,\nto retire with precipitation, and lock up the house. From that night to\nthis it has never once been opened, nor was any of the furniture\nwithdrawn;\u2014the very goose which was undergoing the process of being\nroasted at the time of the dreadful occurrence is still at the fire! No\none knows to whom the house belongs; no one ever inquires after it; no\none living ever saw the inside of it;\u2014it is a condemned house! There is\nsomething peculiarly dreadful about a house under these circumstances.\nWhat sights of horror might present themselves if it were entered! Satan\nis the _ultimus h\u00e6res_ of all such unclaimed property.\n\nBesides the numberless old houses in Edinburgh that are haunted, there\nare many endowed with the simple credit of having been the scenes of\nmurders and suicides. Some we have met with, containing rooms which had\nparticular names commemorative of such events, and these names, handed\ndown as they had been from one generation to another, usually suggested\nthe remembrance of some dignified Scottish families, probably the former\ntenants of the houses.\n\nThe closed house in Mary King\u2019s Close (behind the Royal Exchange) is\nbelieved by some to have met with that fate for a very fearful reason.\nThe inhabitants at a very remote period were, it is said, compelled to\nabandon it by the supernatural appearance which took place in it, on the\nvery first night after they had made it their residence. At midnight, as\nthe goodman was sitting with his wife by the fire, reading his Bible,\nand intending immediately to go to bed, a strange dimness which suddenly\nfell upon the light caused him to raise his eyes from the book. He\nlooked at the candle, and saw it was burning blue. Terror took\npossession of his frame. He turned away his eyes from the ghastly\nobject; but the cure was worse than the disease. Directly before him,\nand apparently not two yards off, he saw the head as of a dead person\nlooking him straight in the face. There was nothing but a head, though\nthat seemed to occupy the precise situation in regard to the floor which\nit might have done had it been supported by a body of the ordinary\nstature. The man and his wife fainted with terror. On awaking, darkness\npervaded the room. Presently the door opened, and in came a hand holding\na candle. This advanced and stood\u2014that is, the body supposed to be\nattached to the hand stood\u2014beside the table, whilst the terrified pair\nsaw two or three couples of feet skip along the floor, as if dancing.\nThe scene lasted a short time, but vanished quite away upon the man\ngathering strength to invoke the protection of Heaven. The house was of\ncourse abandoned, and remained ever afterwards shut up.\n\n\n\n\n THE WINDY YULE.\n\n BY JOHN GALT.\n\n\nIt was in the course of the winter after the decease of Bailie M\u2018Lucre,\nthat the great loss of lives took place, which, everybody agreed, was\none of the most calamitous things that had for many a year befallen the\ntown.\n\nThree or four vessels were coming with cargoes of grain from Ireland;\nanother from the Baltic with Norway deals; and a third from Bristol,\nwhere she had been on a charter for some Greenock merchants.\n\nIt happened that, for a time, there had been contrary winds, against\nwhich no vessel could enter the port, and the ships whereof I have been\nspeaking were all lying together at anchor in the bay, waiting a change\nof weather. These five vessels were owned among ourselves, and their\ncrews consisted of fathers and sons belonging to the place, so that,\nboth by reason of interest and affection, a more than ordinary concern\nwas felt for them; for the sea was so rough, that no boat could live in\nit to go near them, and we had our fears that the men on board would be\nvery ill off. Nothing, however, occurred but this natural anxiety, till\nthe Saturday, which was Yule. In the morning the weather was blasty and\nsleety, waxing more and more tempestuous till about midday, when the\nwind checked suddenly round from the nor\u2019-east to the sou\u2019-west, and\nblew a gale as if the prince of the powers of the air was doing his\nutmost to work mischief. The rain blattered, the windows clattered, the\nshop-shutters flapped, pigs from the lum-heads came rattling down like\nthunder claps, and the skies were dismal both with cloud and carry. Yet,\nfor all that, there was in the streets a stir and a busy visitation\nbetween neighbours, and every one went to their high windows, to look at\nthe five poor barks that were warsling against the strong arm of the\nelements of the storm and the ocean.\n\nStill the lift gloomed, and the wind roared, and it was as doleful a\nsight as ever was seen in any town afflicted with calamity to see the\nsailors\u2019 wives, with their red cloaks about their heads, followed by\ntheir hirpling and disconsolate bairns, going one after another to the\nkirkyard, to look at the vessels where their helpless bread-winners were\nbattling with the tempest. My heart was really sorrowful, and full of a\nsore anxiety to think of what might happen to the town, whereof so many\nwere in peril, and to whom no human magistracy could extend the arm of\nprotection. Seeing no abatement of the wrath of heaven, that howled and\nroared around us, I put on my big-coat, and taking my staff in my hand,\nhaving tied down my hat with a silk handkerchief, towards gloaming I\nwalked likewise to the kirkyard, where I beheld such an assemblage of\nsorrow, as few men in a public situation have ever been put to the trial\nto witness.\n\nIn the lee of the kirk many hundreds of the town were gathered together;\nbut there was no discourse among them. The major part were sailors\u2019\nwives and weans, and at every new thud of the blast, a sob arose, and\nthe mothers drew their bairns closer in about them, as if they saw the\nvisible hand of a foe raised to smite them. Apart from the multitude, I\nobserved three or four young lasses standing behind the Whinnyhill\nfamily\u2019s tomb, and I jaloused that they had joes in the ships; for they\noften looked to the bay, with long necks and sad faces, from behind the\nmonument. A widow woman, one old Mary Weery, that was a lameter, and\ndependent on her son, who was on board the _Louping Meg_ (as the Lovely\nPeggy was nicknamed at the shore), stood by herself, and every now and\nthen wrung her hands, crying, with a woeful voice, \u201cThe Lord giveth, and\nthe Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord;\u201d\u2014but it was\nmanifest to all that her faith was fainting within her. But of all the\npiteous objects there, on that doleful evening, none troubled my\nthoughts more than three motherless children, that belonged to the mate\nof one of the vessels in the jeopardy. He was an Englishman that had\nbeen settled some years in the town, where his family had neither kith\nnor kin; and his wife having died about a month before, the bairns, of\nwhom the eldest was but nine or so, were friendless enough, though both\nmy gudewife, and other well-disposed ladies, paid them all manner of\nattention till their father would come home. The three poor little\nthings, knowing that he was in one of the ships, had been often out and\nanxious, and they were then sitting under the lee of a headstone, near\ntheir mother\u2019s grave, chittering and creeping closer and closer at every\nsquall. Never was such an orphan-like sight seen.\n\nWhen it began to be so dark that the vessels could no longer be\ndiscerned from the churchyard, many went down to the shore, and I took\nthe three babies home with me, and Mrs Pawkie made tea for them, and\nthey soon began to play with our own younger children, in blithe\nforgetfulness of the storm. Every now and then, however, the eldest of\nthem, when the shutters rattled and the lum-head roared, would pause in\nhis innocent daffing, and cower in towards Mrs Pawkie, as if he was\ndaunted and dismayed by something he knew not what.\n\nMany a one that night walked the sounding shore in sorrow, and fires\nwere lighted along it to a great extent; but the darkness and the noise\nof the raging deep, and the howling wind, never intermitted till about\nmidnight: at which time a message was brought to me, that it might be\nneedful to send a guard of soldiers to the beach, for that broken masts\nand tackle had come in, and that surely some of the barks had perished.\nI lost no time in obeying this suggestion, which was made to me by one\nof the owners of the _Louping Meg_; and to show that I sincerely\nsympathised with all those in affliction, I rose and dressed myself, and\nwent down to the shore, where I directed several old boats to be drawn\nup by the fires, and blankets to be brought, and cordials to be\nprepared, for them that might be spared with life to reach the land; and\nI walked the beach with the mourners till daylight.\n\nAs the day dawned, the wind began to abate in its violence, and to wear\naway from the sou\u2019-west into the norit, but it was soon discovered that\nsome of the vessels with the corn had perished; for the first thing seen\nwas a long fringe of tangle and grain along the line of the high-water\nmark, and every one strained with greedy and grieved eyes, as the\ndaylight brightened, to discover which had suffered. But I can proceed\nno further with the dismal recital of that doleful morning. Let it\nsuffice here to be known, that, through the haze, we at last saw three\nof the vessels lying on their beam-ends with their masts broken, and the\nwaves riding like the furious horses of destruction over them. What had\nbecome of the other two was never known; but it was supposed that they\nhad foundered at their anchors, and that all on board perished.\n\nThe day being now Sabbath, and the whole town idle, everybody in a\nmanner was down on the beach, to help and mourn as the bodies, one after\nanother, were cast out by the waves. Alas! few were the better of my\nprovident preparation, and it was a thing not to be described to see,\nfor more than a mile along the coast, the new-made widows and fatherless\nbairns, mourning and weeping over the corpses of those they loved.\nSeventeen bodies were, before ten o\u2019clock, carried to the desolated\ndwellings of their families; and when old Thomas Pull, the betheral,\nwent to ring the bell for public worship, such was the universal sorrow\nof the town, that Nanse Donsie, an idiot natural, ran up the street to\nstop him, crying, in the voice of pardonable desperation, \u201cWha, in sic a\ntime, can praise the Lord?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n GRIZEL COCHRANE.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nThe age which this noble woman adorned with her life and heroic actions\nwas that gloomy one extending between the Restoration and Revolution\n(from 1660 to 1688), when the Scottish nation suffered under a cruel\noppression, on account of their conscientious scruples respecting the\nexisting forms of Church and State. Three insurrections, more bold than\nwise, marked the impatience of the Scots under this bloody rule; but it\nwas with the last solely that Grizel Cochrane was connected.\n\nSir John Cochrane of Ochiltree, the father of our heroine, was the\nsecond son of the first Earl of Dundonald, and the ancestor of the\npresent line of that noble and ingenious family. He was a distinguished\nfriend of Sidney, Russell, and other illustrious men, who signalised\nthemselves in England by their opposition to the court; and he had so\nlong endeavoured in vain to procure some improvement in the national\naffairs, that he at length began to despair of his country altogether,\nand formed the design of emigrating to America. Having gone to London in\n1683, with a view to a colonising expedition to South Carolina, he\nbecame involved in the deliberations of the Whig party, which at that\ntime tended towards a general insurrection in England and Scotland, for\nthe purpose of forcing an alteration of the royal councils, and the\nexclusion of the Duke of York from the throne. In furtherance of this\nplan, Sir John pledged himself to assist the Earl of Argyle in raising\nthe malcontents in Scotland. This earl was, if not the acknowledged head\nof the party in that kingdom, at least the man of highest rank who\nespoused its interests.\n\nBy the treachery of some of his subordinate agents, this design was\ndetected prematurely; and while some were unfortunately taken and\nexecuted, among whom were Sidney and Lord Russell, the rest fled from\nthe kingdom. Of the latter number were the Earl of Argyle, Sir John\nCochrane, and Sir Patrick Hume of Polwarth,\u2014the last a patriot rivalling\nCochrane in talent and purity of motives, and also, like him, destined\nto experience the devotedness of a daughter\u2019s love. The fugitives found\nsafety in Holland, where they remained in peace till the death of\nCharles the Second, in February 1685, when the Duke of York, the object\npolitically of their greatest detestation, became king. It was then\ndetermined to invade Scotland with a small force, to embody the Highland\nadherents of Argyle with the west country Presbyterians, and, marching\ninto England, to raise the people as they moved along, and not rest till\nthey had produced the desired melioration of the State.\n\nThe expedition sailed in May, but the Government was enabled to take\nsuch precautions as, from the very first, proved a complete frustration\nto their designs. Argyle lingered timidly in his own country, and\nfinally, against the advice of Cochrane and Hume, who were his chief\nofficers, made some unfortunate movements, which ended in the entire\ndissolution of his army, and his own capture and death. While this\nwell-meaning but weak nobleman committed himself to a low disguise, in\nthe vain hope of effecting his escape, Sir John Cochrane and Sir Patrick\nHume headed a body of 200 men, formed out of the relics of the army, and\nbravely resolved, even with that small force, to attempt the\naccomplishment of their original intention\u2014namely, a march into England.\nThey accordingly crossed the Clyde into Renfrewshire, where they\ncalculated on obtaining some reinforcement. The boats on this occasion\nbeing insufficient to transport the whole at once, the first party,\nheaded by the two patriots, was obliged to contend, on the opposite bank\nof the river, with a large squadron of militia, while the boats returned\nfor the remainder; after which the united force caused their opponents\nto retreat. The militia returned, however, in greater force, and renewed\nthe assault at a place called Muirdykes, in the parish of Lochwinnoch.\nThey were now commanded by Lord Ross and a Captain Clellan, and amounted\nto two troops, while Sir John Cochrane\u2019s men had decreased to seventy in\nnumber.\n\nIn this predicament they were called on by the royal troops to lay down\ntheir arms, and surrender themselves prisoners. But preferring the risk\nof death on the field to the tender mercies of a vindictive foe, they\nrejected the terms with disdain, and, entering a sheepfold, used its\nfrail sod walls as a defence against the furious attack of the enemy,\nwhom, after a keen conflict, in which every man fought hand to hand with\nhis opponents, they at length succeeded in beating off, with the loss of\ntheir captain and some other men, while Lord Ross was wounded. Cochrane,\nhowever, soon after learned that the enemy was returning with a great\nreinforcement, and fearing that he could not much longer defend himself\non the field, retired with his troops to a neighbouring wilderness or\nmorass, where he dismissed them, with the request that each man would\nprovide the best way he could for his own safety. For himself, having\nreceived two severe contusions in the body during the engagement, and\nbeing worn out with fatigue, he sought refuge in the house of his uncle,\nMr Gavin Cochrane of Craigmuir, who lived at no great distance from the\nplace of encounter. This gentleman, however, as it unfortunately\nhappened, had married a sister of the Captain Clellan killed in the late\nbattle, and, filled with revenge for the death of her brother, this lady\nsecretly informed against her guest, who was immediately seized and\nremoved to Edinburgh, where, after being paraded through the streets,\nbound and bareheaded, and conducted by the common hangman, he was lodged\nin the Tolbooth on the 3d of July 1685, there to await his trial as a\ntraitor. The day of trial came, and he was condemned to death, in spite\nof the most strenuous exertions of his aged father, the Earl of\nDundonald, who, having received his title from the hands of Charles the\nSecond, had, from motives of honour, never conspired against him.\n\nWhere is the tongue that can express all the secret and varied anguish\nthat penetrates the yearning heart, when about to leave for ever the\nwarm precincts of mortality, to quit the loving charities of life, and\nto have all the cords which bound it to existence suddenly torn asunder?\nNatural strength of mind may suffice to conceal much of this mortal\nconflict, or even to hide it altogether from the eye of the careless\nobserver, but still it is at work within, and grapples in deadly\nstruggle with the spirit.\n\nSuch was the state of Cochrane\u2019s mind on the night of his condemnation,\nwhen left once more to the gloomy solitude of his prison. It was not the\nparting stroke of death he feared, however sharp. He was a father,\nloving and beloved; and the thoughts of the sorrow his children were\ndoomed to suffer on his account, wrung his heart, and burning tears,\nwhich his own fate could not have called forth, were shed for them. No\nfriend or relative had been permitted to see him from the time of his\napprehension; but it was now signified to him, that any of his family\nthat he desired to communicate with might be allowed to visit him.\nAnxious, however, to deprive his enemies of an opportunity of an\naccusation against his sons, he immediately conveyed to them his earnest\nentreaties, and indeed commands, that they should refrain from availing\nthemselves of this leave till the night before his execution. This was a\nsacrifice which it required his utmost fortitude to make; and it had\nleft him to a sense of the most desolate loneliness, insomuch that when,\nlate in the evening, he heard his prison door unlocked, he lifted not\nhis eyes towards it, imagining that the person who entered could only be\nthe jailer, who was particularly repulsive in his countenance and\nmanner. What, then, was his surprise and momentary delight, when he\nbeheld before him his only daughter, and felt her arms entwining his\nneck! Yet, when he looked on her face, and saw the expression it bore of\nmute despairing agony, more fearful than the most frantic manifestations\nof misery, and marked her pale cheeks, which no longer bloomed with the\ntints of health and happiness, and felt the cold dampness of her brow,\nhe thought himself wrong for having given way for an instant to the joy\nher presence had created, and every other sensation fled before the fear\nof what might be the consequence to her of this interview. He had no\nsooner, however, expressed his feelings on this subject, than she became\nsensible that, in order to palliate his misery, she must put a strong\ncurb upon her own, and in a short time was calm enough to enter into\nconversation with her father upon the dismal subject of his present\nsituation, and to deliver a message from the old earl, her grandfather,\nby which he was informed that an appeal had been made from him to the\nking, and means taken to propitiate Father Peters, his Majesty\u2019s\nconfessor, who, it was well known, often dictated to him in matters of\nState. It appeared evident, however, by the turn which their discourse\npresently took, that neither father nor daughter was at all sanguine in\ntheir hopes from this negotiation. The Earl of Argyle had been executed\nbut a few days before, as had also several of his principal adherents,\nthough men of less consequence than Sir John Cochrane; and it was\ntherefore improbable that he, who had been so conspicuously active in\nthe insurrection, should be allowed to escape the punishment which it\nwas now in their power to inflict. Besides all this, the treaty to be\nentered into with Father Peters would require some time to adjust, and\nmeanwhile the arrival of the warrant for execution must every day be\nlooked for.\n\nUnder these circumstances, several days passed, each of which found Miss\nGrizel Cochrane an inmate of her father\u2019s prison for as many hours as\nshe was permitted. During these interviews of the father and daughter,\nwhile heart clung unto heart, they reaped all the consolation which an\nundisguised knowledge of the piety and courage of each could bestow.\nStill, after such intercourse, the parting scene which they anticipated\nseemed more and more dreadful to think of; and, as the daughter looked\non the pale and dejected countenance of her parent, her bosom was\npenetrated with the sharpest pangs. The love of her father might be\ntermed a component part of her nature. She had cherished this filial\nlove ever since she possessed a consciousness of thought, and it was now\nstrong and absorbing, in proportion to the danger in which he stood.\nGrizel Cochrane was only at that period eighteen years old; but it is\nthe effect of such perilous times as those in which she lived to sober\nthe reckless spirit of youth, and make men and women of children. She\nhad, however, a natural strength of character, that would, on all\nextraordinary occasions, have displayed itself without such a tuition,\nand which, being now joined with what she conceived the necessity of the\ncase, rendered her capable of a deed which has caused her history to vie\nwith that of the most distinguished of heroines.\n\nEver since her father\u2019s condemnation, her daily and nightly thoughts had\ndwelt on the fear of her grandfather\u2019s communication with the king\u2019s\nconfessor being rendered unavailable, for want of the time necessary for\nenabling the friends in London, to whom it was trusted, to make their\napplication, and she boldly determined to execute a plan, whereby the\narrival of the death warrant would be retarded. A short time, therefore,\nbefore it was expected by the council in Edinburgh, she thought it\nnecessary, in her visit to her father, to mention that some urgent\naffair would prevent her from seeing him again for a few days. Alarmed\nat this, and penetrating her design of effecting somewhat in his favour,\nhe warned her against attempting impossibilities.\n\n\u201cNothing is impossible to a determined mind,\u201d said she; \u201cand fear\nnothing for me.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut the inexperience of youth, my child,\u201d he replied, \u201cmay involve you\nin danger and in blame; and did you but know the characters of those you\nmust encounter, while vainly pleading for your father\u2019s life, you would\nfear, as I do, the sullying of your fair fame.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am a Cochrane, my father!\u201d said the heroic girl\u2014an answer how brief,\nbut to him how expressive! He could say no more; he beheld in his child,\nso young, so beautiful, and so self-devoted, all the virtues of her race\ncombined, and he felt for the moment that the courage she had prayed for\nwould be granted to carry her through the undertaking she meditated,\nwhatever that might be. She felt grateful to her father that he did not\nurge her further; but she trembled as she turned, at her departure, to\ncatch another look of those loved and venerated features; for his eye\nappeared to be following her with a parting expression, which seemed to\nsay it was the last fond look.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nAt that time horses were used as a mode of conveyance so much more than\ncarriages, that almost every gentlewoman had her own steed, and Miss\nCochrane, being a skilful rider, was possessed of a well-managed\npalfrey, on whose speed and other qualities she had been accustomed to\ndepend. On the morning after she had bid her father farewell, long ere\nthe inhabitants of Edinburgh were astir, she found herself many miles on\nthe road to the Borders. She had taken care to attire herself in a\nmanner which corresponded with the design of passing herself off for a\nyoung serving-woman journeying on a borrowed horse to the house of her\nmother in a distant part of the country; and by only resting at solitary\ncottages, where she generally found the family out at work, save perhaps\nan old woman or some children, she had the good fortune, on the second\nday after leaving Edinburgh, to reach in safety the abode of her old\nnurse, who lived on the English side of the Tweed, four miles beyond the\ntown of Berwick. In this woman she knew she could place implicit\nconfidence, and to her, therefore, revealed her secret. She was\nresolved, she said, to make an attempt to save her father\u2019s life, by\nstopping the postman, an equestrian like herself, and forcing him to\ndeliver up his bags, in which she expected to find the fatal warrant.\nSingular as such a determination may appear in a delicate young woman,\nespecially if we consider that she was aware of the arms always carried\nby the man to whose charge the mail was committed, it is nevertheless an\nundoubted fact that such was her resolve. In pursuance of this design,\nshe had brought with her a brace of small pistols, together with a\nhorseman\u2019s cloak tied up in a bundle, and hung on the crutch of her\nsaddle; and now borrowed from her nurse the attire of her\nfoster-brother, which, as he was a slight-made lad, fitted her\nreasonably well.\n\nAt that period, all those appliances which at this day accelerate the\nprogress of the traveller were unknown, and the mail from London, which\nnow arrives in about ten hours, took eight days in reaching the Scottish\ncapital. Miss Cochrane thus calculated on a delay of sixteen or\nseventeen days in the execution of her father\u2019s sentence\u2014a space of time\nwhich she deemed amply sufficient to give a fair trial to the treaty set\non foot for his liberation. She had, by means which it is unnecessary\nhere to detail, possessed herself of the most minute information with\nregard to the places at which the postmen rested on their journey, one\nof which was a small public-house, kept by a widow woman, on the\noutskirts of the little town of Belford. There the man who received the\nbag at Durham was accustomed to arrive about six o\u2019clock in the morning,\nand take a few hours\u2019 repose before proceeding farther on his\njourney.[19] In pursuance of the plan laid down by Miss Cochrane, she\narrived at this inn about an hour after the man had composed himself to\nsleep, in the hope of being able, by the exercise of her wit and\ndexterity, to ease him of his charge.\n\nFootnote 19:\n\n Lest it should appear at issue with probability that the postman\n should thus \u201ctake his ease at his inn,\u201d it may be mentioned, as a fact\n defying all question, that this official, at a period much later, used\n sometimes to dismount on a muir, near the place here mentioned, and\n partake of a game at quoits, or other sports which might be proceeding\n by the wayside.\n\nHaving put her horse into the stable, which was a duty that devolved on\nthe guests at this little change-house, from its mistress having no\nostler, she entered the only apartment which the house afforded, and\ndemanded refreshment.\n\n\u201cSit down at the end of that table,\u201d said the old woman, \u201cfor the best I\nhave to give you is there already; and be pleased, my bonnie man, to\nmake as little noise as ye can, for there\u2019s ane asleep in that bed that\nI like ill to disturb.\u201d\n\nMiss Cochrane promised fairly; and after attempting to eat some of the\nviands, which were the remains of the sleeping man\u2019s meal, she asked for\nsome cold water.\n\n\u201cWhat!\u201d said the old dame, as she handed it to her; \u201cye are a\nwater-drinker, are ye? It\u2019s but an ill custom for a change-house.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am aware of that,\u201d replied her guest; \u201cand therefore, when in a\npublic-house, I always pay for it the price of the stronger potation,\nwhich I cannot take.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed!\u2014well, that is but just,\u201d said the landlady; \u201cand I think the\nmore of you for such reasonable conduct.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs the well where you get this water near at hand?\u201d said the young\nlady; \u201cfor if you will take the trouble to bring me some from it, as\nthis is rather warm, it shall be considered in the lawing.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is a good bit off,\u201d responded the landlady; \u201cbut I cannot refuse to\nfetch some for such a civil, discreet lad, and will be as quick as I\ncan; but, for any sake, take care and don\u2019t meddle with these pistols,\u201d\nshe continued, pointing to a pair of pistols on the table, \u201cfor they are\nloaded, and I am always terrified for them.\u201d\n\nSaying this, she disappeared; and Miss Cochrane, who would have\ncontrived some other errand for her, had the well been near, no sooner\nsaw the door shut, than she passed, with trembling eagerness, and a\ncautious but rapid step, to the place where the man lay soundly\nsleeping, in one of those close wooden bedsteads common in the houses of\nthe poor, the door of which was left half open to admit the air, and\nwhich she opened still wider, in the hope of seeing the mail-bag, and\nbeing able to seize upon it. But what was her dismay when she beheld\nonly a part of the integument which contained what she would have\nsacrificed her life a thousand times to obtain, just peeping out from\nbelow the shaggy head and brawny shoulders of its keeper, who lay in\nsuch a position upon it as to give not the smallest hope of its\nextraction without his being aroused from his nap.\n\nA few bitter moments of observation served to convince her that\npossession of this treasure must be obtained in some other way; and,\nagain closing the door of the bed, she approached the pistols, and\nhaving taken them from the holsters, she as quickly as possible drew the\nloading, which having secreted, she then returned them to their cases,\nand resumed her seat at the foot of the table. She had barely time to\nrecover from the agitation into which the fear of the man\u2019s awakening\nduring her recent occupation had thrown her, when the old woman returned\nwith the water; and having taken a draught, of which she stood much in\nneed, she settled her account much to her landlady\u2019s content, by paying\nfor the water the price of a pot of beer. Having then carelessly asked\nand ascertained how much longer the other guest was likely to continue\nhis sleep, she left the house, and mounting her horse, set off at a\ntrot, in a different direction from that in which she had arrived.\n\nMaking a compass of two or three miles, she once more fell into the high\nroad between Belford and Berwick, where she walked her horse gently on,\nawaiting the coming up of the postman. Though all her faculties were now\nabsorbed in one aim, and the thought of her father\u2019s deliverance still\nreigned supreme in her mind, yet she could not help occasionally\nfiguring to herself the possibility of her tampering with the pistols\nbeing discovered, and their loading replaced, in which case it was more\nthan likely that her life would be the forfeit of the act she meditated.\nA woman\u2019s fears would still intrude, notwithstanding all her heroism,\nand the glorious issue which promised to attend the success of her\nenterprise. When she at length saw and heard the postman advancing\nbehind her, the strong necessity of the case gave her renewed courage;\nand it was with perfect coolness that, on his coming close up, she\ncivilly saluted him, put her horse into the same pace with his, and rode\non for some way in his company. He was a strong, thick-set fellow, with\na good-humoured countenance, which did not seem to Miss Cochrane, as she\nlooked anxiously upon it, to savour much of hardy daring. He rode with\nthe mail-bags (for there were two\u2014one containing the letters direct from\nLondon, and the other those taken up at the different post-offices on\nthe road) strapped firmly to his saddle in front, close to the holsters.\nAfter riding a short distance together, Miss Cochrane deemed it time, as\nthey were nearly half-way between Belford and Berwick, to commence her\noperations. She therefore rode nearly close to her companion, and said,\nin a tone of determination,\u2014\n\n\u201cFriend, I have taken a fancy for those mail-bags of yours, and I must\nhave them; therefore, take my advice, and deliver them up quietly, for I\nam provided for all hazards. I am mounted, as you see, on a fleet steed;\nI carry firearms; and, moreover, am allied with those who are stronger,\nthough not bolder than myself. You see yonder wood,\u201d she continued,\npointing to one at the distance of about a mile, with an accent and air\nwhich was meant to carry intimidation with it; \u201cagain, I say, take my\nadvice; give me the bags, and speed back the road you came for the\npresent, nor dare to approach that wood for at least two or three hours\nto come.\u201d\n\nThere was in such language from a stripling something so surprising that\nthe man looked on Miss Cochrane for an instant in silent and unfeigned\namazement.\n\n\u201cIf you mean, my young master,\u201d said he, as soon as he found his tongue,\n\u201cto make yourself merry at my expense, you are welcome. I am no sour\nchurl to take offence at the idle words of a foolish boy. But if,\u201d he\nsaid, taking one of the pistols from the holster, and turning its muzzle\ntowards her, \u201cye are mad enough to harbour one serious thought of such a\nmatter, I am ready for you. But, methinks, my lad, you seem at an age\nwhen robbing a garden or an old woman\u2019s fruit-stall would befit you\nbetter, if you must turn thief, than taking his Majesty\u2019s mails upon his\nown highway, from such a stout man as I am. Be thankful, however, that\nyou have met with one who will not shed blood if he can help it, and\nsheer off before you provoke me to fire.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay,\u201d said his young antagonist, \u201cI am not fonder of bloodshed than you\nare; but if you will not be persuaded, what can I do? for I have told\nyou a truth, _that mail I must and will have_. So now choose,\u201d she\ncontinued, as she drew one of the small pistols from under her cloak,\nand deliberately cocking it, presented it in his face.\n\n\u201cThen your blood be upon your own head,\u201d said the fellow, as he raised\nhis hand, and fired his pistol, which, however, only flashed in the pan.\nDashing this weapon to the ground, he lost not a moment in pulling out\nthe other, which he also aimed at his assailant, and fired with the same\nresult. In a transport of rage and disappointment, the man sprung from\nhis horse, and made an attempt to seize her; but by an adroit use of her\nspurs she eluded his grasp, and placed herself out of his reach.\nMeanwhile his horse had moved forward some yards, and to see and seize\nthe advantage presented by this circumstance was one and the same to the\nheroic girl, who, darting towards it, caught the bridle, and having led\nher prize off about a hundred yards, stopped while she called to the\nthunderstruck postman to remind him of her advice about the wood. She\nthen put both horses to their speed, and on turning to look at the man\nshe had robbed, had the pleasure of perceiving that her mysterious\nthreat had taken effect, and he was now pursuing his way back to\nBelford.\n\nMiss Cochrane speedily entered the wood to which she had alluded, and\ntying the strange horse to a tree, out of all observation from the road,\nproceeded to unfasten the straps of the mail. By means of a sharp\npenknife, which set at defiance the appended locks, she was soon\nmistress of the contents, and with an eager hand broke open the\nGovernment dispatches, which were unerringly pointed out to her by their\naddress to the council in Edinburgh, and their imposing weight and broad\nseals of office. Here she found not only the warrant for her father\u2019s\ndeath, but also many other sentences inflicting different degrees of\npunishment on various delinquents. These, however, it may be readily\nsupposed, she did not then stop to examine; she contented herself with\ntearing them into small fragments, and placing them carefully in her\nbosom.\n\nThe intrepid girl now mounted her steed, and rode off, leaving all the\nprivate papers as she had found them, imagining\u2014what eventually proved\nthe case\u2014that they would be discovered ere long, from the hints she had\nthrown out about the wood, and thus reach their proper places of\ndestination. She now made all haste to reach the cottage of her nurse,\nwhere, having not only committed to the flames the fragments of the\ndreaded warrant, but also the other obnoxious papers, she quickly\nresumed her female garments, and was again, after this manly and daring\naction, the simple and unassuming Miss Grizel Cochrane. Leaving the\ncloak and pistols behind her, to be concealed by her nurse, she again\nmounted her horse, and directed her flight towards Edinburgh, and by\navoiding as much as possible the high road, and resting at sequestered\ncottages, as she had done before (and that only twice for a couple of\nhours each time), she reached town early in the morning of the next day.\n\nIt must now suffice to say that the time gained by the heroic act above\nrelated was productive of the end for which it was undertaken, and that\nSir John Cochrane was pardoned, at the instigation of the king\u2019s\nfavourite counsellor, who interceded for him in consequence of receiving\na bribe of five thousand pounds from the Earl of Dundonald. Of the\nfeelings which on this occasion filled the heart of his courageous and\ndevoted daughter, we cannot speak in adequate terms; and it is perhaps\nbest at any rate to leave them to the imagination of the reader. The\nstate of the times was not such for several years as to make it prudent\nthat her adventure should be publicly known; but after the Revolution,\nwhen the country was at length relieved from persecution and danger, and\nevery man was at liberty to speak of the trials he had undergone, and\nthe expedients by which he had mastered them, her heroism was neither\nunknown nor unapproved. Miss Cochrane afterwards married Mr Ker of\nMoriston, in the county of Berwick; and there can be little doubt that\nshe proved equally affectionate and amiable as a wife, as she had\nalready been dutiful and devoted as a daughter.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh\nJournal._\n\n\n\n\n THE FATAL PRAYER.\n\n\nThe village of Gourock is situated on the shore of a fine bay, about two\nmiles from the town of Greenock. I was taken with the pleasantness of\nits situation, when one day viewing it at a little distance on the\nGreenock road, and sat down on the dyke by the roadside to enjoy the\nprospect at my leisure.\n\nPresently an elderly man, of a grave aspect and a maritime appearance,\npassing slowly along the road, came and sat down near the same place. I\nguessed him to be one of the better class of fishermen, who had\npurchased, with the toil of his youth and his manhood, a little\nbreathing-time to look about him in the evening of his days, ere the\ncoming of night. After the usual salutations, we fell into discourse\ntogether, and I found him to be a man who had looked well about him in\nhis pilgrimage, and reasoned on things and feelings\u2014not living as the\nbrutes that perish. After a pause in the conversation, he remarked, to\nmy thinking, in a disjointed manner\u2014\n\n\u201cIs it not strange, sir, that the thoughts that sometimes come into the\nbrain of a man sleeping or waking\u2014like a wind that blows across his\nbosom, coming he knows not whence, and going he knows not whither\u2014leave\nbehind them an impression and a feeling, and become the springs of human\naction, and mingle in the thread of human destiny?\u201d\n\n\u201cStrange, indeed,\u201d said I. \u201cWhat you say has more than once occurred to\nme; but being unable to reason satisfactorily on the subject, I set down\naltogether such ideas as having no better foundation than the fears and\nsuperstitions of the ignorant. But it seems to me that your remark,\nthough of a general nature, must have been made in mental reference to\nsome particular thing; and I would fain crave to know what it is.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are right,\u201d said he; \u201cI was thinking at the moment of something\nwhich has sat, for some days past, like a millstone on my mind: and I\nwill tell it to you with pleasure.\u201d\n\nSo I edged myself closer to him on the stones, that I might hear the\nbetter; and without more ado he began to discourse as follows:\n\n\u201cAbout six months ago, a wedding took place in the village, and a more\ncomely and amiable couple never came together. Mr Douglas, though the\nson of a poor man, had been an officer in the army,\u2014an ensign, I\nbelieve,\u2014and when his regiment was disbanded, he came to live here on\nhis half-pay, and whatever little else he might have. Jeanie Stuart at\nthe time was staying with an uncle, one of our own folk, her parents\nhaving both been taken away from her; and she made up, as far as she\ncould, for her board, by going in the summer season to sew in the\nfamilies that come from the great towns for the sea-bathing. So gentle\nshe was, and so calm in her deportment, and so fair to look on withal,\nthat even these nobility of the loom and the sugar-hogshead thought it\nno dishonour to have her among them; and unconsciously, as it were, they\ntreated her just as if she had been of the same human mould with\nthemselves.\n\n\u201cWell, they soon got acquainted,\u2014our Jeanie and Mr Douglas,\u2014and drew\nkindly together; and the end of it was they were married. They lived in\na house there, just beyond the point that you may see forms the opposite\nangle of the bay, not far from a place called Kempock; and Mr Douglas\njust employed himself, like any of us, in fishing and daundering about,\nand mending his nets, and such like. Jeanie was the happy woman now, for\nshe had aye a mind above the commonality; and, I am bold to say, thought\nher stay long enough among these would-be gentry, where she sat many a\nwearisome day for no use, and would fain have retired from their\nfoolishness into the strength and greenness of her own soul. But now she\nhad a companion and an equal, and indeed a superior; for Mr Douglas had\nseen the world, and had read both books and men, and could wile away the\ntime in discoursing of what he had seen and heard tell of in foreign\nlands, among strange people and unknown tongues. And Jeanie listened,\nand listened, and thought her husband the first of mankind. She clung to\nhim as the honeysuckle clings to the tree: his pleasure was her\npleasure\u2014his sorrow was her sorrow\u2014his bare word was her law.\n\n\u201cOne day, about two weeks ago, she appeared dull and dispirited, and\ncomplained of a slight headache; on which Mr Douglas advised her to go\nto bed and rest herself awhile; which she said she would do; and having\nsome business in the village he went out. On coming back, however, in\nthe forenoon, he found her just in the same spot, leaning her head on\nher hand; but she told him she was better, and that it was nothing at\nall. He then began to get his nets ready, saying he was going out with\nsome lads of the village to the deep-sea fishing, and would be back the\nnext day. She looked at him, but said nothing; long and strangely she\nlooked, as if wondering what he was doing, and not understanding\nanything that was going on. But finally when he came to kiss her and bid\nher good-bye, she threw her arms round him, and when he would have gone\nshe held him fast, and her bosom heaved as if her heart would break; but\nstill she said nothing.\n\n\u201c\u2018What can be the matter with you, Jeanie?\u2019 said Mr Douglas.\n\n\u201c\u2018Stay with me to-day,\u2019 said she at last; \u2018depart not this night, just\nthis one night\u2014it is not much to ask\u2014to-morrow you may go where you\nplease, and I will not be your hindrance a moment.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut Mr Douglas was vexed at such folly, and she could answer nothing to\nhis questions, except that a thought had come into her head, and she\ncould not help it. So he was resolved to go, and kissing her fondly, he\nthrew his nets on his shoulders and went away.\n\n\u201cFor some minutes after his departure Jeanie did not move from the spot,\nbut stood looking at the door whence he had gone out, and then began to\ntremble all over like the leaf of a tree. At length, coming to herself\nwith a start, she knelt down, and throwing back her hair from her\nforehead, turned her face up towards heaven, and prayed with a loud\nvoice to the Almighty, that she \u2018might have her husband in her arms that\nnight.\u2019 For some moments she remained motionless and silent in the same\nattitude, till at length a sort of brightness, resembling a calm smile,\npassed over her countenance like a gleam of sunshine on the smooth sea,\nand bending her head low and reverently, she rose up. She then went as\nusual about her household affairs, and appeared not anything\ndiscomposed, but as tranquil and happy as if nothing had happened.\n\n\u201cNow the weather was fine and calm in the morning, but towards the\nafternoon it came on to blow; and indeed the air had been so sultry all\nday, that the seafarers might easily tell there would be a racket of the\nelements before long. As the wind, however, had been rather contrary, it\nwas supposed that the boats could not have got far enough out to be in\nthe mischief, but would put back when they saw the signs in the sky. But\nin the meantime the wind increased, till towards night it blew as hard a\ngale as we have seen in these parts for a long time. The ships out\nthere, at the Tail of the Bank, were driven from their moorings, and two\nof them stranded on their beam ends on the other side; every stick and\nstitch on the sea made for any port they could find; and as the night\ncame on in darkness and thunder, it was a scene that might cow even\nhearts that had been brought up on the water as if it was their proper\nelement, and been familiar with the voice of the tempest from their\nyoung days. There was a sad lamenting and murmuring then, among the\nwomen folk especially\u2014them that were kith or kin to the lads on the sea;\nand they went to one another\u2019s houses in the midst of the storm and the\nrain, and put in their pale faces through the darkness, as if searching\nfor hope and comfort, and drawing close to one another like a flock of\nfrightened sheep in their fellowship of grief and fear. But there was\none who stirred not from her house, and who felt no terror at the\nshrieking of the night-storm, and sought for no comfort in the\ncountenance of man\u2014and that was the wife of Mr Douglas. She sometimes,\nindeed, listened to the howling of the sea that came by fits on her ear\nlike the voice of the water-kelpie, and starting would lay down her work\nfor a moment; but then she remembered the prayer she had prayed to Him\nwho holds the reins of the tempest in His hands, and who says to the\nroaring waters, \u2018Be still,\u2019 and they are still\u2014and the glorious balm she\nhad felt to sink into her heart at that moment of high and holy\ncommunion, even like the dew of heaven on a parched land. So her soul\nwas comforted, and she said to herself, \u2018God is not a man that He can\nlie;\u2019 and she rested on His assurance as on a rock, and laughed to scorn\nthe tremblings of her woman\u2019s bosom. For why? The anchor of her hope was\nin heaven, and what earthly storm was so mighty as to remove it? Then\nshe got up, and put the room in order, and placed her husband\u2019s slippers\nto air at the fireside; and stirred up the fuel, and drew in the\narm-chair for her weary and storm-beaten mariner. Then would she listen\nat the door, and look out into the night for his coming; but she could\nhear no sound save the voice of the waters, and the roar of the tempest,\nas it rushed along the deep. She re-entered the house, and walked to and\nfro in the room with a restless step, but an unblenched cheek.\n\n\u201cAt last the neighbours came to her house, knowing that her husband was\none of those who had gone out that day, and told her that they were\ngoing to walk down towards the Clough, even in the mirk hour, to try if\nthey could not hear some news of the boats. So she went with them, and\nwe all walked together along the road\u2014women and men, it might be, some\ntwenty or thirty of us. But it was remarked, that though she came not\nhurriedly nor in fear, yet she had not even thrown her cloak on her\nshoulders, to defend her from the night air, but came forth with her\nhead uncovered, and in her usual raiment of white, like a bride to the\naltar. As we passed along, it must have been a strange sight to see so\nmany pale faces by the red glare of the torches they carried, and to\nhear so many human wailings filling up the pauses of the storm; but at\nthe head of our melancholy procession there was a calm heart and a firm\nstep, and they were Jeanie\u2019s. Sometimes, indeed, she would look back, as\nsome cry of womanish foreboding from behind would smite on her ear, and\nstrange thoughts would crowd into her mind; and once she was heard to\nmutter\u2014if her prayer had but saved her husband to bind some other\ninnocent victim to the mysterious altar of wrath! And she stopped for a\nmoment, as if in anguish at the wild imagination.\n\n\u201cBut now as we drew nearer the rocks where the lighthouse is built,\nsounds were heard distinctly on the shore, and we waved the torches in\nthe air, and gave a great shout, which was answered by known voices\u2014for\nthey were some of our own people\u2014and our journey was at an end. A number\nof us then went on before, and groped our way among the rocks as well as\nwe could in the darkness; but a woful tale met our ear; for one of the\nboats had been shattered to pieces while endeavouring to land there, and\nwhen he went down they were just dragging the body of a comrade, stiff\nand stark, from the sea. When the women behind heard of this, there was\na terrible cry of dismay, for no one knew but it might be her own\nhusband, son, or brother; and some who carried lights dropped them from\nfear, and others held them trembling to have the terrors of their hearts\nconfirmed.\n\n\u201cThere was one, however, who stood calm and unmoved by the side of the\ndead body. She spoke some words of holy comfort to the women, and they\nwere silent at her voice. She then stepped lightly forward, and took a\ntorch from the trembling hand that held it, and bent down with it beside\nthe corpse. As the light fell one moment on her own fair face, it showed\nno signs of womanish feeling at the sight and touch of mortality; a\nbright and lovely bloom glowed on her cheek, and a heavenly lustre\nbeamed in her eye; and as she knelt there, her white garments and long\ndark hair floating far on the storm, there was that in her look which\ndrew the gaze even of that terrified group from the object of their\ndoubt and dread. The next moment the light fell on the face of the\ndead\u2014the torch dropped from her hand, and she fell upon the body of her\nhusband! _Her prayer was granted._ She held her husband in her arms that\nnight, and although no struggles of parting life were heard or seen, she\ndied on his breast.\u201d\n\nWhen the fisherman had concluded his story\u2014and after some observations\nwere made by us both, touching the mysterious warning, joined with a\ngrateful acknowledgment that the stroke of death might be as often dealt\nin mercy as in wrath\u2014we shook hands; and asking one another\u2019s names, as\nit might so fortune that we should once more, in the course of our\nearthly pilgrimage, be within call of one another, the old man and I\nparted, going each his several way.\u2014_Literary Melange._\n\n\n\n\n GLENMANNOW, THE STRONG HERDSMAN.\n\n BY WILLIAM BENNET.\n\n\nDuke James of Queensberry, like others of our nobility and gentry,\nresided during a part of the year in London; and on one of his visits to\nthe metropolis, he and a party of friends happened to have a match at\ndiscus, or, as it is more commonly called, \u201cputting the stone.\u201d Several\nadepts happened to be of the party, who boasted much of their superior\nstrength and adroitness, and after making one of their best throws,\noffered to stake a large sum that not one of their companions knew of or\ncould find a person to match it.\n\n\u201cThe throw is certainly a good one,\u201d said the Duke of Queensberry; \u201cyet\nI think it were easy to find many champions of sufficient muscle to show\nus a much better. I myself have a homely unpractised herdsman in\nScotland, on whose head I will stake the sum you mention, that he shall\nthrow the quoit fully two yards over the best of you.\u201d\n\n\u201cDone! produce your man!\u201d was the reply of all; and the duke accordingly\nlost no time in dispatching a letter to one of his servants at\nDrumlanrig, ordering him to set out immediately on its receipt for\nGlenmannow, and to come with honest John M\u2018Call to London without delay.\n\nThe duke\u2019s letter with Glenmannow was not less absolute than the order\nof an emperor. He wondered, but never thought of demurring; and without\nany further preparation than clothing himself in his Sunday\u2019s suit, and\ngiving Mally his wife a few charges about looking to the hill in his\nabsence, he assumed his large staff, and departed with the servant for\n\u201cLunnun.\u201d\n\nOn his arrival, the duke informed him of the purpose for which he had\nbeen sent, and desired that on the day, and at the hour appointed, he\nshould make his appearance along with one of his servants, who knew\nperfectly the back streets and by-lanes of London, and who, after he\nshould have decided the bet, would conduct him immediately in safety\nfrom the ground, as it was not improbable that his appearance and\nperformance might attract a crowd and lead to unpleasant consequences.\nWhen the day arrived, the party assembled and proceeded to the ground,\nwhere, to the duke\u2019s surprise, though not to his terror, his crafty\nopponents chose a spot directly in front of a high wall, and at such a\ndistance that the best of their party should pitch the quoit exactly to\nthe foot of it; so that their antagonist, to make good the duke\u2019s boast\nof \u201ctwo yards over them,\u201d should be obliged to exceed them those two\nyards in height, instead of straight forward distance. This implied such\nan effort as amounted in their minds to a physical impossibility; and as\nthe duke, from having neglected to specify the particular nature of the\nground, could not legally object to this advantage, they looked upon the\nvictory as already their own.\n\nThe quoit chosen was a large ball of lead, and already had the champion\nof the party tossed it to the wall, and demanded of the duke to produce\nthe man appointed to take it up. His grace\u2019s servant, who fully\ncomprehended the instructions given to him, entered at this crisis with\nthe \u2018buirdly\u2019 and, to them, uncouth Glenmannow. His appearance attracted\nno small notice, and even merriment; but the imperturbable object of it\nregarded the whole scene with the indifference peculiar to his\ncharacter; and, with his mind fixed only upon the great end for which he\nwas there, requested to be shown the quoit, and the spots from which and\nto where it had been thrown. This demand was soon complied with, and\nwhile he assumed his station, with the quoit in his hand, the duke\nwhispered in his ear the deception which had been practised, and urged\nhim to exert his whole force in order to render it unavailing.\n\n\u201cWill you throw off your coat? It will give you more freedom,\u201d said his\nGrace in conclusion.\n\n\u201cMy coat! Na, na; nae coats aff wi\u2019 me for this silly affair,\u201d replied\nhe. \u201cI thocht it had been some terrible I throw or ither that thae chaps\nhad made, when I was ca\u2019ed for a\u2019 the way to Lunnun to see to gang ayont\nthem; but if this be a\u2019, I wadna hae meaned ye to hae done\u2019t yoursel.\u201d\nThen poising the ball for a little in his hand, and viewing it with an\nair of contempt, \u201cThere!\u201d said he, tossing it carelessly from him into\nthe air, \u201che that likes may gang and fetch it back.\u201d\n\nThe ball, as if shot from the mouth of a cannon, flew on in a straight\nline completely over the wall, and alighted on the roof of a house at\nsome distance beyond it. Its weight and velocity forced it through the\ntiles, and with a crash which immediately caused the house to be\nevacuated by its inmates, it penetrated also the garret floor, and\nrolled upon that of the next storey. An instantaneous hubbub ensued,\u2014the\nparty staring at each other in silence, and the crowd swearing it was\nthe devil! but the servant knew his duty, and in a twinkling Glenmannow\nwas no longer amongst them.\n\nHis Grace, after paying for the damage done to the house, conducted the\nwhole party to his residence, there to discharge their forfeit, and to\ngaze upon the prodigy by whom they were vanquished. Glenmannow was well\nrewarded for his trouble and loss of time in journeying to London; and,\nover and above the immediate bounty of his Grace, he returned to his\nhonest Mally with a discharge for one year\u2019s rent of the farm in his\npocket.\n\nOne summer, during his Grace\u2019s residence at Drumlanrig, his friend the\nDuke of Buccleuch, who was at that time colonel of a regiment of\nfencibles, happened to be passing between Dumfries and Sanquhar with a\ncompany of his grenadiers; and having made Thornhill a station for the\nnight, he went and billeted himself upon his Grace of Queensberry, by\nwhom he was received with a hearty welcome. The two friends deeming one\nnight\u2019s intercourse too short, and Buccleuch\u2019s marching orders not being\nperemptory in regard to time, it was agreed between them that they\nshould spend the two succeeding days together, and that the soldiers,\nduring that period, should be distributed among the tenantry around the\ncastle.\n\nBuccleuch, though a personal stranger to Glenmannow, was no stranger to\nhis fame; and it was contrived between them, that a few of the\ngrenadiers should be dispatched to beat up his quarters, and endeavour\nto force themselves upon him as his guests. Six of the stoutest were\naccordingly selected for this purpose, and after being told the\ncharacter of the person to whom they were sent, and the joke which was\nintended to follow it, they received a formal billet, and set out for\ntheir destination. Their orders were to enter the house in a seemingly\nrough manner, to find fault with everything, to quarrel with Glenmannow,\nand endeavour, if possible, to overpower and bind him; but not on any\naccount to injure either his person or effects in even the slightest\ndegree. The soldiers, their commander knew, were arch fellows, and would\nacquit themselves in the true spirit of their instructions.\n\nIn those days few roads, excepting footpaths,\u2014and those frequently too\nindistinctly marked to be traced by a stranger,\u2014existed in the interior\nparts of the country. The soldiers, therefore, experienced no small\ndifficulty in marshalling their way around the slope of the huge\nCairnkinnow, in evading bogs and brakes, leaping burns and march dykes,\nand in traversing all the heights and hollows which lay between them and\ntheir secluded bourne. But the toils of their journey were more than\ncompensated by the pleasures of it, for the pilgrim must possess little\nof either fancy or feeling, who could wander without delight amid the\nwild scenery of that mountainous district. When the top of Glenquhargen\nis reached, and the bottom of the Glen of Scaur is beheld far, far\nbeneath your feet; when the little river, which gives to the glen its\nname, is seen, descending from the hills, like an infant commencing the\njourney of life, into the long level holm which spreads its bosom to\nreceive it; when, after descending, the eyes are cast around on its\namphitheatre of Alpine hills, arrayed in \u201cthe brightness of green,\u201d and\non the clouds that slumber, or the mists that curl along their summits;\nand when the head is thrown backward to contemplate the rocky peak of\nGlenquhargen, with the hawk, the gled, and the raven whirling,\nscreaming, and croaking around it, that individual were dull and\ndespicable indeed whose spirit would not fly forth and mingle, and\nidentify itself, as it were, with the grand and the beautiful around\nhim.\n\nIn a truly picturesque situation, on the side of one of the most\nnorthern of those hills, the soldiers beheld the house of Glenmannow. It\nwas a low, thatchroofed building, with a peat-stack leaning against one\ngable, and what might well be denominated a hut, which served for barn,\nbyre, and stable, attached to the other; while a short way farther up\nthe hill stood a round bucht, in which, upon occasion, the sturdy tenant\nwas in the habit of penning his flock. A more modern structure has now\nbeen reared in the immediate vicinity of Glenmannow\u2019s domicile; yet in\nthe beginning of the present century some vestiges of the ancient one\nwere still remaining.\n\nIt was nearly noon when the party arrived in the \u201cdoor-step;\u201d yet at\nthat late hour they found Mally busied in making a quantity of milk\nporridge for her own and her husband\u2019s breakfast, who had not yet\nreturned from his morning visit to the hill. The appearance of soldiers\nin so sequestered a spot was to her a matter of scarcely less surprise\nthan was that of the Spaniards to the simple Indians, on their first\nlanding upon the shores of the New World. Soldiers, too, are generally\nobjects of terror in such places, where their names are associated in\nthe minds of the peasantry only with ideas of oppression and of\nslaughter; and at the period referred to, this feeling was in much\ngreater force than at present. Poor Mally endeavoured as much as\npossible to conceal her fears and embarrassment, and with all the\npoliteness she was mistress of, desired the party to be seated. Her\nartifice, however, was far from equalling their penetration: they soon\nremarked her timorous side\u2014glances and hesitating manner, as she walked\nbackward and forward through the house; and they therefore resolved to\ndivert themselves a little by working upon her prejudices.\n\n\u201cThat bayonet of mine,\u201d said one of the fellows, \u201cwill never be as clear\nagain, I am afraid. The blood of that old herd, whom we did away with as\nwe came, sticks confoundedly to it.\u201d\n\nMally was at this moment dishing the porridge in two _goans_, one for\nherself and another for John, and on hearing this horrible annunciation,\nshe made a dead pause, and letting go the foot of the pot, suffered it\nto fall to its perpendicular with a bang which forced the cleps out of\nher hand, and precipitated the whole, with a large quantity of undished\nporridge, to the floor.\n\n\u201cIf we do any more such tricks to-day,\u201d continued another wag, \u201cI shall\nwipe mine well before the blood dries upon it, and then it will not rust\nas yours has done.\u201d\n\nMally, regardless of the porridge she had spilt, now stepped with\ncautious, but quick and trembling steps to the door. Before she had\nreached the threshold\u2014\n\n\u201cCome,\u201d cried the soldier who had thus spoken, \u201clet us taste this food\nwhich the mistress has been preparing. Good woman, return and give us\nspoons. No flinching! We won\u2019t harm you, unless you provoke us to it.\nWhy do you hesitate? Are you unwilling to part with your victuals? By my\nfaith! the walk we have had this morning has given us such appetites,\nthat if you are not active, we shall have a slice off yourself!\u201d\n\n\u201cO mercy!\u201d cried Mally, staring wildly, \u201chae patience a wee, an I\u2019se gie\nye ocht that\u2019s in the house; but dinna meddle wi\u2019 that goanfu\u2019 o\u2019\nporridge, I beseech ye. They\u2019re our John\u2019s; and if he comes frae the\nhill, and finds them suppet, he\u2019ll brain some o\u2019 ye, as sure as I\u2019m\nlivin\u2019.\u201d\n\nShe then made for the cupboard, and began to draw from thence bread,\nbutter, and cheese; but the rogues, on hearing that John was so partial\nto his porridge, deemed this opportunity of arousing his ire too\nfavourable to be lost, and they therefore insisted on being accommodated\nwith spoons in order to \u201cscart the coggie.\u201d Mally was obliged\nreluctantly to hand each a spoon from the wicker-creel which hung in the\ncorner, and the six fellows were just in the act of devouring the\ncontents of the goan, when honest Glenmannow made his appearance.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s a\u2019 this?\u201d were his first words, on entering and perceiving such\na bevy of red-coats.\n\n\u201cWhy, honest man, we have got a billet upon you,\u201d said one of them.\n\n\u201cA billet! Wha frae?\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom the Duke of Queensberry, with whom our colonel, the Duke of\nBuccleuch, is stopping at present. We are just arrived; it was a deuced\nlong walk; we were very hungry, and are just making free with your\nbreakfast, until something better be prepared for us.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re makin\u2019 mair free than welcome, I doubt, my lads. I hae nae\nobjection, since our juke has sent ye, to gie ye a nicht\u2019s quarters, an\u2019\nto let ye live on the best we can afford; but I think ye micht hae haen\nmair mense than to fa\u2019 on my parritch that way, like a wheen collies.\u201d\n\n\u201cLike what? Hold your peace, sir,\u201d thundered the whole at once. \u201cWe are\nupon the king\u2019s service, and have a right to what we please, wherever we\nare billeted.\u201d\n\n\u201cFor a\u2019 sakes, John, let them alane!\u201d cried Mally, who saw the tempest\nthat was gathering on her husband\u2019s brow. \u201cWe hae plenty o\u2019 meal in the\nhouse, and canna be mickle the waur o\u2019 what they\u2019ll tak for ae day an\u2019\nnicht. Ye\u2019se get something else to your breakfast directly.\u201d Then she\nwent close to his side, and whispered into his ear the fearful\nconversation she had heard. Glenmannow, though he never knew what it was\nto fear, was of a disposition too quiet and mild not to be easily\npacified, and the soldiers saw with regret his looks beginning to\nbrighten under the influence of Mally\u2019s eloquence.\n\n\u201cEgad! there\u2019s a fine calf before the window,\u201d cried one of them, whom a\nnew thought had opportunely struck; \u201cTom, go out and put a ball through\nit. We shall have a fine roast of veal, if this old lady knows how to\nmanage it.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ll hae a fine roast deevil!\u201d roared Glenmannow, now provoked beyond\nsufferance; \u201cI\u2019ll gie ye\u201d \u2014\u2014\n\n\u201cDown, down with him!\u201d cried the whole party at once, springing up, and\nendeavouring to surround him. But in this they resembled a posse of\nmastiffs attacking some lordly bull, which the enraged animal shakes\nfrom his sides and tramples in the dust. In one instant Glenmannow\u2019s\nplaid was flung from him upon the bed; his staff also, which was too\nlong for use at such close quarters, was relinquished, and seizing by\nthe collar and thigh the first of the fellows who attacked him, he used\nhim against the others, both as a weapon and shield, with such fury and\neffect, that they were all glad to provide for their safety by an\ninstant retreat. Fortunately for them, the door chanced to be open, so\nthat they reached the bent with comparatively little injury. But the\npoor fellow who was trussed in Glenmannow\u2019s grasp, and dashed against\nthis and the other of them with such violence, had his body beaten\nalmost to a mummy, and kept howling and calling for mercy in a most\nlamentable manner. By Glenmannow, however, he was totally unheard,\nuntil, on rushing to the door, his eye chanced to fall upon one of his\nown cars placed on end, and leaning against the side of the house.\nTossing the soldier from him upon the grass, he immediately seized this\nrude vehicle, and, wrenching from it a limb, cast the huge weapon upon\nhis shoulder, and bounded off in pursuit of his enemies.\n\nBy this time the soldiers had gained a hundred yards in advance, and\nwere stretching away like greyhounds toward the summit of Glenquhargen.\nThey were all nimble-footed, and the panic with which they were now\nactually seized gave wings to their speed, and rendered a matter of no\nregard the rocks and other impediments over which they were flying.\nTheir pursuer was not more speedy, but much longer winded, and the rage\nwhich then impelled him was not less potent than their terror. He\npossessed a fund of physical ability which was almost inexhaustible, and\nhe had sworn not to drop the pursuit till he had \u201csmashed the hale set,\u201d\nso that from the length of the race the poor wights had but a small\nchance of safety. At length the top of Glenquhargen, then Cairnkinnow,\nand next Gowkthorn, were reached, without any loss or advantage to\neither party. From the latter of these places, the ground declines\nnearly the whole way to Drumlanrig, and the soldiers, with the start in\ntheir favour, flew on with a glimmering of hope that now they could\nscarcely be overtaken. Their hope was realised, but not without such\noverstraining as had nearly proved equally fatal with the vengeance from\nwhich they fled. Leaning forward almost to the ground, and staggering\nlike drunkards from excess of fatigue, they at last reached the western\nstaircase which leads into the court of the castle. Behind them\nGlenmannow rushed on also with abated speed, but with indignation as hot\nas ever. He still bore upon his shoulder the ponderous car limb; his\nface was literally bathed in perspiration; and the wild expression of\nhis eyes, and the foam which was beginning to appear at each corner of\nhis mouth, rendered him a true personification of Giant Madness broken\nfrom his chains.\n\nThe two dukes, who had been informed of their approach by some servants\nwho observed them descending the opposite heights, were waiting to\nreceive them within the balustrade which runs along that side of the\ncastle; but on marking the fury of Glenmannow, Duke James deemed it\nprudent to retire with the exhausted soldiers until the storm should be\npassed; for while his tenant remained in that mood of mind, he dared\nnot, absolute as was his authority, to come into his presence. His\nbrother of Buccleuch was therefore left to bear the first brunt of the\nsalutation, who, on Glenmannow\u2019s approach, called out, \u201cWhat is the\nmatter? What is to do?\u201d Glenmannow, without regarding this interrogatory\nfurther than by darting upon him a wild and fierce look, sprang up\nstairs, and rushed past him into the court of the castle. But here his\nprogress was stopped; for among the several doors which lead from thence\nto every part of the castle, he knew not by which his enemies had\nentered. One, however, was known to him, and along that passage he\nrapidly hastened, until he at length arrived in the kitchen. There he\nwas equally at fault, and there his pursuit was ended; for the smiles of\nthe sonsy cook, and the fondlements of the various servants who thronged\naround him, succeeded in restoring his mind to a degree of calmness and\nrepose. The cook eased his shoulder of the car limb, with the intention\nof repaying herself for the trouble by using it as fuel; others divested\nhim of his bonnet; and all, with many words, prevailed upon him at last\nto assume a chair. After a moment\u2019s silence, in which he seemed to be\nlost in reflection, \u201cAy, ay,\u201d said he, \u201cI see through a\u2019 this noo. It\nhas been a trick o\u2019 the juke\u2019s makin\u2019 up.\u201d Then, with a serious air, he\nadded, \u201cBut it was dangerous though; for if I had gotten a haud o\u2019 thae\nchaps, wha kens what I might hae done!\u201d\n\nThe duke, on being informed of this change wrought upon his tenant, and\nhaving learnt from the soldiers the way in which he had been deprived of\nhis breakfast, ordered him a plentiful refreshment, and afterwards sent\nfor him into the presence of himself and of Buccleuch. The breach\nbetween them was speedily healed; and Glenmannow, nothing poorer for his\nrace, returned shortly afterwards with a servant on horseback, who was\ndispatched to convey to headquarters the poor grenadier who had been so\nroughly handled in the affray.\n\nMally, with a humanity and forgiveness which the soldier had little\nright to expect, had succeeded in removing him from the spot where he\nwas cast down, into the house, and having there laid him upon a bed,\ntended him with such kindness and care, that, by the time of\nGlenmannow\u2019s return, he was so far recovered as to be able to sit upon\nthe horse sent to remove him. Glenmannow, after Mally had wrapped round\nhim a pair of blankets, bore him out in his arms, and placed him behind\nthe servant, who in this manner conducted him in safety to Drumlanrig.\n\nThis is the last exploit of a remarkable kind which I have been able to\nglean respecting Glenmannow. He lived to a pretty long age, yet his life\nwas abridged within its natural period by imprudently taxing his great\nstrength beyond its actual capability. A high dyke was in the course of\nbeing built, from the heights on the left of the Nith into the channel\nof the river, about four miles above Drumlanrig, on the way to Sanquhar,\nand in order to resist the force of the current, the largest stones that\ncould be moved were built into the dyke at its termination. One in\nparticular, which lay near the place, was deemed excellently fitted for\nthat purpose, but its weight rendered it unmanageable. Glenmannow\nundertook to lift it into its place, and in reality did so; but in the\neffort he injured his breast and spine, and brought on a lingering\ndisorder, of which he died in less than a twelvemonth afterwards, in the\nyear 1705. I am not aware of his having left any descendants to\nperpetuate and spread his name; one thing at least is certain, that in\nthe present day none such are to be found in that district which was the\nprincipal scene of his exploits, and where still is cherished to such a\ndegree his singular yet honest renown.\u2014_Traits of Scottish Life, and\nPictures of Scenes and Character._\n\n\n\n\n MY GRANDMOTHER\u2019S PORTRAIT.\n\n BY DANIEL GORRIE.\n\n\nIn picture galleries, or in private apartments, portraits seldom receive\nmuch attention from visitors, unless they happen to have known the\noriginals, or to be aware that the pictures are the productions of\ndistinguished artists. And yet, whether we have known the originals or\nnot, and apart altogether from the general artistic merit of the works,\nthere are many portraits which have a wonderful effect in giving the\nmind a reflective and inquisitive turn. Portraits of this description\nmay occasionally be seen in retired country houses of modest dimensions,\nwhere one need scarcely expect to find specimens of the highest class of\nart. Faces we may there observe, silently depending from the walls, on\nwhich strongly-pronounced character is depicted in spite of every\nartistic defect, and through the deep lines of which the record of a\nstirring or painful life seems to struggle earnestly for utterance.\nPeople are too much in the habit of regarding every person as\ncommonplace and uninteresting who has not managed somehow to make a\nnoise in the world; but in these \u201ccounterfeit presentments\u201d of men and\nwomen who have died in comparative obscurity, known only to their own\ncircle of friends, we may see much that strangely moves our hearts, and\nmakes us long to learn what their history has been.\n\nLet the reader look in fancy on that old portrait hanging before me\nthere on the wall. To me it is no dead picture, but rather does it seem\nthe living embodiment of a maternal grandmother\u2014a heroic old dame, who\nnever lost heart whatever might betide, and of whom that image is now\nalmost the sole remaining relic. Even a stranger could scarcely fail to\nnote with curious interest that small round face with nose and chin\nattenuated by years\u2014those peering eyes, where a twinkle of youth yet\nbreaks through the dim of eld\u2014that wrinkled brow, shaded with a brown\nfrontage-braid of borrowed hair\u2014and that compact little head, encased in\na snow-white cap with its broad band of black ribbon. The least skilful\nartist could hardly have failed in depicting the features; but the old\nfamiliar expression is also there, preserved as in amber, and the aged\nface is pleasantly blended in my mind with memories of early days.\nDetached incidents in her life, which she was fond of frequently\nrelating to her grandchildren, who eagerly clustered around her,\nlistening to the oft-told tale, recur to me with considerable freshness\nafter the lapse of many years.\n\nAt the time when that portrait was taken, Mrs Moffat\u2014as I shall name\nher\u2014was well-nigh eighty years of age. For about the half of that period\nshe had led a widowed life. Her husband, who witnessed many stirring\nscenes on sea and shore, had been a surgeon in the Royal Navy, and she\nwas left \u201cpassing rich with forty pounds a year\u201d of government pension.\n\nThere was one remarkable incident in his history to which she frequently\nrecurred. Samuel Moffat obtained an appointment as surgeon on board the\nill-fated _Royal George_; but before the time set apart for her leaving\nport, he found that the smell of the fresh paint of the new vessel\ncreated a feeling of nausea, which would have rendered him unfit for\nduty; and by his good fortune in getting transferred, on this account,\nto another man-of-war, he escaped the sad fate that befell so many\nhapless victims\u2014\n\n When Kempenfelt went down\n With twice four hundred men.\n\nA striking incident of this kind naturally made a deep impression on his\nown mind, and it also formed a prominent reminiscence in the memory of\nhis faithful partner during the long remainder of her life.\n\nThe earlier period of Mrs Moffat\u2019s widowhood was passed in Edinburgh;\nbut when death and marriage had scattered her family, she followed one\nof her married daughters to the country, and took up her abode in a neat\npoplar-shaded cottage on the outskirts of a quiet village, situated in a\nfertile and beautiful valley of the county that lies cradled in the\ntwining arms of the Forth and the Tay. That cottage, with its garden\nbehind, and pretty flower-borders in front, and with its row of poplar\nand rowan-trees, through which the summer breeze murmured so pleasantly,\ncomes up vividly before my mind\u2019s eye at this moment. Beautiful as of\nyore the valley smiles around, with its girdling ridges belted with\nwoods, and dotted with pleasant dwellings; and away to westward,\nshutting in the peaceful scene from the tumult of the great world, rise\nthe twin Lomond hills, glorious at morn and eve, when bathed in the\nbeams of the rising and setting sun. The good old lady, who had spent a\nlarge portion of her life in \u201cAuld Reekie,\u201d when narrow Bristo Street\nand Potterrow and the adjoining courts were inhabited by the better\nclass of citizens, took kindly to the country cottage, and she was fond\nof the garden and flowers. With a basket on her arm, she trotted about\nthe garden, apparently very busy, but doing little after all. In autumn,\nafter a gusty night, one of her first morning occupations was to gather\nup the fallen ruddy apples, which she preserved for the special\ngratification of her grandchildren. Many a time and oft were they\ndebarred from touching the red berries of the rowan-trees, which look as\ntempting in children\u2019s eyes as did the forbidden fruit in those of\nMother Eve. The girls were even enjoined not to make necklaces of these\nclustering red deceivers.\n\nIn that retired village there were, in those days, a good many\nwell-to-do people, who had not found it very difficult to make money out\nof a generous soil. The different families lived on very sociable terms,\nand during the winter season there were rounds of tea-parties, winding\nup with cold suppers and hot toddy. Teetotalism was a thing unknown in\nthat district and in those days, though I shall do the good folks the\njustice of saying that they knew the virtues of moderation. To all those\nwinter gatherings of the local gentry, Mrs Moffat invariably received an\ninvitation. They could not do without her, relishing as they did her\nready wit and hearty good-humour. She was, in sooth, the life of every\nparty. On such occasions she displayed all the artless buoyancy of\nyouth, as if she had never endured the agonies of bereavement, or borne\nthe burdens of life. She was then the very image of \u201cOld Delight,\u201d and\nher aged face renewed its youth in the sunshine of joy. Some of the\nknowing lairds tried by bantering and otherwise to draw her out, and her\nquick cutting repartees were followed by explosions of mirth. It seemed\nmarvellous that such a well of sunny mirth should be encased in that\ntiny frame. Indeed, it was nothing unusual for the hearty old lady to\ntreat the company to a \u201ccanty\u201d song at these village parties, and\ntouches of melody still lingered about the cracks of her voice. When\nbothered overmuch to sing another song after she had already done\nenough, she generally met the request with a solitary stanza to this\neffect:\u2014\n\n There was a wee mannie an\u2019 a wee wifie,\n And they lived in a vinegar bottle;\n \u201cAnd O,\u201d says the wee mannie to the wee wifie,\n \u201cWow, but oor warld is little, is little!\n Wow, but oor warld is little!\u201d\n\nRare encounters of wit and amusing banter occasionally took place\nbetween her and a strange eccentric humorist of a lawyer of the old\nschool, who frequently visited the village from a neighbouring country\ntown. Old Bonthron was the name by which he was familiarly known.\n\nIt may readily be imagined that, when old Mr Bonthron and Mrs Moffat met\nin the same company, the fun would grow \u201cfast and furious,\u201d and such\ncertainly was the case. I have seen the hearty old humorist take the\nequally hearty old lady on his knee, and dandle her there like a child,\ngreatly to their own delight and to the infinite amusement of the\ncompany. There will be less genial and boisterous mirth now-a-days, I\nshould imagine, in that sequestered village.\n\nSuch was Mrs Moffat in her lightsome hours, when friends met friends;\nbut her grandchildren were as much delighted with her when, in graver\nmood, she recalled early recollections, told them pleasant little\nstories, and narrated graphically what to her were eventful incidents in\nher life.\n\nI can still remember some of the pleasant pictures she gave us of her\nearly days. She was born in the town of Dalkeith, which is beautiful for\nsituation, being planted in the midst of the richest woodland scenery,\nand she imprinted in our hearts vivid impressions of the delighted\nfeelings with which, in the days of her girlhood, she looked through the\ngate of the Duke\u2019s great park, and saw the long winding avenue and the\ngreensward traversed by nibbling sheep, and the magnificent trees whose\n\u201cshadowing shroud\u201d might cover a goodly company at their rural feast in\nthe noontide of a summer\u2019s day. She described the rustic seats and\nsummer-houses on the banks of a brook, that wandered at its own sweet\nwill through the wooded grounds\u2014regions and resorts of joyance, where\nthe children of the town, through the kindness of the then reigning Duke\nof Buccleuch, were permitted to spend the livelong summer\u2019s day, thus\nenabling them to store their memories with pleasing recollections, which\nmight come back upon them in their declining days, like visions of\nbeauty from lands of old romance. There was a pathetic story about a\nfamily of larks that had their nest in the Duke\u2019s Park, which she\nrecited to us over and over again, by way of inculcating the virtue of\ntreating kindly all the creatures of God. Her story was, that some of\nthe young rascals of Dalkeith had caught the mother-bird in the nest,\nand had carried off her and the whole family of young ones at one fell\nswoop. The male bird, thus deprived at once of mate and family, took up\nhis melancholy station near the nest, and mourned his loss with\nplaintive pipe for two days, at the end of which time the broken-hearted\nwarbler died. This affecting incident, told with much seriousness and\nfeeling, was not unproductive of good effect upon the young listeners.\nCities and towns being still to us mysteries of which we had only a\nvague conception, it pleased us much to hear her tell how the bells of\nDalkeith tolled children to bed, and how little boys walked through the\nstreets at night, calling \u201cHot pies for supper!\u201d It struck us that at\nwhatever hour the bell tolled, we should have liked to remain out of bed\ntill the pies went round.\n\nOn winter evenings, beside the good old lady\u2019s cottage fire, she was\noften constrained to recount her famous voyage to London, in which she\nwellnigh suffered shipwreck. The war-vessel on board of which her\nhusband acted as surgeon had arrived in the Thames. He could not then\nobtain leave of absence, and as they had not met for many long months,\nshe determined\u2014protracted as the passage then was from Leith to\nLondon\u2014to make an effort to see her husband, and to visit the great\nmetropolis. Steamers had not, at that period, come into existence, and\nthe clipper-smacks that traded between Leith and London, and took a few\nventuresome passengers on their trips, dodged along the Scotch and\nEnglish coasts for days and weeks, thus making a lengthened voyage of\nwhat is now a brief and pleasant sail. It was considered a bold and\nhazardous undertaking, in those days, for any lady to proceed alone on\nsuch a voyage. This, however, she did, as she was gifted with a\nwonderful amount of pluck, leaving her family in the charge of some\nfriends till she returned.\n\nThe vessel had scarcely left the Firth of Forth, and got out into the\nopen sea, when the weather underwent a bad turn, and soon they had to\nencounter all the fury of a severe storm, which caused many shipwrecks\nalong the whole eastern seaboard. With a kind of placid contentment\u2014nay,\neven with occasional glee\u2014would she describe the protracted miseries and\nhardships they endured, having run short of supplies, and every hour\nexpecting the vessel to founder. It was three weeks after leaving Leith\nuntil the smack was, as she described it, towed up the Thames like a\ndead dog, without either mast or bowsprit\u2014a hapless and helpless hulk.\nHowever, she managed to see her husband, and the happiness of the\nmeeting would be considered a good equivalent for the mishaps of the\nvoyage. She saw, in the great metropolis, the then Prince of Wales\u2014the\n\u201cFirst Gentleman in Europe,\u201d and used to relate, with considerable gusto\n(old ladies being more rough-and-ready then than now), how the Prince,\nas he was riding in St James\u2019s Park, overheard a hussar in the crowd\nexclaiming, \u201cHe\u2019s a d\u2014\u2014d handsome fellow!\u201d and immediately lifting his\nhat, his Royal Highness replied, \u201cThank you, my lad; but you put too\nmuch spice in your compliments!\u201d That London expedition was a red-letter\nleaf in Mrs Moffat\u2019s biography, and it was well thumbed by us juveniles.\nHer return voyage was comparatively comfortable, and much more rapid;\nbut she never saw her husband again, as he died at sea, and was\nconsigned to the deep.\n\nEven more interesting than the London trip were all the stories and\nincidents connected with her only son\u2014our uncle who _ought_ to have\nbeen, but who was dead before any of us were born. Through the kindness\nand influence of Admiral Greig of the Russian navy, he obtained a\ncommission in the Russian service at an unusually early age\u2014Russia and\nBritain being at that time in close alliance. Neither the Russian navy\nnor army was in the best condition, and the Emperor was very desirous to\nobtain the services of British officers, Scotsmen being preferred. Mrs\nMoffat loved her son with all the warmth of her kindly nature, and when\nhe had been about a year or two in the Russian service, the news spread\nthrough Edinburgh one day, that a Russian man-of-war was coming up the\nFirth to Leith roads. I have heard the good lady relate the eventful\nincidents of that day with glistening eyes and tremulous voice.\n\nThe tidings were conveyed to her by friends who knew that she had some\nreason to be interested in the news. She had received no communication\nfrom her son for some time, as the mails were then very irregular, and\nletters often went amissing; and, filled with the hope that he might be\non board the Russian vessel that was approaching the roads, she\nimmediately hurried off for Leith, whither crowds of people were already\nrepairing, as a Russian war-vessel in the Forth was as great a rarity\nthen as it is now. Before she arrived at the pier, the vessel had\nanchored in the roads, and the pier, neither so long nor so commodious\nas it is now, was thronged with people pressing onwards to get a sight\nof the stranger ship. Nothing daunted by the crowd, Mrs Moffat squeezed\nherself forward, at the imminent risk of being seriously crushed. A\ngentleman who occupied a \u201ccoigne of vantage,\u201d out of the stream of the\ncrowd, observed this slight-looking lady pressing forward with great\neagerness. He immediately hailed her, and asked, as she appeared very\nmuch interested, if she expected any one, or had any friends on board.\nShe replied that she half expected her son to be with the vessel. The\ngentleman, who was to her a total stranger, but who must have been a\ngentleman every inch, immediately took her under his protection, and\nhaving a telescope in his hand, he made observations, and reported\nprogress.\n\nOne of the ship\u2019s boats had been let down, and he told her that he\nobserved officers in white uniform rapidly descending. Mrs Moffat\u2019s\neagerness and anxiety were now on the increase. The boat put off from\nthe ship, propelled by sturdy and regular strokes, cutting the water\ninto foam, which sparkled in the sunshine. When the boat had approached\nmidway between the ship and the shore, Mrs Moffat asked her protector if\nhe could distinguish one officer apparently younger than the others.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d he replied; \u201cthere is one who seems scarcely to have passed from\nboyhood to manhood.\u201d\n\nHer eager impatience, with hope and fear alternating in her heart,\nseemed now to agitate her whole frame, and the bystanders, seeing her\nanxiety, appeared also to share in her interest.\n\nAt last the boat, well filled with officers, shot alongside the pier,\nthe crowd rushing and cheering, as it sped onward to the upper\nlanding-place. It was with great difficulty that the gentleman could\nrestrain the anxious mother from dashing into the rushing stream of\npeople. When the crowd had thinned off a little, they made their way up\nthe pier, and found that the officers had all left the boat and gone\ninto the Old Ship Inn\u2014probably because they had no desire of being\nmobbed. Mrs Moffat immediately went to the inn, and requested an\nattendant to ask if one of the officers belonged to Scotland, and if so,\nto be good enough to mention his name.\n\n\u201cYes\u2014Moffat!\u201d was the cheery response, and in a short time mother and\nson were locked in each other\u2019s arms in the doorway of the Old Ship.\n\nWith a glee, not unmingled with tender regrets, she used to tell how,\nwhen she and the spruce young officer were proceeding up Leith Walk\ntogether to Edinburgh, an old woman stopped them, and, clapping him\nkindly on the shoulder, said\u2014\u201cAy, my mannie, ye\u2019ll be a captain yet!\u201d\nThis prophecy of the old woman certainly met its fulfilment.\n\nAfter staying a few days in the old home near the Meadows, young Moffat\nagain took his departure, never more to see his affectionate mother, or\nthe bald crown of Arthur Seat rising by the side of the familiar Firth.\nHe joined the army (changes of officers from the navy to the army being\nthen frequent in the Russian service), and reenacted his part honourably\nin many memorable scenes. Still do I remember the tender and tearful\ncare with which his old mother opened up the yellow letters, with their\nfaded ink-tracings, which contained descriptions of the part he played\nin harassing the French, during their disastrous retreat after the\nburning of Moscow. One of these letters, I recollect, commenced\nthus\u2014\u201cHere we are, driving the French before us like a flock of sheep;\u201d\nand in others he gave painful descriptions of their coming up to small\nparties of French soldiers who were literally glued by the extreme frost\nto the ground\u2014quite stiff and dead, but still in a standing attitude,\nand leaning on their muskets. Poor wretches! that was their sole reward\nfor helping to whet the appetite of an insatiable ambition. In those\nwarlike times, young Moffat grew into favour, and gained promotion. He\nreceived a gold-hilted sword from the Emperor for distinguished service,\nbut he succumbed to fatigue, and died on foreign soil. The gold-headed\nsword and his epaulets, which he had bequeathed to a favourite sister,\nfell into the hands of harpies in London, and to this day have never\nreached Scotland.\n\nIn the quiet village Mrs Moffat spent her declining days in peace and\nsweet content, and she now sleeps in the village churchyard, till the\nlast spring that visits the world shall waken inanimate dust to immortal\nlife.\n\n\n\n\n THE BAPTISM.\n\n BY PROFESSOR WILSON.\n\n\nIt is a pleasant and impressive time, when, at the close of divine\nservice, in some small country church, there takes place the gentle stir\nand preparation for a baptism. A sudden air of cheerfulness spreads over\nthe whole congregation; the more solemn expression of all countenances\nfades away; and it is at once felt that a rite is about to be performed\nwhich, although of a sacred and awful kind, is yet connected with a\nthousand delightful associations of purity, beauty, and innocence. Then\nthere is an eager bending of smiling faces over the humble galleries\u2014an\nunconscious rising up in affectionate curiosity\u2014and a slight murmuring\nsound, in which is no violation of the Sabbath sanctity of God\u2019s house,\nwhen, in the middle passage of the church, the party of women is seen,\nmatrons and maids, who bear in their bosoms, or in their arms, the\nhelpless beings about to be made members of the Christian communion.\n\nThere sit, all dressed becomingly in white, the fond and happy baptismal\ngroup. The babies have been intrusted, for a precious hour, to the\nbosoms of young maidens, who tenderly fold them to their yearning\nhearts, and with endearments taught by nature, are stilling, not always\nsuccessfully, their plaintive cries. Then the proud and delighted girls\nrise up, one after the other, in sight of the whole congregation, and\nhold up the infants, arrayed in neat caps and long flowing linen, into\ntheir fathers\u2019 hands. For the poorest of the poor, if he has a heart at\nall, will have his infant well dressed on such a day, even although it\nshould scant his meal for weeks to come, and force him to spare fuel to\nhis winter fire.\n\nAnd now the fathers were all standing below the pulpit, with grave and\nthoughtful faces. Each has tenderly taken his infant into his\ntoil-hardened hands, and supports it in gentle and steadfast affection.\nThey are all the children of poverty, and if they live, are destined to\na life of toil. But now poverty puts on its most pleasant aspect, for it\nis beheld standing before the altar of religion with contentment and\nfaith. This is a time when the better and deeper nature of every man\nmust rise up within him, and when he must feel, more especially, that he\nis a spiritual and immortal being making covenant with God. He is about\nto take upon himself a holy charge; to promise to look after his child\u2019s\nimmortal soul; and to keep its little feet from the paths of evil, and\nin those of innocence and peace. Such a thought elevates the lowest mind\nabove itself, diffuses additional tenderness over the domestic\nrelations, and makes them who hold up their infants to the baptismal\nfont, better fathers, husbands, and sons, by the deeper insight which\nthey then possess into their nature and their life.\n\nThe minister consecrates the water; and, as it falls on his infant\u2019s\nface, the father feels the great oath in his soul. As the poor helpless\ncreature is wailing in his arms, he thinks how needful indeed to human\ninfancy is the love of Providence! And when, after delivering each his\nchild into the arms of the smiling maiden from whom he had received it,\nhe again takes his place for admonition and advice before the pulpit,\nhis mind is well disposed to think on the perfect beauty of that\nreligion of which the Divine Founder said, \u201cSuffer little children to be\nbrought unto me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven!\u201d\n\nThe rite of baptism had not thus been performed for several months in\nthe kirk of Lanark. It was now the hottest time of persecution; and the\ninhabitants of that parish found other places in which to worship God\nand celebrate the ordinances of religion. It was now the Sabbath-day,\nand a small congregation of about a hundred souls had met for divine\nservice in a place of worship more magnificent than any temple that\nhuman hands had ever built to Deity. Here, too, were three children\nabout to be baptised. The congregation had not assembled to the toll of\nthe bell, but each heart knew the hour and observed it; for there are a\nhundred sun-dials among the hills, woods, moors, and fields, and the\nshepherd and the peasant see the hours passing by them in sunshine and\nshadow.\n\nThe church in which they were assembled was hewn by God\u2019s hand out of\nthe eternal rocks. A river rolled its way through a mighty chasm of\ncliffs, several hundred feet high, of which the one side presented\nenormous masses, and the other corresponding recesses, as if the great\nstone girdle had been rent by a convulsion. The channel was overspread\nwith prodigious fragments of rock or large loose stones, some of them\nsmooth and bare, others containing soil and verdure in their rents and\nfissures, and here and there crowned with shrubs and trees. The eye\ncould at once command a long stretching vista, seemingly closed and shut\nup at both extremities by the coalescing cliffs. This majestic reach of\nriver contained pools, streams, rushing shelves, and waterfalls\ninnumerable; and when the water was low, which it now was in the common\ndrought, it was easy to walk up this scene, with the calm blue sky\noverhead, an utter and sublime solitude. On looking up, the soul was\nbowed down by the feeling of that prodigious height of unscaleable and\noften overhanging cliff. Between the channel and the summit of the\nfar-extended precipices were perpetually flying rooks and wood-pigeons,\nand now and then a hawk, filling the profound abyss with their wild\ncawing, deep murmur, or shrilly shriek. Sometimes a heron would stand\nerect and still on some little stone island, or rise up like a white\ncloud along the black wall of the chasm and disappear. Winged creatures\nalone could inhabit this region. The fox and wild-cat chose more\naccessible haunts. Yet there came the persecuted Christians and\nworshipped God, whose hand hung over their heads those magnificent\npillars and arches, scooped out those galleries from the solid rock, and\nlaid at their feet the calm water in its transparent beauty, in which\nthey could see themselves sitting in reflected groups, with their Bibles\nin their hands.\n\nHere, upon a semicircular ledge of rocks, over a narrow chasm, of which\nthe tiny stream played in a murmuring waterfall, and divided the\ncongregation into two equal parts, sat about a hundred persons, all\ndevoutly listening to their minister, who stood before them on what\nmight well be called a small natural pulpit of living stone. Up to it\nthere led a short flight of steps, and over it waved the canopy of a\ntall graceful birch-tree. This pulpit stood in the middle of the\nchannel, directly facing that congregation, and separated from them by\nthe clear deep sparkling pool into which the scarce-heard water poured\nover the blackened rock. The water, as it left the pool, separated into\ntwo streams, and flowed on each side of that altar, thus placing it on\nan island, whose large mossy stones were richly embowered under the\ngolden blossoms and green tresses of the broom. Divine service was\nclosed, and a row of maidens, all clothed in purest white, came gliding\noff from the congregation, and crossing the stream on some\nstepping-stones, arranged themselves at the foot of the pulpit, with the\ninfants about to be baptized. The fathers of the infants, just as if\nthey had been in their own kirk, had been sitting there during worship,\nand now stood up before the minister. The baptismal water, taken from\nthe pellucid pool, was lying consecrated in a small hollow of one of the\nupright stones that formed one side or pillar of the pulpit, and the\nholy rite proceeded. Some of the younger ones in that semicircle kept\ngazing down into the pool, in which the whole scene was reflected, and\nnow and then, in spite of the grave looks or admonishing whispers of\ntheir elders, letting a pebble fall into the water, that they might\njudge of its depth from the length of time that elapsed before the clear\nair-bells lay sparkling on the agitated surface. The rite was over, and\nthe religious services of the day closed by a psalm. The mighty rocks\nhemmed in the holy sound, and sent it in a more compacted volume, clear,\nsweet, and strong, up to heaven. When the psalm ceased, an echo, like a\nspirit\u2019s voice, was heard dying away up among the magnificent\narchitecture of the cliffs, and once more might be noticed in the\nsilence the reviving voice of the waterfall.\n\nJust then a large stone fell from the top of the cliff into the pool, a\nloud voice was heard, and a plaid hung over on the point of a shepherd\u2019s\nstaff. Their watchful sentinel had descried danger, and this was his\nwarning. Forthwith the congregation rose. There were paths dangerous to\nunpractised feet, along the ledges of the rocks, leading up to several\ncaves and places of concealment. The more active and young assisted the\nelder\u2014more especially the old pastor, and the women with the infants;\nand many minutes had not elapsed, till not a living creature was visible\nin the channel of the stream, but all of them hidden, or nearly so, in\nthe clefts and caverns.\n\nThe shepherd who had given the alarm had lain down again in his plaid\ninstantly on the greensward upon the summit of these precipices. A party\nof soldiers were immediately upon him, and demanded what signals he had\nbeen making, and to whom; when one of them, looking over the edge of the\ncliff, exclaimed, \u201cSee, see, Humphrey! we have caught the whole\ntabernacle of the Lord in a net at last. There they are, praising God\namong the stones of the river Mouss. These are the Cartland Craigs. By\nmy soul\u2019s salvation, a noble cathedral!\u201d \u201cFling the lying sentinel over\nthe cliffs. Here is a canting Covenanter for you, deceiving honest\nsoldiers on the very Sabbath-day. Over with him, over with him\u2014out of\nthe gallery into the pit.\u201d But the shepherd had vanished like a shadow;\nand, mixing with the tall green broom and brushes, was making his unseen\nway towards the wood. \u201cSatan has saved his servant. But come, my lads,\nfollow me; I know the way down into the bed of the stream, and the steps\nup to Wallace\u2019s Cave. They are called the \u2018Kittle Nine Stanes.\u2019 The\nhunt\u2019s up\u2014we\u2019ll be all in at the death. Halloo, my boys, halloo!\u201d\n\nThe soldiers dashed down a less precipitous part of the wooded banks, a\nlittle below the \u201cCraigs,\u201d and hurried up the channel. But when they\nreached the altar where the old grayhaired minister had been seen\nstanding, and the rocks that had been covered with people, all was\nsilent and solitary\u2014not a creature to be seen.\n\n\u201cHere is a Bible dropped by some of them,\u201d cried a soldier; and with his\nfoot spun it away into the pool.\n\n\u201cA bonnet! a bonnet!\u201d cried another. \u201cNow for the pretty sanctified face\nthat rolled its demure eyes below it.\u201d\n\nBut after a few jests and oaths the soldiers stood still, eyeing with a\nkind of mysterious dread the black and silent walls of the rock that\nhemmed them in, and hearing only the small voice of the stream that sent\na profounder stillness through the heart of that majestic solitude.\n\u201cCurse these cowardly Covenanters! What if they tumble down upon our\nheads pieces of rock from their hiding-places? Advance? Or retreat?\u201d\n\nThere was no reply; for a slight fear was upon every man. Musket or\nbayonet could be of little use to men obliged to clamber up rocks, along\nslender paths, leading they knew not where; and they were aware that\narmed men now-a-days worshipped God,\u2014men of iron hearts, who feared not\nthe glitter of the soldier\u2019s arms, neither barrel nor bayonet; men of\nlong stride, firm step, and broad breast, who, on the open field, would\nhave overthrown the marshalled line, and gone first and foremost if a\ncity had to be taken by storm.\n\nAs the soldiers were standing together irresolute, a noise came upon\ntheir ears like distant thunder, but even more appalling; and a slight\ncurrent of air, as if propelled by it, passed whispering along the\nsweetbriers and the broom, and the tresses of the birch-trees. It came\ndeepening and rolling, and roaring on, and the very Cartland Craigs\nshook to their foundation as if in an earthquake. \u201cThe Lord have mercy\nupon us!\u2014what is this?\u201d And down fell many of the miserable wretches on\ntheir knees, and some on their faces, upon the sharp-pointed rocks. Now\nit was like the sound of many myriad chariots rolling on their iron\naxles down the stony channel of the torrent. The old grayhaired minister\nissued from the mouth of Wallace\u2019s Cave, and said, with a loud voice,\n\u201cThe Lord God terrible reigneth!\u201d A waterspout had burst up among the\nmoorlands, and the river, in its power, was at hand. There it\ncame\u2014tumbling along into that long reach of cliffs, and in a moment\nfilled it with one mass of waves. Huge agitated clouds of foam rode on\nthe surface of a blood-red torrent. An army must have been swept off by\nthat flood. The soldiers perished in a moment; but high up in the\ncliffs, above the sweep of destruction, were the Covenanters\u2014men, women,\nand children, uttering prayers to God, unheard by themselves in that\nraging thunder.\n\n\n\n\n THE LAIRD\u2019S WOOING.\n\n BY JOHN GALT.\n\n\nThe laird began the record of his eighteenth year in these words:\u2014\n\nThere lived at this time, on the farmstead of Broomlands, a person that\nwas a woman, by calling a widow; and she and her husband, when he was in\nthis life, had atween them Annie Daisie, a dochter;\u2014very fair she was to\nlook upon, comely withal, and of a feleecity o\u2019 nature.\n\nThis pretty Annie Daisie, I know not hoo, found favour in my eyes, and I\nmade no scruple of going to the kirk every Sabbath day to see her,\nthough Mr Glebeantiends was, to a certainty, a vera maksleepie preacher.\nWhen I forgathered with her by accident, I was all in a confusion; and\nwhen I would hae spoken to her wi\u2019 kindly words, I could but look in her\nclear een and nicher like Willie Gouk, the haverel laddie; the which\nmade her jeer me as if I had a want, and been daft likewise; so that\nseeing I cam no speed in courting for myself, I thocht o\u2019 telling my\nmother; but that was a kittle job,\u2014howsoever, I took heart, and said\u2014\n\n\u201cMother!\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, son,\u201d she made answer, \u201cwhat would ye?\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m going to be marriet,\u201d quo\u2019 I.\n\n\u201cMarriet!\u201d cried she, spreading out her arms wi\u2019 consternation. \u201cAnd\nwha\u2019s the bride?\u201d\n\nI didna like just to gie her an even down answer, but said I thought\nmyself old enough for a helpmeet to my table, which caused her to\nrespond with a laugh; whereupon I told her I was thinking of Annie\nDaisie.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019ll surely ne\u2019er marry the like o\u2019 her;\u2014she\u2019s only a gair\u2019ner\u2019s\ndochter.\u201d\n\nBut I thocht of Adam and Eve, and said\u2014\u201cWe\u2019re a\u2019 come of a\ngair\u2019ner;\u201d\u2014the which caused her presently to wax vera wroth with me; and\nshe stampit with her foot, and called me a blot on the \u2018scutcheon o\u2019\nAuldbiggins; then she sat down, and began to reflec\u2019 with herself; and,\nafter a season, she spoke rawtional about the connection, saying she had\na wife in her mind for me, far more to the purpose than such a\ncausey-dancer as Annie Daisie.\n\nBut I couldna bide to hear Annie Daisie mislikened, and yet I was feart\nto commit the sin of disobedience, for my mother had no mercy when she\nthought I rebelled against her authority; so I sat down, and was in a\ntribulation, and then I speir\u2019t, with a flutter of affliction, who it\nwas that she had willed to be my wife.\n\n\u201cMiss Betty Gr\u00e6me,\u201d said she; \u201cif she can be persuaded to tak sic a\nheadowit.\u201d\n\nNow this Miss Betty Gr\u00e6me was the tocherless sixth daughter o\u2019 a broken\nGlasgow provost, and made her leevin\u2019 by seamstress-work and flowering\nlawn; but she was come of gentle blood, and was herself a gentle\ncreature, though no sae blithe as bonnie Annie Daisie; and for that I\ntold my mother I would never take her, though it should be the death o\u2019\nme. Accordingly I ran out of the house, and took to the hills, and\nwistna where I was, till I found myself at the door of the Broomlands,\nwith Annie Daisie before me, singing like a laverock as she watered the\nyarn of her ain spinning on the green. On seeing me, however, she\nstoppit, and cried\u2014\n\n\u201cGude keep us a\u2019, laird!\u2014what\u2019s frightened you to flee hither?\u201d\n\nBut I was desperate, and I ran till her, and fell on my knees in a\nlover-like fashion; but wha would hae thocht it?\u2014she dang me ower on my\nback, and as I lay on the ground she watered me with her watering-can,\nand was like to dee wi\u2019 laughing: the which sign and manifestation of\nhatred on her part quenched the low o\u2019 love on mine; an\u2019 I raise an\u2019\nwent hame, drookit and dripping as I was, and told my mother I would be\nan obedient and dutiful son.\n\nSoon after this, Annie Daisie was marriet to John Lounlans; and there\nwas a fulsome phrasing about them when they were kirkit, as the\ncomeliest couple in the parish. It was castor-oil to hear\u2019t; and I was\ndetermined to be upsides with them, for the way she had jilted me.\n\nIn the meanwhile my mother, that never, when she had a turn in hand,\nalloo\u2019t the grass to grow in her path, invited Miss Betty Gr\u00e6me to stay\na week with us; the which, as her father\u2019s family were in a straitened\ncircumstance, she was glad to accept; and being come, and her mother\nwith her, I could discern a confabbing atween the twa auld leddies\u2014Mrs\nGr\u00e6me shaking the head of scrupulosity, and my mother laying down the\nlaw and the gospel;\u2014all denoting a matter-o\u2019-money plot for me and Miss\nBetty.\n\nAt last it came to pass, on the morning of the third day, that Miss\nBetty did not rise to take her breakfast with us, but was indisposed;\nand when she came to her dinner, her een were bleared and begrutten.\nAfter dinner, however, my mother that day put down, what wasna common\nwith her housewifery, a bottle o\u2019 port in a decanter, instead o\u2019 the\ngardevin for toddy, and made Miss Betty drink a glass to mak her better,\nand me to drink three, saying, \u201cFaint heart never won fair leddy.\u201d Upon\nthe whilk hint I took another myself, and drank a toast for better\nacquaintance with Miss Betty. Then the twa matrons raise to leave the\nroom, and Miss Betty was rising too; but her mother laid her hand upon\nher shouther, and said\u2014\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s our lot, my dear, and we maun bear with it.\u201d\n\nThus it came to pass that I and Miss Betty were left by ourselves in a\nvery comical situation.\n\nThere was silence for a space of time between us; at last she drew a\ndeep sigh, and I responded, to the best o\u2019 my ability, with another.\nThen she took out her pocket-napkin, and began to wipe her eyes. This is\nsomething like serious courting, thocht I to myself, for sighs and tears\nare the food of love; but I wasna yet just ready to greet; hoosever, I\nlikewise took up my pocket-napkin, and made a sign of sympathy by\nblowing my nose, and then I said\u2014\n\n\u201cMiss Betty Gr\u00e6me, how would ye like to be Leddy of Auldbiggins, under\nmy mother?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, heavens!\u201d cried she, in a voice that gart me a\u2019 dinnle; and she\nburst into a passion of tears\u2014the whilk to see so affectit me that I\ncouldna help greeting too; the sight whereof made her rise and walk the\nroom like a dementit bedlamite.\n\nI was terrified, for her agitation wasna like the raptures I expectit;\nbut I rose from my seat, and going round to the other side of the table\nwhere she was pacing the floor, I followed her, and pulling her by the\nskirt, said, in a gallant way, to raise her spirits\u2014\n\n\u201cMiss Betty Gr\u00e6me, will ye sit doon on my knee?\u201d\n\nI\u2019ll ne\u2019er forget the look she gied for answer; but it raised my\ncourage, and I said, \u201cE\u2019en\u2019s ye like, Meg Dorts\u201d\u2014and with a flourish o\u2019\nmy heel, I left her to tune her pipes alane. This did the business, as I\nthocht; for though I saw her no more that night, yet the next morning\nshe came to breakfast a subdued woman, and my mother, before the week\nwas out, began to make preparations for the wedding.\n\nBut, lo and behold! one afternoon, as Miss Betty and me were taking a\nwalk, at her own request, on the high road, by came a whisky with a\nyoung man in it, that had been a penny-clerk to her father, and before\nyou could say, hey cockolorum! she was up in the gig, and doon at his\nside, and aff and away like the dust in a whirlwind.\n\nI was very angry to be sae jiltit a second time, but it wasna with an\nanger like the anger I suffered for what I met with at the hands of\nAnnie Daisie. It was a real passion. I ran hame like a clap o\u2019 thunder,\nand raged and rampaged till Mrs Gr\u00e6me was out of the house, bag and\nbaggage. My mother thought I was gane wud, and stood and lookit at me,\nand didna daur to say nay to my commands. Whereas, the thocht o\u2019 the\nusage I had gotten frae Annie Daisie bred a heart-sickness of\nhumiliation, and I surely think that if she had not carried her scorn o\u2019\nme sae far as to prefer a bare farmer lad like John Lounlans, I had hae\nsank into a decline, and sought the grave with a broken heart. But her\nmarrying him roused my corruption, and was as souring to the milk of my\nnature. I could hae forgiven her the watering; and had she gotten a\ngentleman of family, I would not have been overly miscontented; but to\nthink, after the offer she had from a man of my degree, that she should\ntake up with a tiller of the ground, a hewer of wood and a drawer of\nwater, was gall and wormwood. Truly, it was nothing less than a kithing\nof the evil spirit of the democraws that sae withered the green\nbay-trees of the world, when I was made a captain in the volunteers, by\norder of the Lord Lieutenant, \u2019cause, as his lordship said, of my stake\nin the country.\u2014\u201c_The Last of the Lairds._\u201d\n\n\n\n\n THOMAS THE RHYMER:\n _AN ANCIENT FAIRY LEGEND_.\n\n BY SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n\nThomas of Erceldoune, in Lauderdale, called the Rhymer on account of his\nproducing a poetical romance on the subject of Tristrem and Yseult,\nwhich is curious as the earliest specimen of English verse known to\nexist, flourished in the reign of Alexander III. of Scotland. Like other\nmen of talent of the period, Thomas was suspected of magic. He was also\nsaid to have the gift of prophecy, which was accounted for in the\nfollowing peculiar manner, referring entirely to the Elfin superstition.\nAs Thomas lay on Huntly Bank (a place on the descent of the Eildon\nhills, which raise their triple crest above the celebrated monastery of\nMelrose), he saw a lady so extremely beautiful that he imagined it must\nbe the Virgin Mary herself. Her appointments, however, were those rather\nof an amazon, or goddess of the woods. Her steed was of the highest\nbeauty, and at his mane hung thirty silver bells and nine, which were\nmusic to the wind as she paced along. Her saddle was of \u201croyal bone\u201d\n(ivory), laid over with \u201corfeverie\u201d (goldsmith\u2019s work). Her stirrups\u2014her\ndress\u2014all corresponded with her extreme beauty and the magnificence of\nher array. The fair huntress had her bow in hand, and her arrows at her\nbelt. She led three greyhounds in a leash, and three raches, or hounds\nof scent, followed her closely.\n\nShe rejected and disclaimed the homage which Thomas desired to pay to\nher; so that, passing from one extremity to the other, Thomas became as\nbold as he had at first been humble. The lady warns him that he must\nbecome her slave, if he should prosecute his suit towards her in the\nmanner he proposes. Before their interview terminates, the appearance of\nthe beautiful lady is changed into that of the most hideous hag in\nexistence. A witch from the spital or almshouse would have been a\ngoddess in comparison to the late beautiful huntress. Hideous as she\nwas, Thomas\u2019s irregular desires had placed him under the control of this\nhag, and when she bade him take leave of the sun, and of the leaf that\ngrew on the tree, he felt himself under the necessity of obeying her. A\ncavern received them, in which, following his frightful guide, he for\nthree days travelled in darkness, sometimes hearing the booming of a\ndistant ocean, sometimes walking through rivers of blood, which crossed\ntheir subterranean path. At length they emerged into daylight, in a most\nbeautiful orchard. Thomas, almost fainting for want of food, stretches\nout his hand towards the goodly fruit which hangs around him, but is\nforbidden by his conductress, who informs him that these are the fatal\napples which were the cause of the fall of man. He perceives also that\nhis guide had no sooner entered this mysterious ground, and breathed its\nmagic air, than she was revived in beauty, equipage, and splendour, as\nfair or fairer than he had first seen her on the mountain. She then\nproceeds to explain to him the character of the country.\n\n\u201cYonder right hand path,\u201d she says, \u201cconveys the spirits of the blest to\nparadise. Yon downward and well-worn way leads sinful souls to the place\nof everlasting punishment. The third road, by yonder dark brake,\nconducts to the milder place of pain, from which prayer and mass may\nrelease offenders. But see you yet a fourth road, sweeping along the\nplain to yonder splendid castle? Yonder is the road to Elfland, to which\nwe are now bound. The lord of the castle is king of the country, and I\nam his queen. And when we enter yonder castle, you must observe strict\nsilence, and answer no question that is asked at you, and I will account\nfor your silence by saying I took your speech when I brought you from\nmiddle earth.\u201d\n\nHaving thus instructed her lover, they journeyed on to the castle, and\nentering by the kitchen, found themselves in the midst of such a festive\nscene as might become the mansion of a great feudal lord or prince.\n\nThirty carcases of deer were lying on the massive kitchen board, under\nthe hands of numerous cooks, who toiled to cut them up and dress them,\nwhile the gigantic greyhounds which had taken the spoil lay lapping the\nblood, and enjoying the sight of the slain game. They came next to the\nroyal hall, where the king received his loving consort without censure\nor suspicion. Knights and ladies, dancing by threes, occupied the floor\nof the hall, and Thomas, the fatigues of his journey from the Eildon\nhills forgotten, went forward and joined in the revelry. After a period,\nhowever, which seemed to him a very short one, the queen spoke with him\napart, and bade him prepare to return to his own country.\n\n\u201cNow,\u201d said the queen, \u201chow long think you that you have been here?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertes, fair lady,\u201d answered Thomas, \u201cnot above these seven days.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are deceived,\u201d answered the queen; \u201cyou have been seven years in\nthis castle; and it is full time you were gone. Know, Thomas, that the\narchfiend will come to this castle to-morrow to demand his tribute, and\nso handsome a man as you will attract his eye. For all the world would I\nnot suffer you to be betrayed to such a fate; therefore up, and let us\nbe going.\u201d\n\nThis terrible news reconciled Thomas to his departure from Elfin land,\nand the queen was not long in placing him upon Huntly Bank, where the\nbirds were singing. She took a tender leave of him, and to ensure his\nreputation bestowed on him the tongue which _could not lie_. Thomas in\nvain objected to this inconvenient and involuntary adhesion to veracity,\nwhich would make him, as he thought, unfit for church or for market, for\nking\u2019s court or for lady\u2019s bower. But all his remonstrances were\ndisregarded by the lady, and Thomas the Rhymer, whenever the discourse\nturned on the future, gained the credit of a prophet whether he would or\nnot; for he could say nothing but what was sure to come to pass.\n\nThomas remained several years in his own tower near Erceldoune, and\nenjoyed the fame of his predictions, several of which are current among\nthe country people to this day. At length, as the prophet was\nentertaining the Earl of March in his dwelling, a cry of astonishment\narose in the village, on the appearance of a hart and hind, which left\nthe forest, and, contrary to their shy nature, came quietly onward,\ntraversing the village towards the dwelling of Thomas. The prophet\ninstantly rose from the board; and acknowledging the prodigy as the\nsummons of his fate, he accompanied the hart and hind into the forest,\nand though occasionally seen by individuals to whom he has chosen to\nshow himself, he has never again mixed familiarly with mankind.\n\nThomas of Erceldoune, during his retirement, has been supposed, from\ntime to time, to be levying forces to take the field in some crisis of\nhis country\u2019s fate. The story has often been told, of a daring\nhorse-jockey having sold a black horse to a man of venerable and antique\nappearance, who appointed the remarkable hillock upon Eildon hills,\ncalled the Lucken-hare, as the place where, at twelve o\u2019clock at night,\nhe should receive the price. He came, and his money was paid in ancient\ncoin, and he was invited by his customer to view his residence. The\ntrader in horses followed his guide in the deepest astonishment through\nseveral ranges of stalls, in each of which a horse stood motionless,\nwhile an armed warrior lay equally still at the charger\u2019s feet.\n\n\u201cAll these men,\u201d said the wizard in a whisper, \u201cwill awaken at the\nbattle of Sheriffmuir.\u201d\n\nAt the extremity of this extraordinary dep\u00f4t hung a sword and a horn,\nwhich the prophet pointed out to the horse-dealer as containing the\nmeans of dissolving the spell. The man in confusion took the horn, and\nattempted to wind it. The horses instantly started in their stalls,\nstamped, and shook their bridles; the men arose and clashed their\narmour, and the mortal, terrified at the tumult he had excited, dropped\nthe horn from his hand. A voice like that of a giant, louder even than\nthe tumult around, pronounced these words:\u2014\n\n Woe to the coward that ever he was born,\n That did not draw the sword before he blew the horn!\n\nA whirlwind expelled the horse-dealer from the cavern, the entrance to\nwhich he could never again find. A moral might, perhaps, be extracted\nfrom the legend,\u2014namely, that it is best to be armed against danger\nbefore bidding it defiance. But it is a circumstance worth notice, that\nalthough this edition of the tale is limited to the year 1715, by the\nvery mention of Sheriffmuir, yet a similar story appears to have been\ncurrent during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, which is given by Reginald\nScot. The narrative is edifying as peculiarly illustrative of the mode\nof marring a curious tale in telling it, which was one of the virtues\nprofessed by Caius when he hired himself to King Lear. Reginald Scot,\nincredulous on the subject of witchcraft, seems to have given some\nweight to the belief of those who thought that the spirits of famous men\ndo, after death, take up some particular habitations near cities, towns,\nand countries, and act as tutelary and guardian spirits to the places\nthey loved while in the flesh.\n\n\u201cBut more particularly to illustrate this conjecture,\u201d says he, \u201cI could\nname a person who hath lately appeared thrice since his decease, at\nleast some ghostly being or other that calls itself by the name of such\na person, who was dead a hundred years ago, and was in his lifetime\naccounted as a prophet or predicter, by the assistance of sublunary\nspirits; and now, at his appearance, did also give strange predictions\nrespecting famine and plenty, war and bloodshed, and the end of the\nworld. By the information of the person that had communication with him,\nthe last of his appearances was in the following manner:\u2014\u2018I had been,\u2019\nsaid he, \u2018to sell a horse at the next market town, but not attaining my\nprice, as I returned home, by the way I met this man, who began to be\nfamiliar with me, asking what news, and how affairs moved through the\ncountry. I answered as I thought fit; withal I told him of my horse,\nwhom he began to cheapen, and proceeded with me so far that the price\nwas agreed upon. So he turned back with me, and told me that if I would\ngo along with him, I should receive my money. On our way we went,\u2014I upon\nmy horse, and he on another milk-white beast. After much travel, I asked\nhim where he dwelt, and what his name was. He told me that his dwelling\nwas a mile off, at a place called _Farran_, of which place I had never\nheard,[20] though I knew all the country round about. He also told me\nthat he himself was the person of the family of Learmonths,[21] so much\nspoken of as a prophet. At which I began to be somewhat fearful,\nperceiving we were on a road which I had never been on before, which\nincreased my fear and amazement more. Well! on we went till he brought\nme under ground, I knew not how, into the presence of a beautiful woman,\nwho paid me the money without speaking a word. He conducted me out again\nthrough a large and long entry, where I saw above six hundred men in\narmour laid prostrate on the ground as if asleep. At last I found myself\nin the open field, by the help of the moonlight, in the very place where\nI first met him, and made a shift to get home by three in the morning.\nBut the money I received was just double of what I esteemed it when the\nwoman paid me, of which, at this instant, I have several pieces to show,\nconsisting of ninepennies, thirteenpence-halfpennies, &c.\u2019\u201d\n\nFootnote 20:\n\n In this Sir Walter confesses himself \u201cin the same ignorance as his\n namesake Reginald, though having at least as many opportunities of\n information.\u201d\n\nFootnote 21:\n\n In popular tradition, the name of Thomas the Rhymer was always averred\n to be Learmonth, though he neither uses it himself, nor is described\n by his son other than Le Rymour. The Learmonths of Dairsie, in Fife,\n claimed descent from the prophet.\n\nIt is a great pity that this horse-dealer, having specimens of the fairy\ncoin, of a quality more permanent than usual, had not favoured us with\nan account of an impress so valuable to medallists. It is not the less\nedifying, as we are deprived of the more picturesque parts of the story,\nto learn that Thomas\u2019s payment was as faithful as his prophecies. The\nbeautiful lady who bore the purse must have been undoubtedly the Fairy\nQueen, whose affection, though, like that of his own Yseult, we cannot\nterm it altogether laudable, seems yet to have borne a faithful and firm\ncharacter.\n\n\n\n\n LACHLAN MORE:\n _A TRADITIONARY TALE OF THE WESTERN HIGHLANDS_.\n\n\nLachlan More Maclean, of Duart, was one of the most remarkable men\nconnected with the Highlands of Scotland in his days. His father having\ndied early, King James the Fifth took a considerable interest in this\nyoung man, and he was educated at his expense. Lachlan\u2019s grandfather had\nbeen at the fatal battle of Flodden, with a large body of his clan, and\nhe was killed in the immediate defence of his unfortunate prince.\n\nThe son and successor of James the Fourth was not unmindful of this, and\nhe was desirous of forming a matrimonial connection between the young\nchief and the heiress of Athole. Preliminaries having been settled among\nthe parties, the bridegroom was suddenly called to his own country, and\non his way he visited the Earl of Glencairn, at his castle on the banks\nof the Clyde. Cards were introduced in the evening, and Maclean\u2019s\npartner was one of the earl\u2019s daughters. In the course of the evening\nthe game happened to be changed, and the company again cut for partners;\non which another of the daughters whispered in her sister\u2019s ear, that if\nthe Highland chief had been her partner, she would not have hazarded the\nloss of him by cutting anew. The chief heard the remark, and was so\npleased with the compliment, and so fascinated with the charm of Lady\nMargaret Cunningham, that a match was made up between them, and they\nwere speedily married. Maclean thus gave great offence to the king, and\nlost the richest heiress at that time in Scotland.\n\nLachlan More\u2019s sister was married to Angus Macdonald, of Islay and\nKintyre, then the most powerful of the branches which sprung from the\nLord of the Isles. These two chiefs appear to have been much of the same\ndisposition,\u2014both were violent, ambitious, and turbulent. Their bloody\nfeuds were productive of much misery to their people, and ended\ninjuriously to all parties. Macdonald, on his return from the Isle of\nSkye, was forced to take shelter in that portion of the island of Jura\nwhich was the property of Maclean; and it unfortunately happened that\ntwo villains of the clan Macdonald, whose bad conduct had induced them\nto take refuge in Mull, to escape punishment from their own chief,\nhappened to be then in Jura. It would seem that they delighted in\nmischief, and they adopted an expedient which effectually answered their\npurpose.\n\nMaclean had some cattle close to the place where the Macdonalds lay; the\ntwo renegades slaughtered some of these, and carried away many more of\nthem. They left Jura before daylight, and contrived to convey\ninformation to Lachlan More that Macdonald had done him all this damage.\nDuart collected a considerable number of his men, and arrived in Jura\nbefore the Macdonalds departed. Without making proper inquiry into the\ncircumstances, he rashly attacked the other party, and many of them were\nslain, but their chief escaped. It appears to be admitted on all hands\nthat this was the beginning of the sanguinary warfare which followed,\nand Maclean was certainly culpable. Mutual friends interfered, and\nendeavoured to effect a reconciliation between persons so nearly\nconnected. The Earl of Argyle was maternal uncle to Lachlan, and chiefly\nby his powerful intercession the further effusion of blood was prevented\nfor a time.\n\nMacdonald had occasion to be again in Skye, and on his return he was\ninvited by Maclean to visit him in the castle of Duart. After dinner,\nsome unfortunate circumstance occurred which produced a quarrel.\nTradition varies in regard to what immediately followed. It seems,\nhowever, that Maclean demanded that the other should yield to him\npossession of the whole island of Islay, of which he then held but the\nhalf. Some consideration was to have been given in return for this\nconcession; but Maclean chose to detain as hostages, to ensure the\nfulfilment of the treaty, the eldest son of Macdonald, then a boy, and\nalso a brother, together with several other persons of some note.\nMaclean soon after set out for Islay to take possession of that island.\nHis nephew accompanied him, but the other hostages were left in Mull\nuntil the whole business should be arranged. What ensued was no more\nthan might have been expected: Macdonald pretended to be disposed for an\namicable adjustment of the terms formerly agreed upon, and prevailed on\nLachlan More to visit him at his house in Islay, where nothing appeared\nto create alarm.\n\nAfter supper, Maclean and his people retired to a barn for rest; but\nMacdonald soon knocked at the door, and said he had forgot to give his\nguests their reposing draught, and desired to be admitted for that\npurpose. A large force had by this time been collected, and Lachlan soon\nunderstood that he would be made to suffer for his former conduct. He\nwas determined, however, to make a resolute defence. He stood in the\ndoor fully armed, and in his left hand he held his nephew, who lay with\nhim. He was a man of extraordinary size and strength, as the appellation\n_More_ indicates, and his situation required all his prowess. Macdonald,\ndesirous to save the life of his son, agreed to permit Lachlan to quit\nthe barn, which had by this time been set on fire. The greater part of\nhis attendants also followed their chief; but the two Macdonalds, who\nhad first fomented this unhappy quarrel, were consumed in the flames.\n\nMacdonald of Islay having now recovered possession of his son, was\ndetermined to put Maclean and all his people to death; but fortunately\nfor them, he had a fall from his horse, by which one of his legs was\nfractured. This retarded the execution of his fell purpose, and enabled\nthe Earl of Argyle to make a representation of the case to the\ngovernment. Maclean was permitted to return to Mull; but several of the\nprincipal gentlemen of his clan, who had accompanied them to Islay, were\nretained as hostages for the safety of those who still remained in the\nsame condition at Duart.\n\nVery soon after Maclean\u2019s departure from Islay, Macdonald of\nArdnamurchan, commonly distinguished by the patronimic of _Mac-vic-Ian_,\nthe son of John\u2019s son, arrived there, and falsely informed Macdonald\nthat Lachlan More had destroyed all his hostages on his return home.\nThis was retaliated on Maclean\u2019s hostages, who were all put to death,\nand the next day the other hostages arrived safely from Mull.\n\nThis is a specimen of the deplorable state of barbarism into which\nScotland sunk during the minority of James the Sixth. The whole kingdom\nwas full of blood and rapine, but the Highlands were in the worst\ncondition of all. For a century afterwards very little amelioration\nseems to have taken place; but it is pleasing to reflect that for the\nlast fifty years there is not in Europe a country where the law bears\nmore absolute sway than in the Scottish Highlands.\n\nMacdonald and Maclean were both committed to ward, one in the Bass, and\nthe other in the Castle of Edinburgh, where they were detained for\nseveral years. They were liberated on strong assurances of peaceable\nconduct, and on giving hostages. Maclean was afterwards ordered to join\nthe Earl of Argyle, who took the command of the army appointed to oppose\nthe Earls of Huntly and Errol, then in open rebellion against the\ngovernment of James the Sixth.\n\nThe two armies encountered at Glenlivat, and the rebels were victorious.\nArgyle, though brave, was young and inexperienced, nor were all his\nofficers faithful to their trust. Innes, in his History of Moray,\nasserts that some of the principal men of his own name were in\ncorrespondence with the enemy; and other writers ascribe much effect to\nthe cannon used by the rebel earls. On this occasion Lachlan More was\ngreatly distinguished for bravery and for prudence, having acted the\npart of an experienced commander, and gained the applause of both\narmies.\n\nIt were well if he had always confined his warfare to such honourable\ncombats. Soon after we find him again engaged in Islay against his\nnephew, James Macdonald, Angus, his former antagonist, being dead. On\nthis occasion, it would seem, however, that he was disposed for peace.\nLachlan had embraced the Protestant religion; and it was a practice with\nhis Catholic ancestors to walk thrice in procession around the shores of\na small island lying in Lochspelvie, invoking success to the expedition\non which they were about to be engaged. With singular absurdity, Lachlan\nresolved to show his contempt for Catholic superstition: he walked\nthrice around the island, but his ancestors had always walked right\nabout, or in the same course with the sun; but this enlightened\nProtestant reversed it. The day following he departed with his forces\nfor Islay, and he never returned. The weather became boisterous, and he\nwas compelled to bear away for Island Nare, in the mouth of Loch\nGruinard. A day was appointed for a conference between himself and his\nnephew; and Lachlan, attended by a small portion of his men, was to be\nmet by Macdonald with an equal number. Macdonald had, however, placed a\nlarge body in ambush at some distance. The conference commenced under\nfavourable appearances, but a misunderstanding soon arose, and swords\nwere drawn. A dreadful conflict ensued, and Maclean fought with\nastonishing bravery. The reserve which had lain concealed joined their\nfriends; but both were on the eve of being defeated, when a body of\nauxiliaries from the island of Arran arrived, and Lachlan More was\nkilled, with all those who had accompanied him on this fatal\nexpedition.[22]\n\nFootnote 22:\n\n Lachlan More was killed in the year 1598.\n\nHis son had remained on the island with a much larger force, but the\npacific appearances deceived him, and he neglected to keep the boats\nafloat. When the fight commenced on shore, he and his men were looking\non, but could not launch their heavy boats, or render assistance. The\nMacdonalds suffered severe loss, and James (afterwards Sir James) was\nleft for dead on the field.\n\nA poor woman of his own clan, assisted by her son, conveyed Lachlan\u2019s\nbody on a sledge to the church of Kilchomen, in Islay, where she got him\nburied. By the jolting of the sledge, the features of the body acquired\na particular expression, at which the young man smiled. His name was\nMacdonald, and his mother was so enraged at his sneer, that she made a\nthrust at him with a dirk, and wounded him severely.\u2014_Lit. Gazette._\n\n\n\n\n ALEMOOR:\n _A TALE OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY_.\n\n\n Sad is the wail that floats o\u2019er Alemoor\u2019s lake,\n And nightly bids her gulfs unbottomed quake,\n While moonbeams, sailing o\u2019er her waters blue,\n Reveal the frequent tinge of blood-red hue.\n The water-birds, with shrill discordant scream,\n Oft rouse the peasant from his tranquil dream;\n He dreads to raise his slow unclosing eye,\n And thinks he hears an infant\u2019s feeble cry.\u2014_Leyden._\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nIn one of those frequent incursions which the Scottish Borderers used to\nmake into the sister territory, it was the misfortune of Sir John\nDouglas, a gallant and distinguished warrior, to be taken prisoner by\nRichard de Mowbray, who, to a naturally proud and vindictive temper,\nadded a bitter and irreconcilable hatred to that branch of the house of\nDouglas to which his prisoner belonged. Instead of treating the brave\nand noble youth with that courtesy which the law of arms and the manners\nof the times authorised, he loaded his limbs with fetters, and threw him\ninto one of the deepest dungeons of his baronial castle of Holme\nCultrum. Earl de Mowbray, his father, was then at the English court, in\nattendance on his sovereign, so that he had none to gainsay his\nauthority, but yielded, without hesitation or restraint, to every\nimpulse of his passions. To what lengths the savage cruelty of his\ntemper might have led him in practising against the life of his youthful\nprisoner is not known, for he was also summoned to London to assist in\nthe stormy councils of that distracted period.\n\nMeanwhile, Douglas lay on the floor of his dungeon, loaded with fetters,\nand expecting every hour to be led out to die. No murmur escaped his\nlips. He waited patiently till the fatal message arrived, only\nregretting that it had not pleased Heaven to suffer him to die sword in\nhand, like his brave ancestors. \u201cYes!\u201d he exclaimed, as he raised his\nstately and warlike form from the ground, and clashing his fettered\nhands together, while his dark eye shot fire; \u201cyes! let false tyrannical\nMowbray come with all his ruffian band\u2014let them give me death by sword\nor by cord\u2014my cheek shall not blanch, nor my look quail before them. As\na Douglas I have lived, as a Douglas I shall die!\u201d But the expected\nsummons came not. Day after day passed on in sullen monotony, more\ntrying to a brave mind than even the prospect of suffering. No sound\nbroke in on the silence around him, but the daily visit of a veteran\nman-at-arms, who brought him his scanty meal. No entreaties could induce\nthis man to speak, so that the unfortunate prisoner could only guess at\nhis probable fate. Sometimes despondency, in spite of his better reason,\nwould steal over his mind. \u201cShall I never again see my noble, my widowed\nmother? my innocent, playful sister?\u2014never again wander through the\ngreen woods of Drumlanrig, or hunt the deer on its lordly domain? Shall\nmy sight never again be greeted by the green earth or cheerful sun? Will\nthese hateful walls enclose me till damp and famine destroy me, and my\nwithered limbs be left in this charnel-house, a monument of the cruelty\nand unceasing hatred of De Mowbray?\u201d\n\nSeven long weeks had rolled tediously along when the prisoner was\nsurprised by his allowance being brought by a stranger in the dress of a\nCumbrian peasant. Eagerly, rapidly he questioned the man respecting\nMowbray, his intentions, and why he had been so long left without being\nallowed to name a ransom. The peasant told him of De Mowbray\u2019s absence,\nand added that, as there was to be a general invasion of Scotland, all\nthe men-at-arms had been marched away that morning to join their\ncompanions, except the warders, by whom he had been ordered to bring\nfood to the prisoner. Joy now thrilled through the heart and frame of\nthe youthful warrior, but he had still enough of caution left to make no\nfurther inquiries, but allow his new jailer to depart without exciting\nhis suspicions too early.\n\nIt is well known to those who are conversant with the history of that\nperiod, that, however bitter the animosities of the two nations were\nwhile engaged in actual warfare, yet in times of peace, or even of\ntruce, the commons lived on friendly terms, and carried on even a sort\nof trade in cattle. All this was known to Sir John, who hoped, through\nthe means of his new attendant, to open a communication with his\nretainers, if he could not engage him to let him free, and become a\nfollower of the Douglas, whose name was alike dreaded in both nations.\nBut events over which he had no control were even then working for him,\nand his deliverance was to come from a quarter he thought not of.\n\nAt the date of this tale, the ladies of rank had few amusements when\ncompared to those of modern times. Books, even if they could have been\nprocured, would sometimes not have been valued or understood, from the\nvery limited education which, in those days, was allowed to females.\nGuarded in their inaccessible towers or castles, their only amusement\nwas listening to the tales of pilgrims, or the songs of wandering\nminstrels, both of whom were always made welcome to the halls of nobles,\nand whose persons, like those of heralds, were deemed sacred even among\ncontending parties. To be present at a tournament was considered as an\nevent of the first importance, and looked forward to with the highest\nexpectation, and afterwards formed an era in their lives. When such\namusements were not to be had, a walk on the ramparts, attended by their\ntrusty maid, was the next resource against the tedium of time. It was\nduring such a walk as this that Emma, only daughter of Earl Mowbray,\naddressed her attendant as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cDo you think it possible, Edith, that the prisoner, whom my brother is\nso solicitous to conceal, can be that noble Douglas of whom we have\nheard so much, and about whom Graham, the old blind minstrel, sung such\ngallant verses?\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed, my sweet lady,\u201d replied her attendant, \u201cthe prisoner in yonder\ndungeon is certainly of the house of Douglas, and, as I think, the very\nSir John of whom we have heard so much.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow knowest thou that?\u201d inquired her lady, eagerly.\n\n\u201cI had always my own thoughts of it,\u201d whispered Edith cautiously, and\ndrawing nearer her mistress; \u201cbut since Ralph of Teesdale succeeded grim\nold Norman as his keeper, I am almost certain of it. He knows every\nDouglas of them, and, from his account, though the dungeon was dark, he\nbelieves it was Sir John who performed such prodigies of valour at the\ntaking of Alnwick.\u201d\n\n\u201cMay Heaven, then, preserve and succour him!\u201d sighed the Lady Emma, as\nshe clasped her hands together.\n\nEmma De Mowbray, the only daughter of the most powerful and warlike of\nthe northern earls, was dazzlingly fair, and her very beautiful features\nwere only relieved from the charge of insipidity on the first look, by\nthe lustre of her dark blue eyes, which were shaded by long and\nbeautiful eye-lashes. Her stature was scarcely above the middle size,\nbut so finely proportioned, that the eye of the beholder never tired\ngazing on it. She was only seventeen, and had not yet been allowed to\ngrace a tournament, her ambitious father having determined to seclude\nhis northern flower till he could astonish the Court of England with her\ncharms, and secure for her such an advantageous settlement as would\nincrease his own power and resources. Thus had Emma grown up the very\nchild of nature and tenderness. Shut out from society of every kind, her\nimagination had run riot, and her most pleasing hours, when not occupied\nby devotional duties, were spent in musing over the romantic legends\nwhich she had heard either from minstrels, or those adventurers who\nofttimes found a home in the castle of a powerful chief, and which were\ncirculated among the domestics till they reached the ear of their\nyouthful lady. These feelings had been unconsciously fostered by her\nspiritual director, Father Anselm, who, of noble birth himself, had once\nbeen a soldier, and delighted, in the long winter evenings, to recount\nthe prowess of his youth; and in the tale of other years, often and\noften was the noble name of Douglas introduced and dwelt upon with\nenthusiastic rapture, as he narrated the chief\u2019s bravery in the Holy\nLand. In short, every circumstance combined to feed and excite the\nfeverish exalted imagination of this untutored child. Had her mother\nlived, the sensibilities of her nature had been cherished and refined,\nand taught to keep within the bounds of their proper channel. As it was,\nthey were allowed to run riot, and almost led her to overstep the limits\nof that retiring modesty which is so beautiful in the sex. No sooner,\nthen, had she learnt that Douglas was the captive of her haughty\nbrother, and perhaps doomed to a lingering or ignominious death, than\nshe resolved to attempt his escape, be the consequences what they would.\nA wild tumultuary feeling took possession of her mind as she came to\nthis resolution. What would the liberated object say to her, or how look\nhis thanks? and, oh! if indeed he proved to be the hero of her\nday-dreams, how blessed would she be to have it in her power to be his\nguardian angel! The tear of delight trembled in her eye, as she turned\nfrom the bartisan of the castle, and sought the solitude of her chamber.\n\nIt was midnight\u2014the last stroke of the deep-toned castle bell had been\nanswered by the echoes from the neighbouring hills, when two shrouded\nfigures stood by the couch of the prisoner. The glare of a small\nlantern, carried by one of them, awoke Douglas. He sprung to his feet as\nlightly as if the heavy fetters he was loaded with had been of silk, and\nin a stern voice told them he was ready. \u201cBe silent and follow us,\u201d was\nthe reply of one of the muffled visitors. He bowed in silence, and\nprepared to leave his dungeon,\u2014not an easy undertaking, when it is\nremembered that he was so heavily ironed; but the care and ingenuity of\nhis conductors obviated as much as possible even this difficulty; one\ncame on each side, and prevented as much as possible the fetters from\nclashing on each other. In this manner they hurried him on through a\nlong subterraneous passage, then crossed some courts which seemed\novergrown with weeds, and then entered a chapel, where Douglas could\nperceive a noble tomb surrounded by burning tapers. \u201cYou must allow\nyourself to be blindfolded,\u201d said one of them in a sweet, musical, but\nsuppressed voice; he did so, and no sooner was the bandage made fast,\nthan he heard the snap as of a spring, and was immediately led forward.\nIn a few minutes more he felt he had left the rough stones of the\nchurch, and its chill sepulchral air, for a matted floor and a warmer\natmosphere; the bandage dropped from his eyes, and he found himself in a\nsmall square room, comfortably furnished, with a fire blazing in the\nchimney; a second look convinced him he was in the private room of an\necclesiastic, and that he was alone.\n\nIt need not be told the sagacious reader that this escape was the work\nof Lady Emma, aided by Father Anselm, and Ralph Teesdale, who was her\nfoster-brother, and therefore bound to serve her almost at the risk of\nhis life\u2014so very strong were such ties then considered. No sooner did\nDouglas learn from the venerable ecclesiastic to whom he owed his life\nand liberty, than he pleaded for an interview with all the warmth of\ngratitude which such a boon could inspire.\n\nRecruited by a night of comfortable repose, and refreshed by wholesome\nfood, our youthful warrior looked more like those of his name than when\nstretched on the floor of the dungeon. It was the evening of the second\nday after his liberation, while Douglas was listening to his kind and\nvenerable host\u2019s account of the daring deeds by which his ancestor, the\ngood Lord James, had been distinguished, when the door opened, and Lady\nEmma and her attendant entered. Instantly sinking on one knee, Sir John\npoured forth his thanks in language so courtly, so refined, yet so\nearnest and heartfelt, that Lady Emma\u2019s heart beat tumultuously, and her\neyes became suffused with tears.\n\n\u201cSuffer me,\u201d continued Douglas, \u201cto behold the features of her who has\nindeed been a guardian angel to the descendant of that house who never\nforgave an injury, nor ever, while breath animated them, forgot a\nfavour.\u201d\n\nLady Emma slowly raised her veil, and the eyes of the youthful pair met,\nand dwelt on each other with mutual admiration. Again the knight knelt,\nand, pressing her hand to his lips, vowed that he would ever approve\nhimself her faithful and devoted champion. The conversation then took a\nless agitating turn, and, in another hour, Lady Emma took her leave of\nthe good father and his interesting companion, in whose favour she could\nnot conceal that she was already inspired with the most fervent\nfeelings. Nor did she chide Edith, who, while she braided the beautiful\nlocks of her mistress, expatiated on the fine form and manly features of\nDouglas, and rejoiced in his escape.\n\nIt was now time for Sir John to make some inquiries of Father Anselm\nabout the state of the country, and if the Scotch had beat back their\nassailants in the attack made upon them, and learned, to his pleasure\nand surprise, that the enemy were then too much divided among themselves\nto think of making reprisals, the whole force of the kingdom being then\ngathered together to decide the claims of York and Lancaster to the\ncrown of England; that Earl Mowbray and his son, adherents of the queen,\nwere then lying at York with their retainers, ready to close in battle\nwith the adverse party. It might be supposed that this intelligence\nwould inspire the captive with the wish to complete his escape, and\nreturn to Scotland. But no. A secret influence\u2014a sort of charm\u2014bound him\nto the spot; he was fascinated; he had no power to fly, even if the\nmassy gates of the castle had unfolded themselves before him.\n\nBred up in the camp, Douglas was unused to the small sweet courtesies of\nlife; his hours, when in his paternal towers of Drumlanrig, were chiefly\nspent in the chase, or in warlike exercises with his brothers, and the\nvassals of their house. His mother, a lady of noble birth, descended\nfrom the bold Seatons, encouraged such feelings, and kept up that state\nin her castle and retinue which befitted her high rank. His sister\nBertha was a mere child, whom he used to fondle and caress in his\nmoments of relaxation. But now a new world broke upon his astonished\nsenses. He had seen a young, a beautiful lady, to whom he owed life and\nliberty, who, unsought, had generously come forward to his relief. Of\nthe female character he knew nothing; if he did think of them, it was\neither invested with the matronly air of his mother, or the playful\nfondness of his sister. His emotions were new and delightful, and he\nlonged to tell his fair deliverer all he felt; and he did tell her,\nand\u2014she listened.\n\nBut why prolong the tale? Interview succeeded interview, till even\nFather Anselm became aware of their growing attachment. Alas! the good\npriest saw his error too late; and although, even then, he attempted to\nreason with both on the consequences of their passion, yet his arguments\nmade no impression.\n\n\u201cYou will turn war into peace,\u201d whispered Lady Emma, as she listened to\nher spiritual director, \u201cby healing the feud between the families.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you will, by uniting us,\u201d boldly exclaimed the youthful lover,\n\u201cgive to the Mowbrays a friend who will never fail in council or in\nfield.\u201d\n\nOvercome by these and similar arguments, the tender-hearted Anselm at\nlast consented to join their hands. At the solemn hour of midnight, when\nthe menials and retainers were bound in sleep, an agitated yet happy\ngroup stood by the altar of the castle chapel. There might be seen the\nnoble form of Douglas, with a rich mantle wrapped round him, and the\nfair and beautiful figure of his bride, as she blushingly left the arm\nof her attendant to bestow her hand where her heart was already given.\nThe light of the sacred tapers fell full upon the reverend form of\nFather Anselm, and the chapel reverberated the solemn words he uttered\nas he invoked Heaven to bless their union. The athletic figure of Ralph\nTeesdale was seen near the door to guard against surprise.\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\nNothing occurred for some time to mar the harmony and peace of the\nmarried lovers. At length their tranquillity was broken by accounts of\nthe fatal and bloody battle of Towton, which gave a death-blow to the\ninterests of the Lancastrians. This news spread consternation among the\nsmall party at Holme Cultrum. The question was, whether to remain and\nboldly confront the Mowbrays, or fly towards Scotland and endeavour to\nreach Drumlanrig; but the distracted state of the country forbade this\nplan, and the arrival of some fugitives from the field of battle having\nbrought the intelligence that both Earl Mowbray and his son were\nunwounded, and had fled to France, determined the party to remain where\nthey were. This, however, they soon repented of, when they understood\nthat a large body of Yorkists were in full march northwards to demolish\nall the castles held by the insurgent noblemen. This trumpet-note roused\nthe warlike spirit of Douglas. He boldly showed himself to the soldiers,\nand swore to defend the castle to the last, or be buried in its ruins,\nif they would stand by him. But the men-at-arms, either unwilling to\nfight under a stranger, or panicstruck at their late defeat, coldly met\nthis proposal; and while Father Anselm and Douglas were examining the\noutward works, they made their escape by a postern, leaving only two or\nthree infirm old men, besides the menials, to resist the conquering\narmy. Sir John, undaunted by the dastardly behaviour of the men, still\ncontinued his preparations, and inspired such courage into the hearts of\nhis little garrison, that they vowed to stand by him to the last. But\nthese preparations proved needless: Edward, either allured by the\nprospect of greater booty in some richer castle, or afraid of harassing\nhis troops, turned aside into the midland counties, and left the\nbold-hearted Douglas to the enjoyment of his wife\u2019s society.\n\nMonths of unalloyed felicity were theirs; and while England was torn by\ncivil dissensions,\u2014when the father pursued the son, and the son the\nfather, and the most sacred bonds of nature were rent asunder at the\nshrine of party, and while the unburied dead gave the fields of merry\nEngland the appearance of a charnel-house,\u2014all was peace, love, and joy\nwithin the walls of Holme Cultrum. Seated in the lofty halls of her\nfathers, Lady Emma appeared the personification of content; hers was\nindeed that felicity she had not dared to hope for even in her wildest\ndaydreams. It was indeed a lovely sight to behold her leaning on the arm\nof her noble husband, listening to his details of well-fought fields;\nher eye now sparkling with hope, and her cheek now blanched with terror,\nas they paced in the twilight the ample battlements of the castle: it\nwas like the ivy clinging and clasping round the stately oak. If at such\nmoments Douglas wearied of the monotony of existence, and half-wished he\nwas once more in the front of battle, he had only to look in the soft\nblue eye of his Emma, press her to his heart, and everything else was\nforgot.\n\nSummer had passed away, and the fields wore the golden livery of autumn.\nIt was on a beautiful evening, while Douglas, Lady Emma, and Father\nAnselm, were enjoying the soothing breeze, when Ralph Teesdale rushed\nbefore them, his face pale and his trembling accents proclaiming his\nterror.\n\n\u201cFly, my lord!\u201d addressing Douglas; \u201cfly, for you are betrayed; the earl\nis come, at the head of a band of mercenaries, and vows to have your\nhead stuck on the battlements before tomorrow\u2019s sun rise.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will not fly,\u201d said Douglas; \u201cboldly will I confront the earl, and\nclaim my wife.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy father is good, is kind; he will yield to the prayers and tears of\nhis Emma.\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas, alas! my dearest and honoured lady,\u201d rejoined her foster-brother,\n\u201cyour noble father is no more, and \u2019tis your brother who now seeks the\nlife of Douglas.\u201d\n\nThe first part of the sentence was only heard by Lady Emma, who fell\nsenseless into the arms of her husband, and was immediately conveyed to\nher chamber by her ever-ready attendant. A hasty council was then held\nbetween Father Anselm and Douglas.\n\n\u201cYou had better take the advice of that faithful fellow, and give way.\nYou know,\u201d continued the priest, \u201cthe dreadful temper and baleful\npassions of Richard de Mowbray. Not only your own life, but that of your\nwife, may fall a sacrifice to his fury, were he to find you. I am well\naware that he has long considered his sister as an encumbrance on his\nsuccession, and will either cause her to be shut up in a convent, or\nsecretly destroyed.\u201d\n\nDouglas shuddered at the picture, and asked the holy father what he\nshould do.\n\n\u201cRetreat to my secret chamber, in the first instance; it were madness,\nand worse, to attempt to exclude the Earl de Mowbray from his castle,\neven if we had sufficient strength within, which you know we have not. I\nshall cause Lady Emma to be conveyed there also when she recovers; we\nmust resolve on some scheme instantly; the secret of the spring is\nunknown to all but your faithful friends.\u201d\n\nSir John at length complied, and was shortly afterwards joined in his\nretreat by Lady Emma and Edith. Flight\u2014instant flight\u2014was resolved on;\nand the timid and gentle Emma, who had hardly ever ventured beyond the\nwalls of the castle, declared she was ready to dare everything rather\nthan be torn from her husband, or be the means of his being consigned to\nendless captivity, or, it might be, a cruel and lingering death. Father\nAnselm set off again in search of Ralph, and soon returned with the\njoyful intelligence that De Mowbray was still at a castle a few miles\ndistant; that those of his followers who had already arrived were then\ncarousing deeply; and as soon as the first watch was set, a pair of\nfleet horses would be waiting at the small postern, to which Douglas and\nhis lady could steal unobserved, wrapt in horsemen\u2019s cloaks. The short\ninterval which intervened was spent by Edith in making such preparations\nas were required for the travellers, and by the churchman in fervent\npetitions to Heaven for their safety. At length the expected signal was\ngiven from the chapel, and the agitated party stood at the low postern,\nwhere Ralph waited with the horses. It was some moments before the lady\ncould disengage herself from the arms of her weeping attendant; but the\nfather hurried them away, and soon their figures were lost in the gloom,\nand their horses\u2019 tread became faint in the distance.\n\nWell it was for the fugitives that their plans had been so quickly\nexecuted, for ere midnight the trumpets of De Mowbray sounded before the\ncastle gate. There all was uproar and confusion. The means of\nrefreshment had been given with unsparing hand, and the wild spirits of\nthe mercenaries whom he commanded were then in a state bordering on\nstupefaction from their lengthened debauch. The few who accompanied him\nwere not much better, and he himself had all his evil passions inflamed\nby the wine he had quaffed with the Lord of Barnard Castle. Hastily\nthrowing himself from his reeking charger, he entered his castle sword\nin hand, and ordered his sister to be brought before him, and the castle\nto be searched, from turret to foundation stone, for the presumptuous\nDouglas. Pale, trembling, and in tears, Edith threw herself at his feet.\n\n\u201cO, my good lord, my lady, my dear lady is ill, very ill, ever since she\nheard of the death of her honoured father. To-morrow she will endeavour\nto see you.\u201d\n\n\u201cOff, woman!\u201d he exclaimed. \u201cThis night I must and shall see my sister,\ndead or alive,\u201d and he arose with fury in his looks.\n\nBut Wolfstone, his lieutenant, a brave young man, stepped before him,\nand, drawing his sword, exclaimed\u2014\n\n\u201cYou must pass over my dead body ere you break in upon the sacred\nsorrows of Lady Emma.\u201d\n\nThere was something in the brave bearing of the gallant foreigner which\neven De Mowbray respected, for he lowered his voice, and stealing his\nhand from his dagger, said\u2014\n\n\u201cAnd where is Father Anselm, that he comes not to welcome me to the\nhalls of my fathers?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe is gone,\u201d returned Edith, \u201cto the neighbouring monastery, to say a\nmass for the honoured dead,\u201d and she devoutly crossed herself, turning\nher tearful eye on Wolfstone, who, with the most respectful tone, added\u2014\n\n\u201cGo, faithful maiden! say to your lady that Conrad Wolfstone guards her\nchamber till her pleasure is known.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow lead in our prisoner there;\u201d but a dozen of voices exclaimed\nagainst further duty that night.\n\n\u201cHe sleeps sound in his dungeon,\u201d said De Mowbray\u2019s squire; \u201cand\ntomorrow you may make him sleep sounder, if you will. A cup of wine\nwould be more to the purpose, methinks, after our long and toilsome\nmarch.\u201d\n\nA hundred voices joined in the request. The wine was brought, and the\ntyrant soon forgot his projects of vengeance in a prolonged debauch. He\nslept too\u2014that unnatural monster slept\u2014and dreamt of his victims, and\nthe sweet revenge that was awaiting him. It was owing to the presence of\nmind of Ralph that the flight of Douglas was not discovered. He had the\naddress to persuade the half-inebriated soldiers that the prisoner was\nactually securely fettered in the dungeon which he had all along\noccupied. No sooner did he see them engaged in the new carousal than he\nhastened to join Edith in the secret chamber, where they united with\nFather Anselm in his devotions, and prayed for blessings on the head of\ntheir noble lord and lady.\n\nMeanwhile the fugitives had reached Scotland, and were now leisurely\npursuing their way, thinking themselves far beyond the reach of pursuit.\nOn their first crossing the border, a shepherd\u2019s hut afforded the\nagitated Lady Emma an hour\u2019s repose and a draught of milk. The morning\nair revived her spirits, and once more she smiled sweetly as her husband\nbade her welcome to his native soil. From the fear of pursuit, they\ndurst not take the most direct road to Drumlanrig, but continued to\nfollow the narrow tracks among the hills, known only to huntsmen and\nshepherds.\n\nIt was now evening; the sun was sinking among a lofty range of\nmountains, tinging their heathy summits with a purple hue, as his broad\ndisc seemed to touch their tops. The travellers were entering a narrow\ndefile, at the end of which a small but beautiful mountain lake or loch\nburst upon their sight; its waters lay delightfully still and placid,\nreflecting aslant a few alder bushes which grew on its banks, while the\ncanna, or wild cotton grass, reared its white head here and there among\nthe bushes of wild thyme which sent their perfume far on the air. The\nwild and melancholy note of the curlew, as she was roused from her nest\nby the travellers, or the occasional bleat of a lamb, was all that broke\nthe universal stillness.\n\n\u201cAh, my love,\u201d said Lady Emma, riding up close to her husband, \u201cwhat a\nscene of peace and tranquillity! Why could we not live here, far from\ncourts and camps, from battle and bloodshed? But,\u201d she continued,\nlooking fondly and fixedly at her husband, \u201cthis displeases you,\u2014think\nof it only as a fond dream, and pardon me.\u201d\n\n\u201cTrue, my Emma,\u201d returned Douglas, \u201cthese are but fond dreams; the state\nof our poor country commands every man to do his duty, and how could the\nfollowers of the Bloody Heart sheath their swords, and live like\nbondsmen? Never\u2014never! But let us ride on now; the smoke from yonder\ncabin on the brow of the hill promises shelter for the night, and, ere\nto-morrow\u2019s sun go down, you shall be welcomed as the daughter of one of\nthe noblest dames of Scotland. Ride on\u2014the night wears apace.\u201d\n\nScarcely had the words passed his lips, when the quick tramp of a steed\nbehind caused him to turn round. It was Mowbray, his eyes glaring with\nfury, and his frame trembling with rage and excitement.\n\n\u201cTurn, traitor! coward! robber! turn, and meet your just punishment!\u201d\n\n\u201cCoward was never heard by a Douglas unrevenged,\u201d was the haughty answer\nto this defiance, as he wheeled round to meet the challenger, at the\nsame time waving to Lady Emma to ride on; but she became paralysed with\nfear and surprise, and sat on her palfrey motionless. Both drew their\nswords, and the combat began. It was furious but short: Douglas unhorsed\nhis antagonist, and then, leaping from his own steed, went to assist in\nraising him, unwilling farther to harm the brother of his wife. But oh,\nthe treachery and cruelty of the wicked! No sooner did the\ntender-hearted Douglas kneel down beside him to ascertain the nature of\nhis wounds, than Mowbray drew his secret dagger, and stabbed him to the\nheart.\n\n\nThe moon rose pale and cold on the waters of this inland lake, and\nshowed distinctly the body of a female lying near its shore, while a\ndark heap, resembling men asleep, was seen at a little distance on a\nrising ground,\u2014the mournful howl of a large dog only broke the\ndeath-like stillness. Soon, however, a horseman was seen descending the\npass; he was directed by the dog to the female, who still lay as if life\nindeed had fled. He sprung from his horse, and brought water from the\nlake, which he sprinkled on her face and hands. Long his efforts were\nunavailing, but at last the pulse of life began once more to beat, the\neye opened, and she wildly exclaimed\u2014\n\n\u201cO do not kill him!\u201d\n\n\u201cHe is safe for me, lady,\u201d said the well-known voice of Ralph Teesdale.\n\n\u201cThou here, my trusty friend!\u201d murmured Lady Emma; \u201cbear me to Douglas,\nand all may yet be well.\u201d\n\nShe could utter no more; insensibility again seized her, and Ralph,\nlifting her up, bore her in his arms to what he supposed to be a\nshepherd\u2019s cottage, but found it only a deserted summer sheiling. He was\nalmost distracted, and, laying down his precious burden, wrapped in his\nhorseman\u2019s cloak, he ran out again in search of assistance, though\nhardly hoping to find it in such a wild district, still closely followed\nby the dog, which continued at intervals the same dismal howl which had\nattracted the notice of Ralph as they ascended the hill. The sad note of\nthe hound was answered by a loud barking, and never fell sounds more\nwelcome on the ear of the faithful vassal. He followed the sounds, and\nthey led him to a hut tenanted by a shepherd and his wife. His tale was\nsoon told. They hastened with him to the deserted sheiling, where they\nfound the object of their solicitude in a situation to demand instant\nand female assistance. There, amid the wilds of Scotland, in a\ncomfortless cabin, the heir of the warlike and noble Sir John Douglas\nfirst saw the light. Long ere perfect consciousness returned, Lady Emma\nwas removed to the more comfortable home of the shepherd, and there his\nwife paid her every possible attention.\n\nThe care of Ralph consigned the remains of the rival chiefs to one\ngrave. It was supposed that De Mowbray had expired soon after giving\nDouglas the fatal stroke, as his fingers still firmly grasped the hilt\nof his dagger. Their horses and accoutrements were disposed of by the\nshepherd, and thus furnished a fund for the maintenance of the noble\nlady, who was so strangely cast upon their care. Many weeks elapsed ere\nshe was aware she had neither husband nor brother.\n\n\nTime, which calms or extinguishes every passion of the human heart, had\nexerted its healing influence over the mind of Lady Emma. She sat\nwatching the gambols of her son on the banks of the peaceful lake, whose\nwaters had first recalled her to life on the disastrous evening of his\nbirth. There was even a smile on her pale thin lip, as he tottered to\nher knee, and laid there a handful of yellow wildflowers. She clasped\nthe blooming boy to her heart, murmuring, \u201cMy Douglas!\u201d On her first\nawakening to a full sense of her loss and forlorn condition, it was only\nby presenting her son to her that she could be persuaded to live; and\nwhen her strength returned, she determined to go to Drumlanrig, and\nclaim protection for herself and child. But the prudence of Ralph\nsuggested the propriety of his first going to ascertain the state of the\nfamily; and recommending his lady to the care of Gilbert Scott and his\nkind-hearted wife, he set out on his embassy. But sad was his welcome:\nthe noble pile was a heap of blackened and smoking ruins, and the lady\nfled no one knew whither. Sad and sorrowful he returned to the mountain\nretreat, and was surprised at the calmness with which his honoured\nmistress heard his tale. Alas! he knew not that the pang she had already\nsuffered made every other loss appear trivial!\n\nThe lonely sheiling was repaired and furnished. Here Lady Emma, in\nplacid content, nursed her child, attended by her faithful\nfoster-brother, who made occasional excursions to the neighbouring town\nto supply her with any necessary she required. On an occasion of this\nkind, when the lovely boy was nearly two years old, she sat at the door\nof her humble dwelling, listening to his sweet prattle. It was the first\ntime he had attempted to say the most endearing of all words. She forgot\nher sorrows, and was almost happy. Her attention was soon called to some\ndomestic concern within the cottage. The boy was on his accustomed seat\nat the door, when a shrill and piercing scream caused her to run out.\nNeed her anguish and despair be painted, when she saw her lovely boy\nborne aloft in the air in the talons of an eagle? To run, to scream, to\nshout, was the first movement of the frenzied mother; but vain had been\nher efforts, had she not been almost immediately joined by some of her\nneighbours, whose united efforts made the fatigued bird quit its prey\nand drop it into the loch. Many a willing heart, many an active hand,\nwas ready to save the boy. He was delivered to his mother, but, alas!\nonly as a drenched and nerveless corse. Human nature could endure no\nmore. Her brain reeled, and reason fled for ever. Her faithful and\nattached follower returned to find his lady a wandering maniac. Year\nafter year did he follow her footsteps, nor, till death put a period to\nher sufferings, did his care slacken for one instant. After he had seen\nher laid by her husband and brother, he bade adieu to the simple\ninhabitants, and it is supposed he fell in some of the border raids of\nthe period, as he was never more heard of.\n\nReader, this tale is no idle fiction. On the borders of Alemoor Loch, in\nSelkirkshire, may still be seen a small clump of moss-grown trees, among\nwhich were one or two of the crab-apple kind, which showed that here the\nhand of cultivation had once been. Within this enclosure was a small\ngreen mound, to which tradition, in reference to the above story, gave\nthe name of the Lady\u2019s Seat; and about half a mile to the south-west of\nthe lonely loch is an oblong bench, with a rising ground above, still\ncalled the Chieftain\u2019s Grave.\u2014_Chambers\u2019s Edinburgh Journal._\n\n\n\n\n TIBBY FOWLER.\n\n BY JOHN MACKAY WILSON.\n\n Tibby Fowler o\u2019 the glen,\n A\u2019 the lads are wooin\u2019 at her.\u2014_Old Song._\n\n\nAll our readers have heard and sung of \u201cTibby Fowler o\u2019 the glen;\u201d but\nthey may not all be aware that the glen referred to lies within about\nfour miles of Berwick. No one has seen and not admired the romantic\namphitheatre below Edrington Castle, through which the Whitadder coils\nlike a beautiful serpent glittering in the sun, and sports in fantastic\ncurves beneath the pasture-clad hills, the gray ruin, the mossy and\nprecipitous crag, and the pyramid of woods, whose branches, meeting from\neither side, bend down and kiss the glittering river, till its waters\nseem lost in their leafy bosom. Now, gentle reader, if you have looked\nupon the scene we have described, we shall make plain to you the\nsituation of Tibby Fowler\u2019s cottage, by a homely map, which is generally\n_at hand_. You have only to bend your arm, and suppose your shoulder to\nrepresent Edrington Castle, your hand Clarabad, and near the elbow you\nwill have the spot where \u201cten cam rowing ower the water;\u201d a little\nnearer to Clarabad is the \u201clang dyke side,\u201d and immediately at the foot\nof it is the site of Tibby\u2019s cottage, which stood upon the Edrington\nside of the river; and a little to the west of the cottage, you will\nfind a shadowy row of palm-trees, planted, as tradition testifieth, by\nthe hands of Tibby\u2019s father, old Ned Fowler, of whom many speak until\nthis day. The locality of the song was known to many; and if any should\nbe inclined to inquire how we became acquainted with the other\nparticulars of our story, we have only to reply, that that belongs to a\nclass of questions to which we do not return an answer. There is no\nnecessity for a writer of tales taking for his motto\u2014_vitam impendere\nvero_. Tibby\u2019s parents had the character of being \u201cbien bodies;\u201d and,\ntogether with their own savings, and a legacy that had been left them by\na relative, they were enabled at their death to leave their daughter in\npossession of five hundred pounds. This was esteemed a fortune in those\ndays, and would afford a very respectable foundation for the rearing of\none yet. Tibby, however, was left an orphan, as well as the sole\nmistress of five hundred pounds, and the proprietor of a neat and\nwell-furnished cottage, with a piece of land adjoining, before she had\ncompleted her nineteenth year; and when we add that she had hair like\nthe raven\u2019s wings when the sun glances upon them, cheeks where the lily\nand the rose seemed to have lent their most delicate hues, and eyes like\ntwin dew-drops glistening beneath a summer moonbeam, with a waist and an\narm rounded like a model for a sculptor, it is not to be wondered at\nthat \u201ca\u2019 the lads cam wooin\u2019 at her.\u201d But she had a woman\u2019s heart as\nwell as woman\u2019s beauty and the portion of an heiress. She found her\ncottage surrounded, and her path beset, by a herd of grovelling\npounds-shillings-and-pence hunters, whom her very soul loathed. The\nsneaking wretches, who profaned the name of lovers, seemed to have\n_money_ written on their very eyeballs, and the sighs they professed to\nheave in her presence sounded to her like stifled groans of\u2014_Your\ngold\u2014your gold!_ She did not hate them, but she despised their meanness;\nand as they one by one gave up persecuting her with their addresses,\nthey consoled themselves with retorting upon her the words of the adage,\nthat \u201cher _pride_ would have a fall!\u201d But it was not from pride that she\nrejected them, but because her heart was capable of love\u2014of love, pure,\ndevoted, unchangeable, springing from being beloved, and because her\nfeelings were sensitive as the quivering aspen, which trembles at the\nrustling of an insect\u2019s wing. Amongst her suitors there might have been\nsome who were disinterested; but the meanness and sordid objects of many\ncaused her to regard all with suspicion, and there was none among the\nnumber to whose voice her bosom responded as the needle turns to the\nmagnet, and frequently from a cause as inexplicable. She had resolved\nthat the man to whom she gave her hand should wed her for herself\u2014and\nfor herself only. Her parents had died in the same month; and about a\nyear after their death she sold the cottage and the piece of ground, and\ntook her journey towards Edinburgh, where the report of her being a\n\u201cgreat fortune,\u201d as her neighbours termed her, might be unknown. But\nTibby, although a sensitive girl, was also, in many respects, a prudent\none. Frequently she had heard her mother, when she had to take but a\nshilling from the legacy, quote the proverb, that it was\n\n Like a cow in a clout,\n That soon wears out.\n\nProverbs we know are in bad taste, but we quote it, because by its\nrepetition the mother produced a deeper impression on her daughter\u2019s\nmind than could have been effected by a volume of sentiment. Bearing\ntherefore in her memory the maxim of her frugal parent, Tibby deposited\nher money in the only bank, we believe, that was at that period in the\nScottish capital, and hired herself as a child\u2019s maid in the family of a\ngentleman who occupied a house in the neighbourhood of Restalrig. Here\nthe story of her fortune was unknown, and Tibby was distinguished only\nfor a kind heart and a lovely countenance. It was during the summer\nmonths, and Leith Links became her daily resort; and there she was wont\nto walk, with a child in her arms and leading another by the hand, for\nthere she could wander by the side of the sounding sea; and her heart\nstill glowed for her father\u2019s cottage and its fairy glen, where she had\noften heard the voice of its deep waters, and she felt the sensation\nwhich we believe may have been experienced by many who have been born\nwithin hearing of old ocean\u2019s roar, that wherever they may be, they hear\nthe murmur of its billows as the voice of a youthful friend; and she\nalmost fancied, as she approached the sea, that she drew nearer the home\nwhich sheltered her infancy. She had been but a few weeks in the family\nwe have alluded to, when, returning from her accustomed walk, her eyes\nmet those of a young man habited as a seaman. He appeared to be about\nfive-and-twenty, and his features were rather manly than handsome. There\nwas a dash of boldness and confidence in his countenance; but as the\neyes of the maiden met his, he turned aside as if abashed, and passed\non. Tibby blushed at her foolishness, but she could not help it; she\nfelt interested in the stranger. There was an expression, a language, an\ninquiry in his gaze, she had never witnessed before. She would have\nturned round to cast a look after him, but she blushed deeper at the\nthought, and modesty forbade it. She walked on for a few minutes,\nupbraiding herself for entertaining the silly wish, when the child who\nwalked by her side fell a few yards behind. She turned round to call him\nby his name. Tibby was certain that she had no motive but to call the\nchild, and though she did steal a sidelong glance towards the spot where\nshe had passed the stranger, it was a mere accident; it could not be\navoided\u2014at least so the maiden wished to persuade her conscience against\nher conviction; but that glance revealed to her the young sailor, not\npursuing the path on which she had met him, but following her within the\ndistance of a few yards, and until she reached her master\u2019s door she\nheard the sound of his footsteps behind her. She experienced an emotion\nbetween being pleased and offended at his conduct, though we suspect the\nformer eventually predominated; for the next day she was upon the Links\nas usual, and there also was the young seaman, and again he followed her\nto within sight of her master\u2019s house. How long this sort of dumb\nlove-making, or the pleasures of diffidence, continued, we cannot tell.\nCertain it is that at length he spoke, wooed, and conquered; and about a\ntwelvemonth after their first meeting, Tibby Fowler became the wife of\nWilliam Gordon, the mate of a foreign trader. On the second week after\ntheir marriage, William was to sail upon a long, long voyage, and might\nnot be expected to return for more than twelve months. This was a severe\ntrial for poor Tibby, and she felt as if she would not be able to stand\nup against it. As yet her husband knew nothing of her dowry, and for\nthis hour she had reserved its discovery. A few days before their\nmarriage she had drawn her money from the bank and deposited it in her\nchest.\n\n\u201cNo, Willie, my ain Willie,\u201d she cried, \u201cye maunna, ye winna leave me\nalready: I have neither faither, mother, brother, nor kindred; naebody\nbut you, Willie; only you in the wide world; and I am a stranger here,\nand ye winna leave your Tibby. Say that ye winna, Willie?\u201d And she wrung\nhis hand, gazed in his face, and wept.\n\n\u201cI maun gang, dearest; I maun gang,\u201d said Willie, and pressed her to his\nbreast; \u201cbut the thocht o\u2019 my ain wifie will mak the months chase ane\nanither like the moon driving shadows ower the sea. There\u2019s nae danger\nin the voyage, hinny; no a grain o\u2019 danger; sae dinna greet; but come,\nkiss me, Tibby, and when I come hame I\u2019ll mak ye leddy o\u2019 them a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh no, no, Willie!\u201d she replied; \u201cI want to be nae leddy; I want\nnaething but my Willie. Only say that ye\u2019ll no gang, and here\u2019s\nsomething here, something for ye to look at.\u201d And she hurried to her\nchest, and took from it a large leathern pocket-book that had been her\nfather\u2019s, and which contained her treasure, now amounting to somewhat\nmore than six hundred pounds. In a moment she returned to her husband;\nshe threw her arms around his neck; she thrust the pocket-book into his\nbosom. \u201cThere, Willie, there!\u201d she exclaimed; \u201cthat is yours\u2014my faither\nplaced it in my hand wi\u2019 a blessing, and wi\u2019 the same blessing I\ntransfer it to you; but dinna, dinna leave me.\u201d Thus saying, she hurried\nout of the room. We will not attempt to describe the astonishment, we\nmay say the joy, of the fond husband, on opening the pocket-book and\nfinding the unlooked-for dowry. However intensely a man may love a\nwoman, there is little chance that her putting an unexpected portion of\nsix hundred pounds into his hands will diminish his attachment; nor did\nit diminish that of William Gordon. He relinquished his intention of\nproceeding on the foreign voyage, and purchased a small coasting vessel,\nof which he was both owner and commander. Five years of unclouded\nprosperity passed over them, and Tibby had become the mother of three\nfair children. William sold his small vessel, and purchased a larger\none, and in fitting it up all the gains of his five successful years\nwere swallowed up. But trade was good. She was a beautiful brig, and he\nhad her called the _Tibby Fowler_. He now took a fond farewell of his\nwife and little ones upon a foreign voyage which was not calculated to\nexceed four months, and which held out high promise of advantage. But\nfour, eight, twelve months passed away, and there was no tidings of the\n_Tibby Fowler_. Britain was then at war; there were enemies\u2019 ships and\npirates upon the sea, and there had been fierce storms and hurricanes\nsince her husband left; and Tibby thought of all these things and wept;\nand her lisping children asked her when their father would return, for\nhe had promised presents to all, and she answered, to-morrow, and\nto-morrow, and turned from them, and wept again. She began to be in\nwant, and at first she received assistance from some of the friends of\ntheir prosperity; but all hope of her husband\u2019s return was now\nabandoned. The ship was not insured, and the mother and her family were\nreduced to beggary. In order to support them, she sold one article of\nfurniture after another, until what remained was seized by the landlord\nin security for his rent. It was then that Tibby and her children, with\nscarce a blanket to cover them, were cast friendless upon the streets,\nto die or to beg. To the last resource she could not yet stoop, and from\nthe remnants of former friendship she was furnished with a basket and a\nfew trifling wares, with which, with her children by her side, she set\nout, with a broken and sorrowful heart, wandering from village to\nvillage. She had journeyed in this manner for some months, when she drew\nnear her native glen, and the cottage that had been her father\u2019s\u2014that\nhad been her own\u2014stood before her. She had travelled all the day and\nsold nothing. Her children were pulling by her tattered gown, weeping\nand crying, \u201cBread, mother, give us bread!\u201d and her own heart was sick\nwith hunger.\n\n\u201cOh, wheesht, my darlings, wheesht!\u201d she exclaimed, and she fell upon\nher knees, and threw her arms round the necks of all the three, \u201cYou\nwill get bread soon; the Almighty will not permit my bairns to perish;\nno, no, ye shall have bread.\u201d\n\nIn despair she hurried to the cottage of her birth. The door was opened\nby one who had been a rejected suitor. He gazed upon her intently for a\nfew seconds; and she was still young, being scarce more than\nsix-and-twenty, and in the midst of her wretchedness yet lovely.\n\n\u201cGude gracious, Tibby Fowler!\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cis that you? Poor\ncreature! are ye seeking charity? Weel, I think ye\u2019ll mind what I said\nto you now, that your pride would have a fa\u2019!\u201d\n\nWhile the heartless owner of the cottage yet spoke, a voice behind her\nwas heard exclaiming, \u201cIt is her! it is her! my ain Tibby and her\nbairns!\u201d\n\nAt the well-known voice, Tibby uttered a wild scream of joy, and fell\nsenseless on the earth; but the next moment her husband, William Gordon,\nraised her to his breast. Three weeks before, he had returned to\nBritain, and traced her from village to village, till he found her in\nthe midst of their children, on the threshold of the place of her\nnativity. His story we need not here tell. He had fallen into the hands\nof the enemy; he had been retained for months on board of their vessel;\nand when a storm had arisen, and hope was gone, he had saved her from\nbeing lost and her crew from perishing. In reward for his services, his\nown vessel had been restored to him, and he was returned to his country,\nafter an absence of eighteen months, richer than when he left, and laden\nwith honours. The rest is soon told. After Tibby and her husband had\nwept upon each other\u2019s neck, and he had kissed his children, and again\ntheir mother, with his youngest child on one arm, and his wife resting\non the other, he hastened from the spot that had been the scene of such\nbitterness and transport. In a few years more, William Gordon having\nobtained a competency, they re-purchased the cottage in the glen, where\nTibby Fowler lived to see her children\u2019s children, and died at a good\nold age in the house in which she had been born\u2014the remains of which, we\nhave only to add, for the edification of the curious, may be seen until\nthis day.\n\n\n\n\n DANIEL CATHIE, TOBACCONIST.\n\n\nDaniel Cathie was a reputable dealer in snuff, tobacco, and candles, in\na considerable market town in Scotland. His shop had, externally,\nsomething neat and enticing about it. In the centre of one window glowed\na transparency of a ferocious-looking Celt, bonneted, plaided, and\nkilted, with his unsheathed claymore in one hand, and his ram\u2019s-horn\nmull in the other; intended, no doubt, to emblem to the spectator, that\nfrom thence he recruited his animal spirits, drawing courage from the\ntitillation of every pinch. Around him were tastefully distributed jars\nof different dimensions, bearing each the appropriate title of the\nvarious compounds within, from Maccuba and Lundy Foot down to Beggar\u2019s\nBrown and Irish Blackguard. In the other, one half was allotted to\ntobacco pipes of all dimensions, tastefully arranged, so as to form a\nvariety of figures, such as crosses, triangles, and squares; decorated\nat intervals with rolls of twist, serpentinings of pigtail, and\nmonticuli of shag. The upper half displayed candles, distributed with\nequal exhibition of taste, from the prime four in the pound down to the\nhalfpenny dip; some of a snowy whiteness, and others of an aged and\ndelicate yellow tinge; enticing to the eyes of experienced housewives\nand spectacled cognoscenti. Over the door rode a swarthy son of Congo,\nwith broad nostrils, and eyes whose whites were fearfully\ndilated,\u2014astride on a tobacco hogshead,\u2014his woolly head bound with a\ncoronal of feathers, a quiver peeping over his shoulder, and a pipe in\nhis cheeks blown up for the eternity of his wooden existence, in the\necstasy of inhalation.\n\nDaniel himself, the autocrat of this domicile, was a little squat\nfellow, five feet and upwards, of a rosy complexion, with broad\nshoulders, and no inconsiderable rotundity of paunch. His eye was quick\nand sparkling, with something of an archness in its twinkle, as if he\nloved a joke occasionally, and could wink at any one who presumed so far\nin tampering with his shrewdness. His forehead was bald, as well as no\nsmall portion of either temple; and the black curls, which projected\nabove his ears, gave to his face the appearance of more than its actual\nbreadth, which was scantily relieved by a slight blue spotted\nhandkerchief, loosely tied around a rather apoplectic neck.\n\nHis dress was commonly a bottle-green jacket, single-breasted, and\nsquare in the tails; a striped cotton waistcoat; velveteen breeches, and\nlight blue ridge-and-furrow worsted stockings. A watch-chain, of a broad\nsteel pattern, hung glittering before him, at which depended a small\ngold seal, a white almond-shaped shell, and a perforated Queen Anne\u2019s\nsixpence. Over all this lower display, suppose that you fasten a clean,\nglossy linen apron, and you have his entire portrait and appearance.\n\nFrom very small beginnings he had risen, by careful industry, to a\nrespectable place in society, and was now the landlord of the property\nhe had for many years only rented.\n\nMatters prospered, and he got on by slow but steady paces. Business\nbegan to extend its circle around him, and his customers became more\nrespectable and genteel.\n\nIn a short time Daniel opened accounts with his banker. His\nestablishment became more extensive; and after the lapse of a few not\nunimproved years, he took his place in the first rank of the merchants\nof a populous burgh.\n\nHis lengthening purse and respectable character pointed him out as a fit\ncandidate for city honours, and the town-council pitched upon him as an\neligible person to grace their board. This was a new field opened for\nhim. His reasoning powers were publicly called into play; and he had,\nwhat he had never before been accustomed to, luxurious eating and\ndrinking, and both without being obliged to put his hand into his\nbreeches-pocket. Daniel was a happy man\u2014\n\n No dolphin ever was so gay\n Upon the tropic sea.\n\nHe now cogitated with his own mighty mind on the propriety of entering\nupon the matrimonial estate, and of paying his worship to the blind god.\nWith the precision of a man of business, he took down in his note-book a\nlist of the ladies who, he thought, might be fit candidates for the\nhonour he intended them, the merits of the multitude being settled, in\nhis mind, in exact accordance with the supposed extent of their\ntreasures. Let not the reader mistake the term. By treasure he neither\nmeant worth nor beauty, but the article which can be paid down in\nbullion or in bank-notes, possessing the magic properties of adding\nfield to field, and tenement to tenement.\n\nOne after another the pen was drawn through their names, as occasion\noffered of scrutinising their means more clearly, or as lack-success\nobliged him, until the candidates were reduced to a couple; to wit\u2014Miss\nJenny Drybones, a tall spinster, lean and ill-looking, somewhat beyond\nher grand climacteric; and Mrs Martha Bouncer, a brisk widow, fat, fair,\nand a few years on the better side of forty.\n\nMiss Jenny, from her remote youth upwards, had been housekeeper to her\nbrother, a retired wine merchant, who departed this life six years\nbefore, without occasioning any very general lamentation; having been a\nman of exceedingly strict habits of business, according to the jargon of\nhis friends; that is to say, in plain English, a keen, dull, plodding,\navaricious old knave.\n\nBut he was rich, that was one felicity; therefore he had friends. It is\na great pity that such people ever die, as their worth, or, in other\nwords, their wealth, cannot gain currency in the other world; but die he\ndid, in spite of twenty thousand pounds and the doctor, who was not\ncalled in till death had a firm grip of the old miser\u2019s windpipe,\nthrough which respiration came scant and slow, almost like the vacant\nyawns of a broken bellows.\n\nExpectant friends were staggered, as by a thunder-stroke, when the read\nwill, too legal for their satisfaction, left Miss Jenny in sure and\nundivided possession of goods and chattels all and sundry.\n\nFor the regular period she mourned with laudable zeal, displaying black\nfeathers, quilled ruffles, crape veils, and starched weepers, in great\nand unwonted prodigality, which no one objected to, or cavilled about,\nsolely because no one had any business to do so.\n\nIt was evident that her views of life from that era assumed a new\naspect, and the polar winter of her features exhibited something like an\nappearance of incipient thaw; but the downy chin, wrinkled brow, and\npinched nose, were still, alas! too visible. Accordingly, it is more\nthan probable that, instead of renewing her youth like the eagles, she\nhad only made a bold and laudable attempt to _rifacciamento_, in thus\nlighting up her features with a more frequent and general succession of\nsmiles.\n\nNo one can deny that, in as far as regards externals, Miss Jenny mourned\nlugubriously and well, not stinting the usually allotted number of\ncalendar months. These passed away, and so did black drapery; garments\nbrightening by progressive but rapid strides. Ere the twelve months\nexpired, Miss Jenny flaunted about in colours as gaudy as those of \u201cthe\ntiger-moth\u2019s deep damasked wings,\u201d\u2014the counterpart of the bird of\nparadise, the rival of the rainbow.\n\nWidow Martha Bouncer was a lady of a different stamp. Her features still\nglowed in the freshness of youthful beauty, though the symmetry of her\nperson was a little destroyed by a tendency to corpulency. She dressed\nwell; and there was a liveliness and activity about her motions,\ntogether with an archness in her smile, which captivated the affections\nof the tobacconist, rather more than was compatible with his known and\nundisguised hankering after the so-called good things of this life, the\nflesh-pots of Egypt.\n\nMrs Bouncer was the widow of a captain in a marching regiment;\nconsequently she had seen a good deal of the world, and had a budget of\nadventures ever open for the admiration of the listening customer.\nSometimes it might even be objected, that her tongue went a little too\nglibly; but she had a pretty face and a musical voice, and seldom failed\nin being attended to.\n\nThe captain did not, as his profession might lead us to surmise, decamp\nto the other world, after having swallowed a bullet, and dropped the\ndeath-dealing blade from his blood-besmeared hand on the field of\nbattle, but quietly in his bed, with three pairs of excellent blankets\nover him, not reckoning a curiously quilted counterpane. Long\nanticipation lessens the shock of fate; consequently the grief of his\nwidow was not of that violent and overwhelming kind which a more\nsharply-wound-up catastrophe is apt to occasion; but, having noticed the\nslow but gradual approaches of the grim tyrant, in the symptoms of\nswelled ankles, shrivelled features, troublesome cough, and excessive\ndebility, the event came upon her as an evil long foreseen; and the\nsorrow occasioned by the exit of the captain was sustained with becoming\nfortitude.\n\nHaving been fully as free of his sacrifices to Bacchus as to the brother\nof Bellona, the captain left his mate in circumstances not the most\nflourishing; but she was enabled to keep up appearances, and to preserve\nherself from the gulf of debt, by an annuity bequeathed to her by her\nfather, and by the liberality of the widows\u2019 fund.\n\nTime passed on at its usual careless jog-trot; and animal spirits, being\na gift of nature, like all strong natural impulses, asserted their\nlegitimate sway. Mrs Martha began to smile and simper as formerly. Folks\nremarked, that black suited her complexion; and Daniel Cathie could not\nhelp giving breath to the gallant remark, as he was discharging her last\nyear\u2019s account, that he never before had seen her looking half so well.\n\nOn this hint the lady wrought. Daniel was a greasy lubberly civilian to\nbe sure, and could not escort her about with powdered collar, laced\nbeaver, and glittering epaulettes; but he was a substantial fellow, not\namiss as to looks, and with regard to circumstances, possessing\neverything to render a wife comfortable and snug. Elysian happiness, Mrs\nMartha was too experienced a stager to expect on this side of the valley\nof death. Moreover, she had been tossed about sufficiently in the world,\nand was heartily tired of a wandering life. The height of her wise\nambition, therefore, reached no higher than a quiet settlement and a\ncomfortable domicile. She knew that the hour of trial was come, and\nsedulously set herself to work, directing against Daniel the whole\nartillery of her charms. She passed before his door every morning in her\nwalk; and sometimes stood with her pretty face directed to the shop\nwindow, as if narrowly examining some article in it. She ogled him as he\nsat in church; looking as if she felt happy at seeing him seated with\nthe bailies; and Daniel was never met abroad, but the lady drew off her\nsilken glove, and yielded a milk-white delicate hand to the tobacconist,\nwho took a peculiar pleasure in shaking it cordially. A subsequent\nrencontre in a stage coach, where they enjoyed a delightful\n_t\u00e9te-\u00e0-t\u00e9te_ together for some miles (_procul, \u00f4 procul esto profani_),\ntold with a still deeper effect; and everything seemed in a fair way of\nbeing amicably adjusted.\n\nMiss Jenny, undismayed by these not unmarked symptoms of ripening\nintimacy, determined to pursue her own line of amatory politics, and set\nher whole enginery of attack in readiness for operation. She had always\nconsidered the shop at the cross as the surest path for her to the\ntemple of Bona Fortuna. Thence driven, she was lost in hopeless mazes,\nand knew not where to turn.\n\nShe flaunted about, and flashed her finery in the optical observers of\nDaniel, as if to say, This is a specimen,\u2014_ex uno disce\nomnes_,\u2014thousands lie under this sample. Hope and fear swayed her heart\nby turns, though the former passion was uppermost; yet she saw a snake,\nin the form of Mrs Bouncer, lurking in her way; and she took every\nlawful means, or such as an inamorata considers such, to scotch it.\n\nWell might Daniel be surprised at the quantity of candles made use of in\nMiss Jenny\u2019s establishment. It puzzled his utmost calculation; for\nthough the whole house had been illuminated from top to bottom, and\nfours to the pound had been lighted at both ends, no such quantity could\nbe consumed. But there she was, week after week, with her young vassal\nwith the yellow neck behind her, swinging a large wicker-basket over his\narm, in which were deposited, layer above layer, the various produce of\nMiss Jenny\u2019s marketing.\n\nOn Daniel, on these occasions, she showered her complaisance with the\nliberality of March rains; inquiring anxiously after his health;\ncautioning him to wear flannel, and beware of the rheumatics; telling\nhim her private news, and admiring the elegance of his articles, while\nall the time her shrivelled features \u201cgrinned horrible a ghastly smile,\u201d\nwhich only quadrupled the \u201cfold upon fold innumerable\u201d of her wrinkles,\nand displayed gums innocent of teeth,\u2014generosity not being able to\nelevate three rusty stumps to that honour and dignity.\n\nThere was a strong conflict in Daniel\u2019s mind, and the poor man was\ncompletely \u201cbamboozled.\u201d Ought he to let nature have its sway for once,\ntake to his arms the blushing and beautiful widow, and trust to the\nsuccess of his efforts for future aggrandisement? Or must strong habit\nstill domineer over him, and Miss Jenny\u2019s hook, baited with twenty\nthousand pounds, draw him to the shores of wedlock, \u201ca willing captive?\u201d\nMust he leave behind him sons and daughters with small portions, and\n\u201cthe world before them, where to choose;\u201d or none\u2014and his name die away\namong the things of the past, while cousins ten times removed alike in\nblood and regard, riot on his substance? The question was complicated,\nand different interrogatories put to the oracle of his mind afforded\ndifferent responses. The affair was one, in every respect, so nicely\nbalanced, that \u201che wist not what to do.\u201d Fortune long hung equal in the\nbalance, and might have done so much longer, had not an unforeseen\naccident made the scale of the widow precipitately mount aloft, and kick\nthe beam.\n\nIt was about ten o\u2019clock on the night of a blustering November day, that\na tall, red-haired, moustachioed, and raw-boned personage, wrapt up in a\nmilitary great-coat, alighted from the top of the _Telegraph_ at the\nSalutation Inn, and delivered his portmanteau into the assiduous hands\nof Bill the waiter. He was ushered into a comfortable room, whose\nflickering blazing fire mocked the cacophony of his puckered features,\nand induced him hastily to doff his envelopments, and draw in an\narm-chair to the borders of the hearthrug.\n\nHaving discussed a smoking and substantial supper, he asked Bill, who\nwas in the act of supplying his rummer with hot water, if a Mrs Bouncer,\nan officer\u2019s widow, resided in the neighbourhood.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied Bill, \u201cI know her well; she lives at third house round\nthe corner, on the second floor, turning to the door on your right\nhand.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe is quite well, I hope?\u201d asked the son of Mars.\n\n\u201cOh! quite well, bless you; and about to take a second husband. I hear\nthey are to be proclaimed next week. She is making a good bargain.\u201d\n\n\u201cNext week to be married!\u201d ejaculated the gallant captain, turning up\nhis eyes, and starting to his legs with a hurried perplexity.\n\n\u201cSo I believe, sir,\u201d continued Bill very calmly. \u201cIf you have come to\nthe ceremony, you will find that it does not take place till then.\nDepend upon it, sir, you have mistaken the date of your invitation\ncard.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, waiter, you may leave me,\u201d said the captain, stroking his chin in\nevident embarrassment; \u201cbut stop, who is she about to get?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, I thought everybody knew Mr Daniel Cathie, one of the town-council,\nsir; a tobacconist, and a respectable man; likely soon to come to the\nprovostry, sir. He is rather up in years to be sure; but he is as rich\nas a Jew.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you say is his name?\u201d\n\n\u201cDaniel Cathie, Esq., tobacconist, and a candlemaker near the Cross.\nThat is his name and designation,\u2014a very respectable man, sir.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, order the girl to have my bed well warmed, and to put pens, ink,\nand paper into the room. In the meantime, bring me the boot-jack.\u201d\n\nThe captain kept his fiery feelings in restraint before Bill; but the\nintelligence hit him like a cannon-shot. He retired almost immediately\nto his bed-chamber; but a guest in the adjoining room declared in the\nmorning, that he had never been allowed to close his eyes, from some\nperson\u2019s alternately snoring or speaking in his sleep, as if in violent\naltercation with some one; and that, whenever these sounds died away,\nthey were only exchanged for the irregular tread of a foot measuring the\napartment, seemingly in every direction.\n\nIt was nine in the morning; and Daniel, as he was ringing a shilling on\nthe counter, which he had just taken for \u201cvalue received,\u201d and half\nejaculating aloud as he peered at it through his spectacles\u2014\u201cNot a\nBirmingham, I hope\u201d\u2014had a card put into his hand by Jonas Bunting, the\nSalutation shoeblack.\n\nHaving broken the seal, Daniel read to himself,\u2014\u201cA gentleman wishes to\nsee Mr Cathie at the Salutation Inn, on particular business, as speedily\nas possible. Inquire for the gentleman in No. 7.\u2014A quarter before nine,\nA.M.\u201d\n\n\u201cSome of these dunning travellers!\u201d exclaimed Daniel to himself. \u201cThey\nare continually pestering me for orders. If I had the lighting up of the\nmoon, I could not satisfy them all. I have a good mind not to go, for\nthis fellow not sending his name. It is impudence with a vengeance, and\na new way of requesting favours!\u201d As he was muttering these thoughts\nbetween his teeth, however, he was proceeding in the almost unconscious\nact of undoing his apron, which having flung aside, he adjusted his hair\nbefore the glass, carefully pressed his hat into shape, and drew it down\non his temples with both hands; after which, with hasty steps, he\nvanished from behind the counter.\n\nArriving at the inn, he was ushered into No. 7 by the officious Bill,\nwho handed his name before him, and closed the door after him.\n\n\u201cThis is an unpleasant business, Mr Cathie,\u201d said the swaggering\ncaptain, drawing himself up to his full length, and putting on a look of\nimportant ferocity. \u201cIt is needless to waste words on the subject: there\nis a brace of pistols, both are loaded,\u2014take one, and I take the other;\nchoose either, sir. The room is fully eight paces,\u201d added he, striding\nacross in a hurried manner, and clanking his iron heels on the carpet.\n\n\u201cIt would, I think, be but civil,\u201d said Daniel, evidently in\nconsiderable mental as well as bodily agitation, \u201cto inform me what are\nyour intentions, before forcing me to commit murder. Probably you have\nmistaken me for some other; if not, please let me know in what you\nconceive I have offended you!\u201d\n\n\u201cBy the powers!\u201d said Captain Thwackeray with great vehemence, \u201cyou have\ninjured me materially,\u2014nay, mortally,\u2014and either your life, sir, or my\nown, sir, shall be sacrificed to the adjustment.\u201d\n\nWhile saying this, the captain took up first the one pistol, and then\nthe other, beating down the contents with the ramrod, and measuring with\nhis finger the comparative depth to which each was loaded.\n\n\u201cA pretty story, certainly, to injure a gentleman in the tenderest part,\nand then to beg a recital of the particulars. Have you no regard for my\nfeelings, sir?\u201d\n\n\u201cBelieve me, sir, on the word of an honest man, that as to your meaning\nin this business, I am in utter darkness,\u201d said Daniel with cool\nfirmness.\n\n\u201cTo be plain, then,\u2014to be explicit,\u2014to come to the point, sir,\u2014are you\nnot on the eve of marrying Mrs Bouncer?\u201d\n\n\u201cMrs Bouncer!\u201d echoed the tallow-chandler, starting back, and\ncrimsoning. Immediately, however, commanding himself, he continued:\u2014\u201cAs\nto the truth of the case, that is another matter; but were it as you\nrepresent it, I was unaware that I could be injuring any one in so\ndoing.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, sir, we have come to the point; _rem tetigisti acu_; and you speak\nout plainly. Take your pistol,\u201d bravoed the captain.\n\n\u201cNo, no,\u2014not so fast;\u2014perhaps we may understand each other without being\ndriven to that alternative.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell then, sir, abjure her this moment, and resign her to me, or one of\nour lives must be sacrificed.\u201d\n\nWhile he was saying this, Daniel laid his hands on one of the pistols,\nand appeared as if examining it; which motion the captain instantly took\nfor a signal of acquiescence, and \u201cchanged his hand, and checked his\npride.\u201d\n\n\u201cI hope,\u201d continued he, evidently much softened, \u201cthat there shall be no\nneed of resorting to desperate measures. In a word, the affair is\nthis:\u2014I have a written promise from Mrs Bouncer, that, if ever she\nmarried a second time, her hand was mine. It matters not with the\nlegality of the measure, though the proceeding took place in the\nlifetime of her late husband, my friend, Captain Bouncer. It is quite an\naffair of honour. I assure you, sir, she has vowed to accept of none but\nme, Captain Thwackeray, as his successor. If you have paid your\naddresses to her in ignorance of this, I forgive you; if not, we stand\nopposed as before.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh ho! if that be the way the land lies,\u201d replied Daniel, with a shrill\nwhistle, \u201cshe is yours, captain, for me, and heartily welcome. I resign\nher unconditionally, as you military gentlemen phrase it. A great deal\nof trouble is spared by one\u2019s speaking out. If you had told me this,\nthere would have been no reason for loading the pistols. May I now wish\nyou a good morning! \u2019Od save us! but these are fearful weapons on the\ntable! Good morning, sir.\u201d\n\n\u201cBless your heart, no,\u201d said Captain Thwackeray, evidently much relieved\nfrom his distressing situation. \u201cOh no, sir; not before we breakfast\ntogether;\u201d and, so saying, before Daniel had a moment\u2019s time for reply,\nhe pulled the bell violently.\n\n\u201cBill, bring in breakfast for two, as expeditiously as possible\u2014(_Exit\nBill_). I knew that no man of honour, such as I know or believe you to\nbe (your appearance bespeaks it), would act such a selfish part as\ndeprive me of my legal right; and I trust that this transaction shall\nnot prevent friendly intercourse between us, if I come, as my present\nintention is, to take up my abode among you in this town.\u201d\n\n\u201cBy no means,\u201d said Daniel; \u201cMrs Bouncer is yours for me; and as to\nmatrimonials, I am otherwise provided. There are no grounds for\ncontention, captain.\u201d\n\nBreakfast was discussed with admirable appetite by both. The contents of\nthe pistols were drawn, the powder carefully returned into the flask,\nthe two bullets into the waistcoat pocket, and the instruments of\ndestruction themselves deposited in a green woollen case. After\ncordially shaking each other by the hand, the captain saw Mr Daniel to\nthe door, and made a very low _cong\u00e9_, besides kissing his hand at\nparting.\n\nThe captain we leave to fight his own battles, and return to our hero,\nwhose stoicism, notwithstanding its firmness, did not prevent him from\nfeeling considerably on the occasion. Towards Mrs Bouncer he had not a\nRomeo-enthusiasm, but certainly a stronger attachment than he had ever\nexperienced for any other of her sex. Though the case was hopeless, he\ndid not allow himself to pine away with \u201ca green and yellow melancholy,\u201d\nbut reconciled himself to his fate with the more facility, as the\ntransaction between Thwackeray and her was said to have taken place\nduring the lifetime of her late husband, which considerably lessened her\nin his estimation; having been educated a rigid Presbyterian, and\nholding in great abhorrence all such illustrations of military morality.\n\u201cNo, no,\u201d thought he; \u201cmy loss is more apparent than real: the woman who\nwas capable of doing such a thing, would not content herself with\nstopping even there. Miss Jenny Drybones is the woman for _me_\u2014I am the\nman for _her_ money.\u201d And here a thousand selfish notions crowded on his\nheart, and confirmed him in his determination, which he set about\nwithout delay.\n\nThere was little need of delicacy in the matter; and Daniel went to work\nquite in a business-like style. He commenced operations on the\noffensive, offered Miss Jenny his arm, squeezed her hand, buttered her\nwith love-phrases, ogled her out of countenance, and haunted her like a\nghost. Refusal was in vain; and after a faint, a feeble, and sham show\nof resistance, the damsel drew down her flag of defiance, and submitted\nto honourable terms of capitulation.\n\nTen days after Miss Jenny\u2019s surrender, their names were proclaimed in\nchurch; and as the people stared at each other in half wonder and half\ngood-humour, the precentor continued, after a slight pause, \u201cThere is\nalso a purpose of marriage between Mrs Martha Bouncer, at present\nresiding in the parish, and Augustus Thwackeray, Esq., captain of the\nBengal Rangers; whoever can produce any lawful objections against the\nsame, he is requested to do so, time and place convenient.\u201d\n\nEvery forenoon and evening between that and the marriage-day, Daniel and\nhis intended enjoyed a delightful _t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eate_ in the lady\u2019s garden,\nwalking arm-in-arm, and talking, doubtless, of home-concerns and Elysian\nprospects that awaited them. The pair would have formed a fit subject\nfor the pencil of a Hogarth,\u2014about \u201cto become one flesh,\u201d and so\ndifferent in appearance. The lady, long-visaged and wrinkled,\nstiff-backed and awkward, long as a maypole; the bridegroom, jolly-faced\nlike Bacchus, stumpy like an alder-tree, and round as a beer-barrel.\n\nEre Friday had beheld its meridian sunshine, two carriages, drawn up at\nthe door, the drivers with white favours and Limerick gloves, told the\nattentive world that Dr Redbeak had made them one flesh. Shortly after\nthe ceremony, the happy couple drove away amid the cheering of an\nimmense crowd of neighbours, who had planted themselves round the door\nto make observations on what was going on. Another coincidence worthy of\nremark also occurred on this auspicious day. At the same hour, had the\nfair widow Martha yielded up her lily-white hand to the whiskered,\nferocious-looking, but gallant Captain Thwackeray; and the carriages\ncontaining the respective marriage-parties passed one another in the\nstreet at a good round pace. The postilions, with their large flaunting\nribbon-knots, huzza\u2019d in meeting, brandishing their whips in the air, as\nif betokening individual victory. The captain looking out, saw Miss\nJenny, in maiden pride, sitting stately beside her chosen tobacconist;\nand Daniel, glancing to the left, beheld Mrs Martha blushing by the side\nof her moustachioed warrior. Both waved their hands in passing, and\npursued their destinies.\u2014_Janus; or, the Edinburgh Literary Almanac._\n\n\n\n\n THE HAUNTED SHIPS.\n\n BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.\n\n Though my mind\u2019s not\n Hoodwinked with rustic marvels, I do think\n There are more things in the grove, the air, the flood,\n Yea, and the charnelled earth, than what wise man,\n Who walks so proud as if his form alone\n Filled the wide temple of the universe,\n Will let a frail mind say. I\u2019d write i\u2019 the creed\n O\u2019 the sagest head alive, that fearful forms,\n Holy or reprobate, do page men\u2019s heels;\n That shapes, too horrid for our gaze, stand o\u2019er\n The murderer\u2019s dust, and for revenge glare up,\n Even till the stars weep fire for very pity.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\nAlong the sea of Solway\u2014romantic on the Scottish side, with its\nwoodlands, its bays, its cliffs, and headlands; and interesting on the\nEnglish side, with its many beautiful towns with their shadows on the\nwater, rich pastures, safe harbours, and numerous ships\u2014there still\nlinger many traditional stories of a maritime nature, most of them\nconnected with superstitions singularly wild and unusual. To the\ncurious, these tales afford a rich fund of entertainment, from the many\ndiversities of the same story; some dry and barren, and stripped of all\nthe embellishments of poetry; others dressed out in all the riches of a\nsuperstitious belief and haunted imagination. In this they resemble the\ninland traditions of the peasants; but many of the oral treasures of the\nGalwegian or the Cumbrian coast have the stamp of the Dane and the\nNorseman upon them, and claim but a remote or faint affinity with the\nlegitimate legends of Caledonia. Something like a rude prosaic outline\nof several of the most noted of the northern ballads\u2014the adventures and\ndepredations of the old ocean kings\u2014still lend life to the evening tale;\nand, among others, the story of the Haunted Ships is still popular among\nthe maritime peasantry.\n\nOne fine harvest evening I went on board the shallop of Richard Faulder,\nof Allanbay, and committing ourselves to the waters, we allowed a gentle\nwind from the east to waft us at its pleasure towards the Scottish\ncoast. We passed the sharp promontory of Siddick, and skirting the land\nwithin a stone-cast, glided along the shore till we came within sight of\nthe ruined Abbey of Sweetheart. The green mountain of Criffell ascended\nbeside us; and the bleat of the flocks from its summit, together with\nthe winding of the evening horn of the reapers, came softened into\nsomething like music over land and sea. We pushed our shallop into a\ndeep and wooded bay, and sat silently looking on the serene beauty of\nthe place. The moon glimmered in her rising through the tall shafts of\nthe pines of Caerlaverock; and the sky, with scarce a cloud, showered\ndown on wood, and headland, and bay, the twinkling beams of a thousand\nstars, rendering every object visible. The tide, too, was coming with\nthat swift and silent swell observable when the wind is gentle; the\nwoody curves along the land were filling with the flood, till it touched\nthe green branches of the drooping trees; while in the centre current\nthe roll and the plunge of a thousand pellecks told to the experienced\nfisherman that salmon were abundant.\n\nAs we looked, we saw an old man emerging from a path that winded to the\nshore through a grove of doddered hazel; he carried a halve-net on his\nback, while behind him came a girl bearing a small harpoon, with which\nthe fishers are remarkably dexterous in striking their prey. The senior\nseated himself on a large gray stone, which overlooked the bay, laid\naside his bonnet, and submitted his bosom and neck to the refreshing sea\nbreeze; and taking his harpoon from his attendant, sat with the gravity\nand composure of a spirit of the flood, with his ministering nymph\nbehind him. We pushed our shallop to the shore, and soon stood at their\nside.\n\n\u201cThis is old Mark Macmoran, the mariner, with his granddaughter\nBarbara,\u201d said Richard Faulder, in a whisper that had something of fear\nin it; \u201che knows every creek, and cavern, and quicksand in Solway,\u2014has\nseen the Spectre Hound that haunts the Isle of Man; has heard him bark,\nand at every bark has seen a ship sink; and he has seen, too, the\nHaunted Ships in full sail; and, if all tales be true, has sailed in\nthem himself;\u2014he\u2019s an awful person.\u201d\n\nThough I perceived in the communication of my friend something of the\nsuperstition of the sailor, I could not help thinking that common rumour\nhad made a happy choice in singling out old Mark to maintain her\nintercourse with the invisible world. His hair, which seemed to have\nrefused all acquaintance with the comb, hung matted upon his shoulders;\na kind of mantle, or rather blanket, pinned with a wooden skewer round\nhis neck, fell mid-leg down, concealing all his nether garments as far\nas a pair of hose, darned with yarn of all conceivable colours, and a\npair of shoes, patched and repaired till nothing of the original\nstructure remained, and clasped on his feet with two massive silver\nbuckles.\n\nIf the dress of the old man was rude and sordid, that of his\ngranddaughter was gay, and even rich.\n\nShe wore a boddice of fine wool, wrought round the bosom with alternate\nleaf and lily, and a kirtle of the same fabric, which almost touching\nher white and delicate ankle, showed her snowy feet, so fairy-light and\nround that they scarcely seemed to touch the grass where she stood. Her\nhair\u2014a natural ornament which woman seeks much to improve\u2014was of a\nbright glossy brown, and encumbered rather than adorned with a snood,\nset thick with marine productions, among which the small clear pearl\nfound in the Solway was conspicuous. Nature had not trusted to a\nhandsome shape, and a sylph-like air, for young Barbara\u2019s influence over\nthe heart of man; but had bestowed a pair of large bright blue eyes,\nswimming in liquid light, so full of love, and gentleness, and joy, that\nall the sailors, from Annanwater to far St Bees, acknowledged their\npower, and sung songs about the bonnie lass of Mark Macmoran. She stood\nholding a small gaff-hook of polished steel in her hand, and seemed not\ndissatisfied with the glances I bestowed on her from time to time, and\nwhich I held more than requited by a single glance of those eyes which\nretained so many capricious hearts in subjection.\n\nThe tide, though rapidly augmenting, had not yet filled the bay at our\nfeet. The moon now streamed fairly over the tops of Caerlaverock pines,\nand showed the expanse of ocean dimpling and swelling, on which sloops\nand shallops came dancing, and displaying at every turn their extent of\nwhite sail against the beam of the moon. I looked on old Mark the\nMariner, who, seated motionless on his gray stone, kept his eye fixed on\nthe increasing waters with a look of seriousness and sorrow in which I\nsaw little of the calculating spirit of a mere fisherman. Though he\nlooked on the coming tide, his eyes seemed to dwell particularly on the\nblack and decayed hulls of two vessels, which, half immersed in the\nquicksand, still addressed to every heart a tale of shipwreck and\ndesolation. The tide wheeled and foamed around them; and creeping inch\nby inch up the side, at last fairly threw its waters over the top, and a\nlong and hollow eddy showed the resistance which the liquid element\nreceived.\n\nThe moment they were fairly buried in the water, the old man clasped his\nhands together, and said\u2014\n\n\u201cBlessed be the tide that will break over and bury ye for ever! Sad to\nmariners, and sorrowful to maids and mothers, has the time been you have\nchoked up this deep and bonnie bay. For evil were you sent, and for evil\nhave you continued. Every season finds from you its song of sorrow and\nwail, its funeral processions, and its shrouded corses. Woe to the land\nwhere the wood grew that made ye? Cursed be the axe that hewed ye on the\nmountains, the bands that joined ye together, the bay that ye first swam\nin, and the wind that wafted ye here! Seven times have ye put my life in\nperil; three fair sons have ye swept from my side, and two bonnie\ngrandbairns; and now, even now, your waters foam and flash for my\ndestruction, did I venture my frail limbs in quest of food in your\ndeadly bay. I see by that ripple and that foam, and hear by the sound\nand singing of your surge, that ye yearn for another victim, but it\nshall not be me or mine.\u201d\n\nEven as the old mariner addressed himself to the wrecked ships, a young\nman appeared at the southern extremity of the bay, holding his halve-net\nin his hand, and hastening into the current. Mark rose, and shouted, and\nwaved him back from a place which, to a person unacquainted with the\ndangers of the bay, real and superstitious, seemed sufficiently\nperilous: his granddaughter, too, added her voice to his, and waved her\nwhite hands; but the more they strove the faster advanced the peasant,\ntill he stood to his middle in the water, while the tide increased every\nmoment in depth and strength. \u201cAndrew, Andrew!\u201d cried the young woman,\nin a voice quavering with emotion, \u201cturn, turn, I tell you. O the ships,\nthe haunted ships!\u201d But the appearance of a fine run of fish had more\ninfluence with the peasant than the voice of bonnie Barbara, and forward\nhe dashed, net in hand. In a moment he was borne off his feet, and\nmingled like foam with the water, and hurried towards the fatal eddies\nwhich whirled and reared round the sunken ships. But he was a powerful\nyoung man, and an expert swimmer: he seized on one of the projecting\nribs of the nearest hulk, and clinging to it with the grasp of despair,\nuttered yell after yell, sustaining himself against the prodigious rush\nof the current.\n\nFrom a sheiling of turf and straw within the pitch of a bar from the\nspot where we stood, came out an old woman bent with age, and leaning on\na crutch. \u201cI heard the voice of that lad Andrew Lammie; can the chield\nbe drowning, that he skirls sae uncannily?\u201d said the old woman, seating\nherself on the ground and looking earnestly at the water. \u201cOu ay,\u201d she\ncontinued, \u201che\u2019s doomed, he\u2019s doomed; heart and hand never can save him;\nboats, ropes, and man\u2019s strength and wit, all vain! vain! he\u2019s doomed,\nhe\u2019s doomed!\u201d\n\nBy this time I had thrown myself into the shallop, followed reluctantly\nby Richard Faulder, over whose courage and kindness of heart\nsuperstition had great power; and with one push from the shore, and some\nexertion in sculling, we came within a quoit-cast of the unfortunate\nfisherman. He stayed not to profit by our aid; for when he perceived us\nnear, he uttered a piercing shriek of joy, and bounded toward us through\nthe agitated element the full length of an oar. I saw him for a second\non the surface of the water; but the eddying current sucked him down;\nand all I ever beheld of him again was his hand held above the flood,\nand clutching in agony at some imaginary aid. I sat gazing in horror on\nthe vacant sea before us; but a breathing-time before, a human being,\nfull of youth, and strength, and hope, was there: his cries were still\nringing in my ears, and echoing in the woods; and now nothing was seen\nor heard save the turbulent expanse of water, and the sound of its\nchafing on the shores. We pushed back our shallop, and resumed our\nstation on the cliff beside the old mariner and his descendant.\n\n\u201cWherefore sought ye to peril your own lives fruitlessly,\u201d said Mark,\n\u201cin attempting to save the doomed? Whoso touches these infernal ships\nnever survives to tell the tale. Woe to the man who is found nigh them\nat midnight when the tide has subsided, and they arise in their former\nbeauty, with forecastle, and deck, and sail, and pennon, and shroud!\nThen is seen the streaming of lights along the water from their cabin\nwindows, and then is heard the sound of mirth and the clamour of tongues\nand the infernal whoop and halloo, and song, ringing far and wide. Woe\nto the man who comes nigh them!\u201d\n\nTo all this my companion listened with a breathless attention. I felt\nsomething touched with a superstition to which I partly believed I had\nseen one victim offered up; and I inquired of the old mariner\u2014\n\n\u201cHow and when came these haunted ships there? To me they seem but the\nmelancholy relics of some unhappy voyagers, and much more likely to warn\npeople to shun destruction, than entice and delude them to it.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd so,\u201d said the old man with a smile, which had more of sorrow in it\nthan of mirth; \u201cand so, young man, these black and shattered hulks seem\nto the eye of the multitude. But things are not what they seem: that\nwater, a kind and convenient servant to the wants of man, which seems so\nsmooth, and so dimpling, and so gentle, has swallowed up a human soul\neven now; and the place which it covers, so fair and so level, is a\nfaithless quicksand out of which none escape. Things are otherwise than\nthey seem. Had you lived as long as I have had the sorrow to live; had\nyou seen the storms, and braved the perils, and endured the distresses\nwhich have befallen me; had you sat gazing out on the dreary ocean at\nmidnight on a haunted coast; had you seen comrade after comrade, brother\nafter brother, and son after son, swept away by the merciless ocean from\nyour very side; had you seen the shapes of friends, doomed to the wave\nand the quicksand, appearing to you in the dreams and visions of the\nnight; then would your mind have been prepared for crediting the strange\nlegends of mariners; and the two haunted Danish ships would have had\ntheir terrors for you, as they have for all who sojourn on this coast.\n\n\u201cOf the time and cause of their destruction,\u201d continued the old man, \u201cI\nknow nothing certain; they have stood as you have seen them for\nuncounted time; and while all other ships wrecked on this unhappy coast\nhave gone to pieces, and rotted, and sunk away in a few years, these two\nhaunted hulks have neither sunk in the quicksand, nor has a single spar\nor board been displaced. Maritime legend says, that two ships of Denmark\nhaving had permission, for a time, to work deeds of darkness and dolour\non the deep, were at last condemned to the whirlpool and the sunken\nrock, and were wrecked in this bonnie bay, as a sign to seamen to be\ngentle and devout. The night when they were lost was a harvest evening\nof uncommon mildness and beauty: the sun had newly set; the moon came\nbrighter and brighter out; and the reapers, laying their sickles at the\nroot of the standing corn, stood on rock and bank, looking at the\nincreasing magnitude of the waters, for sea and land were visible from\nSt Bees to Barnhourie.\n\n\u201cThe sails of the two vessels were soon seen bent for the Scottish\ncoast; and with a speed outrunning the swiftest ship, they approached\nthe dangerous quicksands and headland of Borranpoint. On the deck of the\nforemost ship not a living soul was seen, or shape, unless something in\ndarkness and form resembling a human shadow could be called a shape,\nwhich flitted from extremity to extremity of the ship, with the\nappearance of trimming the sails, and directing the vessel\u2019s course. But\nthe decks of its companion were crowded with human shapes; the captain,\nand mate, and sailor, and cabin boy, all seemed there; and from them the\nsound of mirth and minstrelsy echoed over land and water. The coast\nwhich they skirted along was one of extreme danger; and the reapers\nshouted to warn them to beware of sandbank and rock; but of this\nfriendly counsel no notice was taken, except that a large and famished\ndog, which sat on the prow, answered every shout with a long, loud, and\nmelancholy howl. The deep sandbank of Carsethorn was expected to arrest\nthe career of these desperate navigators; but they passed, with the\ncelerity of waterfowl, over an obstruction which had wrecked many pretty\nships.\n\n\u201cOld men shook their heads, and departed, saying, \u2018We have seen the\nfiend sailing in a bottomless ship; let us go home and pray:\u2019 but one\nyoung and wilful man said, \u2018Fiend! I\u2019ll warrant it\u2019s nae fiend, but\ndouce Janet Withershins, the witch, holding a carouse with some of her\nCumberland cummers, and mickle red wine will be spilt atween them. \u2019Od,\nI would gladly have a toothfu\u2019! I\u2019ll warrant it\u2019s nane o\u2019 your cauld\nsour slae-water, like a bottle of Bailie Skrinkie\u2019s port, but right\ndrap-o\u2019-my-heart\u2019s-blood stuff, that would waken a body out of their\nlast linen. I wonder whaur the cummers will anchor their craft?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018And I\u2019ll vow,\u2019 said another rustic, \u2018the wine they quaff is none of\nyour visionary drink, such as a drouthy body has dished out to his lips\nin a dream; nor is it shadowy and unsubstantial, like the vessels they\nsail in, which are made out of a cockle-shell, or a cast-off slipper, or\nthe paring of a seaman\u2019s right thumb-nail. I once got a handsel out of a\nwitch\u2019s quaigh myself;\u2014auld Marion Mathers of Dustiefoot, whom they\ntried to bury in the old kirkyard of Dunscore; but the cummer raise as\nfast as they laid her down, and naewhere else would she lie but in the\nbonnie green kirkyard of Kier, among douce and sponsible folk. So I\u2019ll\nvow that the wine of a witch\u2019s cup is as fell liquor as ever did a\nkindly turn to a poor man\u2019s heart; and be they fiends, or be they\nwitches, if they have red wine asteer, I\u2019ll risk a droukit sark for ae\nglorious tout on\u2019t.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Silence, ye sinners,\u2019 said the minister\u2019s son of a neighbouring\nparish, who united in his own person his father\u2019s lack of devotion with\nhis mother\u2019s love of liquor. \u2018Whisht! Speak as if ye had the fear of\nsomething holy before ye. Let the vessels run their own way to\ndestruction: who can stay the eastern wind, and the current of the\nSolway sea? I can find ye Scripture warrant for that: so let them try\ntheir strength on Blawhooly rocks, and their might on the broad\nquicksand. There\u2019s a surf running there would knock the ribs together of\na galley built by the imps of the pit, and commanded by the Prince of\nDarkness. Bonnily and bravely they sail away there; but before the blast\nblows by they\u2019ll be wrecked; and red wine and strong brandy will be as\nrife as dykewater, and we\u2019ll drink the health of bonnie Bell Blackness\nout of her left foot slipper.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe speech of the young profligate was applauded by several of his\ncompanions, and away they flew to the bay of Blawhooly, from whence they\nnever returned. The two vessels were observed all at once to stop in the\nbosom of the bay, on the spot where their hulls now appear: the mirth\nand the minstrelsy waxed louder than ever; and the forms of the maidens,\nwith instruments of music and wine-cups in their hands, thronged the\ndecks. A boat was lowered; and the same shadowy pilot who conducted the\nships made it start towards the shore with the rapidity of lightning,\nand its head knocked against the bank where the four young men stood,\nwho longed for the unblest drink. They leaped in with a laugh, and with\na laugh were they welcomed on deck; wine cups were given to each, and as\nthey raised them to their lips the vessels melted away beneath their\nfeet; and one loud shriek, mingled with laughter still louder, was heard\nover land and water for many miles. Nothing more was heard or seen till\nthe morning, when the crowd who came to the beach saw with fear and\nwonder the two Haunted Ships, such as they now seem, masts and tackle\ngone; nor mark, nor sign, by which their name, country, or destination,\ncould be known, was left remaining. Such is the tradition of the\nmariners.\u201d\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n\u201cAnd trow ye,\u201d said the old woman, who, attracted from her hut by the\ndrowning cries of the young fisherman, had remained an auditor of the\nmariner\u2019s legend; \u201cand trow ye, Mark Macmoran, that the tale of the\nHaunted Ships is done? I can say no to that. Mickle have my ears heard,\nbut more mine eyes have witnessed since I came to dwell in this humble\nhome by the side of the deep sea. I mind the night weel: it was on\nHallow-e\u2019en, the nuts were cracked, and the apples were eaten, and spell\nand charm were tried at my fireside; till, wearied with diving into the\ndark waves of futurity, the lads and lasses fairly took to the more\nvisible blessings of kind words, tender clasps, and gentle courtship.\n\n\u201cSoft words in a maiden\u2019s ear, and a kindly kiss o\u2019 her lip, were old\nworld matters to me, Mark Macmoran; though I mean not to say that I have\nbeen free of the folly of daundering and daffin\u2019 with a youth in my day,\nand keeping tryst with him in dark and lonely places. However, as I say,\nthese times of enjoyment were past and gone with me; the mair\u2019s the pity\nthat pleasure should flee sae fast away,\u2014and as I couldna make sport I\nthought I would not mar any; so out I sauntered into the fresh cold air,\nand sat down behind that old oak, and looked abroad on the wide sea. I\nhad my ain sad thoughts, ye may think, at the time; it was in that very\nbay my blythe gudeman perished, with seven more in his company; and on\nthat very bank where ye see the waves leaping and foaming, I saw seven\nstately corses streeked, but the dearest was the eighth. It was a woful\nsight to me, a widow, with four bonnie boys, with nought to support them\nbut these twa hands, and God\u2019s blessing, and a cow\u2019s grass. I have never\nliked to live out of sight of this bay since that time; and mony\u2019s the\nmoonlight night I sit looking on these watery mountains, and these waste\nshores; it does my heart good, whatever it may do to my head. So ye see\nit was Hallow-e\u2019en; and looking on sea and land sat I; and my heart\nwandering to other thoughts soon made me forget my youthful company at\nhame. It might be near the howe hour of the night; the tide was making,\nand its singing brought strange old-world stories with it; and I thought\non the dangers that sailors endure, the fates they meet with, and the\nfearful forms they see. My own blithe gude-man had seen sights that made\nhim grave enough at times, though he aye tried to laugh them away.\n\n\u201cAweel, between that very rock aneath us and the coming tide, I saw, or\nthought I saw (for the tale is so dream-like that the whole might pass\nfor a vision of the night) the form of a man. His plaid was gray; his\nface was gray; and his hair, which hung low down till it nearly came to\nthe middle of his back, was as white as the white sea-foam. He began to\nhouk and dig under the bank; and God be near me! thought I, this maun be\nthe unblessed spirit of auld Adam Gowdgowpin, the miser, who is doomed\nto dig for shipwrecked treasure, and count how many millions are hidden\nfor ever from man\u2019s enjoyment. The form found something, which in shape\nand hue seemed a left-foot slipper of brass; so down to the tide he\nmarched, and placing it on the water, whirled it thrice round; and the\ninfernal slipper dilated at every turn, till it became a bonnie barge\nwith its sails bent, and on board leaped the form, and scudded swiftly\naway. He came to one of the haunted ships; and striking it with his oar,\na fair ship, with mast and canvas, and mariners, started up: he touched\nthe other haunted ship, and produced the like transformation; and away\nthe three spectre ships bounded, leaving a track of fire behind them on\nthe billows, which was long unextinguished.\n\n\u201cNow wasna that a bonnie and a fearful sight to see beneath the light of\nthe Hallowmas moon? But the tale is far frae finished; for mariners say\nthat once a year, on a certain night, if ye stand on the Borranpoint, ye\nwill see the infernal shallops coming snoring through the Solway; ye\nwill hear the same laugh, and song, and mirth, and minstrelsy, which our\nancestors heard; see them bound over the sandbanks and sunken rocks like\nsea-gulls, cast their anchor in Blawhooly Bay, while the shadowy figures\nlower down the boat, and augment their numbers with the four unhappy\nmortals to whose memory a stone stands in the kirkyard, with a sinking\nship and a shoreless sea cut upon it. Then the spectre-ships vanish, and\nthe drowning shriek of mortals and the rejoicing laugh of fiends are\nheard, and the old hulls are left as a memorial that the old spiritual\nkingdom has not departed from the earth. But I maun away and trim my\nlittle cottage fire, and make it burn and blaze up bonnie, to warm the\ncrickets, and my cauld and crazy bones, that maun soon be laid aneath\nthe green sod in the eerie kirkyard.\u201d\n\nAnd away the old dame tottered to her cottage, secured the door on the\ninside, and soon the hearth-flame was seen to glimmer and gleam through\nthe key-hole and the window.\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll tell ye what,\u201d said the old mariner, in a subdued tone, and with a\nshrewd and suspicious glance of his eye after the old sibyl, \u201cit\u2019s a\nword that may not very well be uttered, but there are many mistakes made\nin evening stories if old Moll Moray there, where she lives, knows not\nmickle more than she is willing to tell of the Haunted Ships, and their\nunhallowed mariners. She lives cannily and quietly; no one knows how she\nis fed or supported; but her dress is aye whole, her cottage ever\nsmokes, and her table lacks neither of wine, white and red, nor of fowl\nand fish, and white bread and brown. It was a dear scoff to Jock\nMatheson, when he called old Moll the uncannie carline of Blawhooly: his\nboat ran round and round in the centre of the Solway\u2014everybody said it\nwas enchanted\u2014and down it went head foremost; and hadna Jock been a\nswimmer equal to a sheldrake, he would have fed the fish; but I warrant\nit sobered the lad\u2019s speech, and he never reckoned himself safe till he\nmade auld Moll the present of a new kirtle and a stone of cheese.\u201d\n\n\u201cO father,\u201d said his granddaughter Barbara, \u201cye surely wrong poor old\nMary Moray: what use could it be to an old woman like her, who has no\nwrongs to redress, no malice to work out against mankind, and nothing to\nseek of enjoyment save a cannie hour and a quiet grave\u2014what use could\nthe fellowship of the fiends, and the communion of evil spirits, be to\nher? I know Jenny Primrose puts rowan-tree above the doorhead when she\nsees old Mary coming; I know the goodwife of Kittlenacket wears\nrowan-berry leaves in the head-band of her blue kirtle, and all for the\nsake of averting the unsonsie glance of Mary\u2019s right ee; and I know that\nthe auld laird of Burntroutwater drives his seven cows to their pasture\nwith a wand of witchtree, to keep Mary from milking them. But what has\nall that to do with haunted shallops, visionary mariners, and bottomless\nboats? I have heard myself as pleasant a tale about the Haunted Ships\nand their unworldly crews as any one would wish to hear in a winter\nevening. It was told me by young Benjie Macharg, one summer night,\nsitting on Arbiglandbank; the lad intended a sort of lovemeeting, but\nall that he could talk of was about smearing sheep and shearing sheep,\nand of the wife which the Norway elves of the Haunted Ships made for his\nuncle Sandie Macharg. And I shall tell ye the tale as the honest lad\ntold it to me.\n\n\u201cAlexander Macharg, besides being the laird of three acres of peat-moss,\ntwo kail gardens, and the owner of seven good milch cows, a pair of\nhorses, and six pet sheep, was the husband of one of the handsomest\nwomen in seven parishes. Many a lad sighed the day he was brided; and a\nNithsdale laird and two Annandale moorland farmers drank themselves to\ntheir last linen, as well as their last shilling, through sorrow for her\nloss. But married was the dame; and home she was carried, to bear rule\nover her home and her husband, as an honest woman should. Now ye maun\nken that though flesh-and-blood lovers of Alexander\u2019s bonnie wife all\nceased to love and to sue her after she became another\u2019s, there were\ncertain admirers who did not consider their claim at all abated, or\ntheir hopes lessened, by the kirk\u2019s famous obstacle of matrimony.\n\n\u201cYe have heard how the devout minister of Tinwald had a fair son carried\naway, and bedded against his liking to an unchristened bride, whom the\nelves and the fairies provided: ye have heard how the bonnie bride of\nthe drunken laird of Soukitup was stolen by the fairies out at the back\nwindow of the bridal chamber the time the bridegroom was groping his way\nto the chamber door; and ye have heard\u2014but why need I multiply cases?\nSuch things in the ancient days were as common as candlelight. So ye\u2019ll\nno hinder certain water-elves and sea-fairies, who sometimes keep\nfestival and summer mirth in these old haunted hulks, from falling in\nlove with the weel-faured wife of Laird Macharg; and to their plots and\ncontrivances they went, how they might accomplish to sunder man and\nwife; and sundering such a man and such a wife was like sundering the\ngreen leaf from the summer, or the fragrance from the flower.\n\n\u201cSo it fell on a time that Laird Macharg took his halve-net on his back,\nand his steel spear in his hand, and down to Blawhooly Bay gaed he, and\ninto the water he went right between the two haunted hulks, and placing\nhis net awaited the coming of the tide. The night, ye maun ken, was\nmirk, and the wind lown, and the singing of the increasing waters among\nthe shells and the pebbles was heard for sundry miles. All at once\nlights began to glance and twinkle on board the two Haunted Ships from\nevery hole and seam, and presently the sound as of a hatchet employed in\nsquaring timber echoed far and wide. But if the toil of these unearthly\nworkmen amazed the laird, how much more was his amazement increased when\na sharp shrill voice called out, \u2018Ho! brother, what are you doing now?\u2019\nA voice still shriller responded from the other haunted ship, \u2018I\u2019m\nmaking a wife to Sandie Macharg.\u2019 And a loud quavering laugh running\nfrom ship to ship, and from bank to bank, told the joy they expected\nfrom their labour.\n\n\u201cNow the laird, besides being a devout and a God-fearing man, was shrewd\nand bold; and in plot and contrivance, and skill in conducting his\ndesigns, was fairly an overmatch for any dozen land elves. But the water\nelves are far more subtle; besides, their haunts and their dwellings\nbeing in the great deep, pursuit and detection are hopeless, if they\nsucceed in carrying their prey to the waves. But ye shall hear.\n\n\u201cHome flew the laird, collected his family around the hearth, spoke of\nthe signs and the sins of the times, and talked of mortification and\nprayer for averting calamity; and finally, taking from the shelf his\nfather\u2019s Bible, brass clasps, black print, and covered with calf-skin,\nhe proceeded, without let or stint, to perform domestic worship. I\nshould have told ye that he bolted and locked the door, shut up all\ninlet to the house, threw salt into the fire, and proceeded in every way\nlike a man skilful in guarding against the plots of fairies and fiends.\nHis wife looked on all this with wonder; but she saw something in her\nhusband\u2019s looks that hindered her from intruding either question or\nadvice, and a wise woman was she.\n\n\u201cNear the mid-hour of the night the rush of a horse\u2019s feet was heard,\nand the sound of a rider leaping from his back, and a heavy knock came\nto the door, accompanied by a voice, saying, \u2018The cummer\u2019s drink\u2019s hot,\nand the knave bairn is expected at Laird Laurie\u2019s to-night; sae mount,\ngudewife, and come.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Preserve me!\u2019 said the wife of Sandie Macharg, \u2018that\u2019s news indeed!\nwho could have thought it? The laird has been heirless for seventeen\nyears. Now, Sandie, my man, fetch me my skirt and hood.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut he laid his arm round his wife\u2019s neck and said\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018If all the lairds in Galloway go heirless, over this door threshold\nshall you not stir to-night; and I have said it, and I have sworn it:\nseek not to know why and wherefore,\u2014but, Lord, send us Thy blessed\nmoonlight!\u2019\n\nThe wife looked for a moment in her husband\u2019s eyes, and desisted from\nfurther entreaty.\n\n\u201c\u2018But let us send a civil message to the gossips, Sandie; and hadna ye\nbetter say I\u2019m sair laid wi\u2019 a sudden sickness?\u2014though it\u2019s sinful-like\nto send the poor messenger a mile agate with a lie in his mouth without\na glass of brandy.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018To such a messenger, and to those who sent him, no apology is needed,\u2019\nsaid the austere laird, \u2018so let him depart.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd the clatter of a horse\u2019s hoofs was heard, and the muttered\nimprecations of its rider on the churlish treatment he had experienced.\n\n\u201c\u2018Now, Sandie, my lad,\u2019 said his wife, laying an arm particularly white\nand round about his neck as she spoke, \u2018are you not a queer man and a\nstern? I have been your wedded wife now these three years, and, beside\nmy dower, have brought you three as bonnie bairns as ever smiled aneath\na summer sun. O man! you a douce man, and fitter to be an elder than\neven Willie Greer himsel,\u2014I have the minister\u2019s ain word for\u2019t,\u2014to put\non these hard-hearted looks, and gang waving your arms that way, as if\nye said, \u201cI winna tak\u2019 the counsel o\u2019 sic a hempie as you.\u201d I\u2019m your ain\nleal wife, and will and maun hae an explanation.\u2019\n\n\u201cTo all this Sandy Macharg replied, \u2018It is written, \u201cWives, obey your\nhusbands;\u201d but we have been stayed in our devotion, so let us pray;\u2019 and\ndown he knelt. His wife knelt also, for she was as devout as bonnie; and\nbeside them knelt their household, and all lights were extinguished.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Now this beats a\u2019,\u2019 muttered his wife to herself; \u2018however, I shall be\nobedient for a time; but if I dinna ken what all this is for before the\nmorn by sunket-time, my tongue is nae langer a tongue, nor my hands\nworth wearing.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe voice of her husband in prayer interrupted this mental soliloquy;\nand ardently did he beseech to be preserved from the wiles of the fiends\nand the snares of Satan; \u2018from witches, ghosts, goblins, elves, fairies,\nspunkies, and water-kelpies; from the spectre shallop of Solway; from\nspirits visible and invisible; from the Haunted Ships and their\nunearthly tenants; from maritime spirits that plotted against godly men,\nand fell in love with their wives\u2019\u2014\u2014\n\n\u201c\u2018Nay, but His presence be near us!\u2019 said his wife in a low tone of\ndismay. \u2018God guide my gudeman\u2019s wits! I never heard such a prayer from\nhuman lips before. But, Sandie, my man, for Lord\u2019s sake, rise; what\nfearful light is this?\u2014barn, and byre, and stable, maun be in a blaze;\nand Hawkie and Hurley, Doddie and Cherrie, and Damson-plum, will be\nsmoored with reek and scorched with flame.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd a flood of light, but not so gross as a common fire, which ascended\nto heaven and filled all the court before the house, amply justified the\ngood wife\u2019s suspicions. But to the terrors of fire, Sandie was as\nimmovable as he was to the imaginary groans of the barren wife of Laird\nLaurie; and he held his wife, and threatened the weight of his right\nhand\u2014and it was a heavy one\u2014to all who ventured abroad, or even unbolted\nthe door. The neighing and prancing of horses, and the bellowing of\ncows, augmented the horrors of the night; and to any one who only heard\nthe din, it seemed that the whole onstead was in a blaze, and horses and\ncattle perishing in the flame. All wiles, common or extraordinary, were\nput in practice to entice or force the honest farmer and his wife to\nopen their door; and when the like success attended every new stratagem,\nsilence for a little while ensued, and a long, loud, and shrilling laugh\nwound up the dramatic efforts of the night.\n\n\u201cIn the morning, when Laird Macharg went to the door, he found standing\nagainst one of the pilasters a piece of black ship oak, rudely fashioned\ninto something like a human form, and which skilful people declared\nwould have been clothed with seeming flesh and blood, and palmed upon\nhim by elfin adroitness for his wife, had he admitted his visitants. A\nsynod of wise men and women sat upon the woman of timber, and she was\nfinally ordered to be devoured by fire, and that in the open air. A fire\nwas soon made, and into it the elfin sculpture was tossed from the\nprongs of two pairs of pitchforks. The blaze that rose was awful to\nbehold; and hissings, and burstings, and loud cracklings, and strange\nnoises, were heard in the midst of the flame; and when the whole sank\ninto ashes, a drinking cup of some precious metal was found; and this\ncup, fashioned no doubt by elfin skill, but rendered harmless by the\npurification with fire, the sons and daughters of Sandie Macharg and his\nwife drink out of to this day.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n A TALE OF THE MARTYRS.\n\n BY JAMES HOGG, THE \u201cETTRICK SHEPHERD.\u201d\n\n\nRed Tam Harkness came into the farm-house of Garrick, in the parish of\nCloseburn, one day, and began to look about for some place to hide in,\nwhen the gudewife, whose name was Jane Kilpatrick, said to him in great\nalarm, \u201cWhat\u2019s the matter, what\u2019s the matter, Tam Harkness!\u201d\n\n\u201cHide me, or else I\u2019m a dead man: that\u2019s the present matter, gudewife,\u201d\nsaid he. \u201cBut yet, when I have time\u2014if ever I hae mair time\u2014I have heavy\nnews for you. For Christ\u2019s sake, hide me, Jane, for the killers are hard\nat hand.\u201d\n\nJane Kilpatrick sprung to her feet, but she was quite benumbed and\npowerless. She ran to one press and opened it, and then to another;\nthere was not room to stuff a clog into either of them. She looked into\na bed; there was no shelter there, and her knees began to bend under her\nweight with terror. The voices of the troopers were by this time heard\nfast approaching, and Harkness had no other shift but in one moment to\nconceal himself behind the outer door, which was open, but the place\nwhere he stood was quite dark. He heard one of them say to another, \u201cI\nfear the scoundrel is not here after all. Guard all the outhouses.\u201d\n\nOn that three or four of the troop rushed by him, and began to search\nthe house and examine the inmates. Harkness that moment slid out without\nbeing observed, and tried to escape up a narrow glen called Kinrivah,\nimmediately behind the house, but unluckily two troopers, who had been\nin another chase, there met him in the face. When he perceived them, he\nturned and ran to the eastward; on which they both fired, which raised\nthe alarm, and instantly the whole pack were after him. It was\nafterwards conjectured that one of the shots had wounded him, for though\nhe, with others, had been nearly surrounded that morning, and twice\nwaylaid, he had quite outrun the soldiers; but now it was observed that\nsome of them began to gain ground on him, and they still continued\nfiring, till at length he fell into a kind of slough east from the\nfarm-house of Locherben, where they came up to him, and ran him through\nwith their bayonets. The spot is called Red Tam\u2019s Gutter to this day.\n\nJane Kilpatrick was one of the first who went to his mangled corpse\u2014a\nwoful sight, lying in the slough, and sore did she lament the loss of\nthat poor and honest man. But there was more: she came to his corpse by\na sort of yearning impatience to learn what was the woful news he had to\ncommunicate to her. But, alas! the intelligence was lost, and the man to\nwhose bosom alone it had haply been confided was no more; yet Jane could\nscarcely prevail on herself to have any fears for her own husband, for\nshe knew him to be in perfectly safe hiding in Glen Govar; still Tam\u2019s\nlast words hung heavy on her mind. They were both suspected to have been\nat the harmless rising at Enterkin for the relief of a favourite\nminister, which was effected; and that was the extent of their crime.\nAnd though it was only suspicion, four men were shot on the hills that\nmorning without trial or examination, and their bodies forbidden\nChristian burial.\n\nOne of these four was John Weir of Garrick, the husband of Jane\nKilpatrick, a man of great worth and honour, and universally respected.\nHe had left his hiding-place in order to carry some intelligence to his\nfriends, and to pray with them, but was entrapped among them and slain.\nStill there was no intelligence brought to his family, save the single\nexpression that fell from the lips of Thomas Harkness in a moment of\ndistraction. Nevertheless, Jane could not rest, but set out all the way\nto her sister\u2019s house in Glen Govar, in Crawford Muir, and arrived there\nat eleven o\u2019clock on a Sabbath evening. The family being at prayers when\nshe went, and the house dark, she stood still behind the hallan, and all\nthe time was convinced that the voice of the man that prayed was the\nvoice of her husband, John Weir. All the time that fervent prayer lasted\nthe tears of joy ran from her eyes, and her heart beat with gratitude to\nher Maker as she drank into her soul every sentence of the petitions and\nthanksgiving. Accordingly, when worship was ended, and the candle\nlighted, she went forward with a light heart and joyful countenance. Her\nsister embraced her, though manifestly embarrassed and troubled at\nseeing her there at such a time. From her she flew to embrace her\nhusband, but he stood still like a statue, and did not meet her embrace.\nShe gazed at him\u2014she grew pale, and, sitting down, she covered her face\nwith her apron. This man was one of her husband\u2019s brothers, likewise in\nhiding, whom she had never before seen; but the tones of his voice, and\neven the devotional expressions that he used, were so like her\nhusband\u2019s, that she mistook them for his.\n\nAll was now grief and consternation, for John Weir had not been seen or\nheard of there since Wednesday evening, when he had gone to warn his\nfriends of some impending danger; but they all tried to comfort each\nother as well as they could, and, in particular, by saying they were all\nin the Lord\u2019s hand, and it behoved Him to do with them as seemed to Him\ngood, with many other expressions of piety and submission. But the next\nmorning, when the two sisters were about to part, the one says to the\nother,\u2014\u201cJane, I cannot help telling you a strange confused dream that I\nhad just afore ye wakened me. Ye ken I put nae faith in dreams, and I\ndinna want you to regard it; but it is as well for friends to tell them\nto ane anither, and then, if aught turn out like it in the course o\u2019\nProvidence, it may bring it to baith their minds that their spirits had\nbeen conversing with God.\u201d\n\n\u201cNa, na, Aggie, I want nane o\u2019 your confused dreams. I hae other things\nto think o\u2019, and mony\u2019s the time and oft ye hae deaved me wi\u2019 them, an\u2019\nsometimes made me angry.\u201d\n\n\u201cI never bade ye believe them, Jeanie, but I likit aye to tell them to\nyou; and this I daresay rose out o\u2019 our conversation yestreen. But I\nthought I was away (ye see I dinna ken where I was); and I was feared\nand confused, thinking I had lost my way. And then I came to an auld\nman, an\u2019 he says to me, \u2018Is it the road to heaven that you are seeking,\nAggie?\u2019 An\u2019 I said, \u2018Ay,\u2019 for I didna like to deny\u2019t.\n\n\u201c\u2018Then I\u2019ll tell you where you maun gang,\u2019 said he; \u2018ye maun gang up by\nthe head of yon dark, mossy cleuch, an\u2019 you will find ane there that\nwill show you the road to heaven;\u2019 and I said \u2018Ay,\u2019 for I didna like to\nrefuse, although it was an uncouth looking road, and ane that I didna\nlike to gang. But when I gaed to the cleuch-head, wha do I see sitting\nthere but your ain gudeman, John Weir, and I thought I never saw him\nlook sae weel; and when I gaed close up to him, there I saw another John\nWeir, lying strippet to the sark, and a\u2019 bedded in blood. He was cauld\ndead, and his head turned to ae side, and when I saw siccan a sight, I\nwas terrified, an\u2019 held wide aff him. But I gaed up to the living John\nWeir, and said to him,\u2014\u2018Gudeman, how\u2019s this?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Dinna ye see how it is, sister Aggie?\u2019 says he, \u2018I\u2019m just set to herd\nthis poor man that\u2019s lying here.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Then I think ye\u2019ll no hae a sair post, John,\u2019 says I, \u2018for he disna\nlook as if he wad rin far away.\u2019 It was very unreverend o\u2019 me to speak\nthat gate, sister, but these were the words that I thought I said; an\u2019\nas it is but a dream, ye ken ye needna heed it.\n\n\u201c\u2018Alas, poor Aggie,\u2019 says he, \u2018ye are still in the gall o\u2019 bitterness.\nLook ower your right shoulder, an\u2019 ye will see what I hae to do. An\u2019 sae\nI looked ower my right shoulder, and there saw a hale drove o\u2019 foxes and\nwulcats, an\u2019 fumarts, an\u2019 martins, an\u2019 corby-craws, an\u2019 a hunder vile\nbeasts, a\u2019 staunin\u2019 round wi\u2019 glaring een, eager to be at the corpse of\nthe dead John Weir; an\u2019 then I was terribly astoundit, an\u2019 I says to\nhim, \u2018Gudeman, how is this?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I am commissioned to keep these awa,\u2019 said he. \u2018Do you think these een\nthat are yet open to the light o\u2019 heaven, and that tongue that has to\nsyllable the praises of a Redeemer far within yon sky, should be left to\nbecome a prey o\u2019 siccan vermin as these?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Will it make sae vera muckle difference, John Weir,\u2019 said I, \u2018whether\nthe carcass is eaten up by these or by the worms?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ah, Aggie, Aggie! worms are worms; but ye little wot what these are,\u2019\nsays he. \u2018But John Weir has warred wi\u2019 them a\u2019 his life, an\u2019 that to\nsome purpose, and they maunna get the advantage o\u2019 him now.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But which is the right John Weir?\u2019 said I; \u2018for here is ane lying\nstiff and lappered in his blood, and another in health and strength and\nsound mind.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I am the right John Weir,\u2019 says he. \u2018Did you ever think the good man\no\u2019 Garrick could die! Na, na, Aggie; Clavers could only kill the body,\nan\u2019 that\u2019s but the poorest part o\u2019 the man. But where are you gaun this\nwild gate?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I was directed this way on my road to heaven,\u2019 said I.\n\n\u201c\u2018Ay, an\u2019 ye were directed right, then,\u2019 says he; \u2018for this is the\ndirect path to heaven, and there is no other.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018That is very extraordinary,\u2019 says I. \u2018And, pray, what is the name of\nthis place, that I may direct my sister Jane, your wife, and all my\nfriends by the same way.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018This is Faith\u2019s Hope,\u2019 says he.\n\nAt the mention of this place, Jane Kilpatrick of Garrick rose slowly up\nto her feet, and held up both her hands. \u201cHold, hold, sister Aggie,\u201d\ncried she, \u201cyou have told enough. Was it in the head of Faith\u2019s Hope\nthat you saw this vision of my dead husband?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes; but at the same time I saw your husband alive.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen I fear your dream has a double meaning,\u201d she answered; \u201cfor though\nit appears like a religious allegory, you do not know that there really\nis such a place, and that not very far from our house. I have often\nlaughed at your dreams, sister, but this one hurries me from you to-day\nwith a heavy and trembling heart.\u201d\n\nJane left Glen Govar by the break of day, and took her way through the\nwild ranges of Crawford Muir, straight for the head of Faith\u2019s Hope. She\nhad some bread in her lap, and a little Bible that she always carried\nwith her; and without one to assist or comfort her, she went in search\nof her lost husband. Before she reached the head of that wild glen, the\nday was far spent, and the sun wearing down. The valley of Nith lay\nspread far below her in all its beauty, but around her there was nothing\nbut darkness, dread, and desolation. The mist hovered on the hills, and\non the skirts of the mist the ravens sailed about in circles, croaking\nfuriously, which had a most ominous effect on the heart of poor Jane. As\nshe advanced further up, she perceived a fox and an eagle sitting over\nagainst each other, watching something which yet they seemed terrified\nto approach; and right between them, in a little green hollow,\nsurrounded by black haggs, she found the corpse of her husband in the\nsame manner as described by her sister. He was stripped of his coat and\nvest, which it was thought he had thrown from him when flying from the\nsoldiers, to enable him to effect his escape. He was shot through the\nheart with two bullets, but nothing relating to his death was ever\nknown, whether he died praying, or was shot as he fled; but there was he\nfound lying, bathed in his blood, in the wilderness, and none of the\nwild beasts of the forest had dared to touch his lifeless form.\n\nThe bitterness of death was now past with poor Jane. Her staff and\nshield was taken from her right hand, and laid low in death by the\nviolence of wicked men. True, she had still a home to go to, although\nthat home was robbed and spoiled; but she found that without him it was\nno home, and that where his beloved form reposed, there was the home of\nher rest. She washed his wounds and the stains of blood from his body,\ntied her napkin round his face, covered him with her apron, and sat down\nand watched beside him all the livelong night, praying to the Almighty,\nand singing hymns and spiritual songs alternately. The next day she\nwarned her friends and neighbours, who went with her the following\nnight, and buried him privately in the northwest corner of the\nchurchyard of Morton.\n\n\n\n\n THE TOWN DRUMMER.\n\n BY JOHN GALT.\n\n\nFor many a year one Robin Boss had been town drummer; he was a relic of\nsome American war fencibles, and was, to say the truth of him, a divor\nbody, with no manner of conduct, saving a very earnest endeavour to fill\nhimself fou as often as he could get the means; the consequence of which\nwas, that his face was as plooky as a curran bun, and his nose as red as\na partan\u2019s tae.\n\nOne afternoon there was need to send out a proclamation to abolish a\npractice that was growing into a custom, in some of the by-parts of the\ntown, of keeping swine at large\u2014ordering them to be confined in proper\nstyes, and other suitable places. As on all occasions when the matter to\nbe proclaimed was from the magistrates, Thomas, on this, was attended by\nthe town-officers in their Sunday garbs, and with their halberts in\ntheir hands; but the abominable and irreverent creature was so drunk,\nthat he wam\u2019let to and fro over the drum, as if there had not been a\nbane in his body. He was seemingly as soople and as senseless as a\nbolster. Still, as this was no new thing with him, it might have passed;\nfor James Hound, the senior officer, was in the practice, when Robin was\nin that state, of reading the proclamations himself. On this occasion,\nhowever, James happened to be absent on some hue and cry quest, and\nanother of the officers (I forget which) was appointed to perform for\nhim. Robin, accustomed to James, no sooner heard the other man begin to\nread than he began to curse and swear at him as an incapable\nnincompoop\u2014an impertinent term that he was much addicted to. The grammar\nschool was at the time skailing, and the boys seeing the stramash,\ngathered round the officer, and yelling and shouting, encouraged Robin\nmore and more into rebellion, till at last they worked up his corruption\nto such a pitch, that he took the drum from about his neck, and made it\nfly like a bombshell at the officer\u2019s head.\n\nThe officers behaved very well, for they dragged Robin by the lug and\nthe horn to the tolbooth, and then came with their complaint to me.\nSeeing how the authorities had been set at nought, and the necessity\nthere was of making an example, I forthwith ordered Robin to be\ncashiered from the service of the town; and as so important a concern as\na proclamation ought not to be delayed, I likewise, upon the spot,\nordered the officers to take a lad that had been also a drummer in a\nmarching regiment, and go with him to make the proclamation.\n\nNothing could be done in a more earnest and zealous public spirit than\nthis was done by me. But habit had begot in the town a partiality for\nthe drunken ne\u2019er-do-well, Robin; and this just act of mine was\nimmediately condemned as a daring stretch of arbitrary power; and the\nconsequence was, that when the council met next day, some sharp words\nflew among us, as to my usurping an undue authority; and the thanks I\ngot for my pains was the mortification to see the worthless body\nrestored to full power and dignity, with no other reward than an\nadmonition to behave better for the future. Now, I leave it to the\nunbiassed judgment of posterity to determine if any public man could be\nmore ungraciously treated by his colleagues than I was on this occasion.\nBut, verily, the council had their reward.\n\nThe divor Robin Boss being, as I have recorded, reinstated in office,\nsoon began to play his old tricks. In the course of the week after the\nMichaelmas term at which my second provostry ended, he was so\ninsupportably drunk that he fell head foremost into his drum, which cost\nthe town five-and-twenty shillings for a new one\u2014an accident that was\nnot without some satisfaction to me; and I trow I was not sparing in my\nderisive commendations on the worth of such a public officer.\nNevertheless, he was still kept on, some befriending him for compassion,\nand others as it were to spite me.\n\nBut Robin\u2019s good behaviour did not end with breaking the drum, and\ncosting a new one. In the course of the winter it was his custom to\nbeat, \u201cGo to bed, Tom,\u201d about ten o\u2019clock at night, and the reveille at\nfive in the morning. In one of his drunken fits he made a mistake, and\ninstead of going his rounds as usual at ten o\u2019clock, he had fallen\nasleep in a change-house, and waking about the midnight hour in the\nterror of some whisky dream, he seized his drum, and running into the\nstreets, began to strike the fire-beat in the most awful manner.\n\nIt was a fine clear frosty moonlight, and the hollow sound of the drum\nresounded through the silent streets like thunder. In a moment everybody\nwas afoot, and the cry of \u201cWhaur is\u2019t? whaur\u2019s the fire?\u201d was heard\nechoing from all sides. Robin, quite unconscious that he alone was the\ncause of the alarm, still went along beating the dreadful summons. I\nheard the noise and rose; but while I was drawing on my stockings in the\nchair at the bed-head, and telling Mrs Pawkie to compose herself, for\nour houses were all insured, I suddenly recollected that Robin had the\nnight before neglected to go his rounds at ten o\u2019clock as usual, and the\nthought came into my head that the alarm might be one of his inebriated\nmistakes; so, instead of dressing myself any further, I went to the\nwindow, and looked out through the glass, without opening it, for, being\nin my night-clothes, I was afraid of taking cold.\n\nThe street was as throng as on a market day, and every face in the\nmoonlight was pale with fear. Men and lads were running with their\ncoats, and carrying their breeches in their hands; wives and maidens\nwere all asking questions at one another, and even lasses were fleeing\nto and fro, like waternymphs with urns, having stoups and pails in their\nhands. There was swearing and tearing of men, hoarse with the rage of\nimpatience, at the tolbooth, getting out the fire-engine from its stance\nunder the stair; and loud and terrible afar off, and over all, came the\npeal of alarm from drunken Robin\u2019s drum.\n\nI could scarcely keep my composity when I beheld and heard all this, for\nI was soon thoroughly persuaded of the fact. At last I saw Deacon\nGirdwood, the chief advocate and champion of Robin, passing down the\ncauseway like a demented man, with a red nightcap, and his big-coat on;\nfor some had cried that the fire was in his yard.\n\n\u201cDeacon,\u201d cried I, opening the window, forgetting, in the jocularity of\nthe moment, the risk I ran from being so naked; \u201cwhaur away sae fast,\ndeacon?\u201d\n\nThe deacon stopped and said, \u201cIs\u2019t out? is\u2019t out?\u201d\n\n\u201cGang your ways home,\u201d quo\u2019 I, very coolly, \u201cfor I hae a notion that a\u2019\nthis hobleshow\u2019s but the fume of a gill in your friend Robin\u2019s head.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s no possible!\u201d exclaimed the deacon.\n\n\u201cPossible here or possible there, Mr Girdwood,\u201d quo\u2019 I, \u201cit\u2019s ower cauld\nfor me to stand talking wi\u2019 you here; we\u2019ll learn the rights o\u2019t in the\nmorning, so good night;\u201d and with that I pulled down the window. But\nscarcely had I done so, when a shout of laughter came gathering up the\nstreet, and soon after poor drunken Robin was brought along by the cuff\nof the neck, between two of the town-officers, one of them carrying his\ndrum. The next day he was put out of office for ever, and folk\nrecollecting in what manner I had acted towards him before, the outcry\nabout my arbitrary power was forgotten in the blame that was heaped upon\nthose who had espoused Robin\u2019s cause against me.\n\n\n\n\n THE AWFUL NIGHT.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR (DELTA).\n\n Ha!\u2014\u2019twas but a dream;\n But then so terrible, it shakes my soul!\n Cold drops of sweat hang on my trembling flesh;\n My blood grows chilly, and I freeze with horror.\n \u2014_Richard the Third._\n\n The Fire-King one day rather amorous felt;\n He mounted his hot copper filly;\n His breeches and boots were of tin, and the belt\n Was made of cast-iron, for fear it should melt\n With the heat of the copper colt\u2019s belly.\n Oh! then there was glitter and fire in each eye,\n For two living coals were the symbols;\n His teeth were calcined, and his tongue was so dry,\n It rattled against them as though you should try\n To play the piano on thimbles.\n \u2014_Rejected Addresses._\n\n\nIn the course of a fortnight from the time I parted with Maister Glen,\nthe Lauder carrier, limping Jamie, brought his callant to our shop door\nin his hand. He was a tall, slender laddie, some fourteen years old, and\nsore grown away from his clothes. There was something genty and delicate\nlike about him, having a pale, sharp face, blue eyes, a nose like a\nhawk\u2019s, and long yellow hair hanging about his haffets, as if barbers\nwere unco scarce cattle among the howes of the Lammermoor hills. Having\na general experience of human nature, I saw that I would have something\nto do towards bringing him into a state of rational civilisation; but,\nconsidering his opportunities, he had been well educated, and I liked\nhis appearance on the whole not that ill.\n\nTo divert him a while, as I did not intend yoking him to work the first\nday, I sent out Benjie with him, after giving him some refreshment of\nbread and milk, to let him see the town and all the uncos about it. I\ntold Benjie first to take him to the auld kirk, which is a wonderful\nbuilding, steeple and aisle; and as for mason work, far before anything\nto be seen or heard tell of in our day; syne to Lugton brig, which is a\ngrand affair, hanging over the river Esk and the flour-mills like a\nrainbow; syne to the Tolbooth, which is a terror to evil-doers, and from\nwhich the Lord preserve us all! syne to the Market, where ye\u2019ll see\nlamb, beef, mutton, and veal, hanging up on the cleeks, in roasting and\nboiling pieces\u2014spar-rib, jiggot, shoulder, and heuk-bane, in the great\nprodigality of abundance; and syne down to the Duke\u2019s gate, by looking\nthrough the bonny white painted iron-staunchels of which ye\u2019ll see the\ndeer running beneath the green trees; and the palace itself, in the\ninside of which dwells one that needs not be proud to call the king his\ncousin.\n\nBrawly did I know, that it is a little after a laddie\u2019s being loosed\nfrom his mother\u2019s apron-string, and hurried from home, till the mind can\nmake itself up to stay among fremit folk; or that the attention can be\nroused to anything said or done, however simple in the uptake. So, after\nBenjie brought Mungo home again, gey forfaughten and wearied-out like, I\nbade the wife give him his four-hours, and told him he might go to his\nbed as soon as he liked. Jalousing also, at the same time, that\ncreatures brought up in the country have strange notions about them with\nrespect to supernaturals\u2014such as ghosts, brownies, fairies, and\nbogles\u2014to say nothing of witches, warlocks, and evil-spirits, I made\nBenjie take off his clothes and lie down beside him, as I said, to keep\nhim warm; but, in plain matter of fact (between friends), that the\ncallant might sleep sounder, finding himself in a strange bed, and not\nvery sure as to how the house stood as to the matter of a good name.\n\nKnowing by my own common sense, and from long experience of the ways of\na wicked world, that there is nothing like industry, I went to Mungo\u2019s\nbedside in the morning, and wakened him betimes. Indeed, I\u2019m leein\u2019\nthere; I need not call it wakening him, for Benjie told me, when he was\nsupping his parritch out of his luggie at breakfast-time, that he never\nwinked an eye all night, and that sometimes he heard him greetin\u2019 to\nhimself in the dark\u2014such and so powerful is our love of home and the\nforce of natural affection. Howsoever, as I was saying, I took him ben\nthe house with me down to the workshop, where I had begun to cut out a\npair of nankeen trowsers for a young lad that was to be married the week\nafter to a servant-maid of Mr Wiggie\u2019s,\u2014a trig quean, that afterwards\nmade him a good wife, and the father of a numerous small family.\n\nSpeaking of nankeen, I would advise everyone, as a friend, to buy the\nIndian, and not the British kind, the expense of outlay being ill\nhained, even at sixpence a-yard\u2014the latter not standing the washing, but\nmaking a man\u2019s legs, at a distance, look like a yellow yorline.\n\nIt behoved me now as a maister, bent on the improvement of his prentice,\nto commence learning Mungo some few of the mysteries of our trade; so\nhaving showed him the way to crook his hough (example is better than\nprecept, as James Batter observes), I taught him the plan of holding the\nneedle; and having fitted his middle-finger with a bottomless thimble of\nour own sort, I set him to sewing the cotton-lining into one leg,\nknowing that it was a part not very particular, and not very likely to\nbe seen; so that the matter was not great, whether the stitching was\nexactly regular, or rather in the zigzag line. As is customary with all\nnew beginners, he made a desperate awkward hand at it, and of which I\nwould of course have said nothing, but that he chanced to brog his\nthumb, and completely soiled the whole piece of work with the stains of\nblood; which, for one thing, could not wash out without being seen; and,\nfor another, was an unlucky omen to happen to a marriage garment.\n\nEvery man should be on his guard: this was a lesson I learned when I was\nin the volunteers, at the time Buonaparte was expected to land down at\nDunbar. Luckily for me in this case, I had, by some foolish mistake or\nanother, made an allowance of a half yard over and above what I found I\ncould manage to shape on; so I boldly made up my mind to cut out the\npiece altogether, it being in the back seam. In that business I trust I\nshowed the art of a good tradesman, having managed to do it so neatly\nthat it could not be noticed without the narrowest inspection; and,\nhaving the advantage of a covering by the coat flaps, had indeed no\nchance of being so, except on desperately windy days.\n\nIn the week succeeding that on which this unlucky mischance happened, an\naccident almost as bad befell, though not to me, further than that every\none is bound by the ten commandments, to say nothing of his own\nconscience, to take a part in the afflictions that befall their\ndoor-neighbours.\n\nWhen the voice of man was whisht, and all was sunk in the sound sleep of\nmidnight, it chanced that I was busy dreaming that I was sitting, one of\nthe spectators, looking at another playacting business. Before coming\nthis length, howsoever, I should by right have observed, that ere going\nto bed I had eaten for my supper part of a black pudding and two\nsausages, that widow Grassie had sent in a compliment to my wife, being\na genteel woman, and mindful of her friends\u2014so that I must have had some\nsort of nightmare, and not been exactly in my seven senses, else I could\nnot have been even dreaming of siccan a place. Well, as I was saying, in\nthe play-house I thought I was; and all at once I heard Maister Wiggie,\nlike one crying in the wilderness, hallooing with a loud voice through\nthe window, bidding me flee from the snares, traps, and gin-nets of the\nEvil One, and from the terrors of the wrath to come. I was in a terrible\nfunk; and just as I was trying to rise from the seat, that seemed\nsomehow glued to my body and would not let me, to reach down my hat,\nwhich, with its glazed cover, was hanging on a pin to one side, my face\nall red, and glowing like a fiery furnace, for shame of being a second\ntime caught in deadly sin, I heard the kirk-bell jow-jowing, as if it\nwas the last trump summoning sinners to their long and black account;\nand Maister Wiggie thrust in his arm in his desperation, in a whirlwind\nof passion, claughting hold of my hand like a vice, to drag me out head\nforemost. Even in my sleep, howsoever, it appears that I like free-will,\nand ken that there are no slaves in our blessed country; so I tried with\nall my might to pull against him, and gave his arm such a drive back,\nthat he seemed to bleach over on his side, and raised a hullaballoo of a\nyell, that not only wakened me, but made me start upright in my bed.\n\nFor all the world such a scene! My wife was roaring \u201cMurder,\nmurder!\u2014Mansie Wauch, will ye no wauken?\u2014Murder, murder! ye\u2019ve felled me\nwi\u2019 your nieve,\u2014ye\u2019ve felled me outright,\u2014I\u2019m gone for evermair,\u2014my hale\nteeth are doun my throat. Will ye no wauken, Mansie Wauch?\u2014will ye no\nwauken?\u2014Murder, murder!\u2014I say murder, murder, murder, murder!\u201d\n\n\u201cWho\u2019s murdering us?\u201d cried I, throwing my cowl back on the pillow, and\nrubbing my eyes in the hurry of a tremendous fright.\u2014\u201cWha\u2019s murdering\nus?\u2014where\u2019s the robbers?\u2014send for the town officer!\u201d\n\n\u201cO Mansie!\u2014O Mansie!\u201d said Nanse, in a kind of greeting tone, \u201cI daursay\nye\u2019ve felled me\u2014but no matter, now I\u2019ve gotten ye roused. Do ye no see\nthe hale street in a bleeze of flames? Bad is the best; we maun either\nbe burned to death, or out of house and hall, without a rag to cover our\nnakedness. Where\u2019s my son?\u2014where\u2019s my dear bairn, Benjie?\u201d\n\nIn a most awful consternation, I jumped at this out to the middle of the\nfloor, hearing the causeway all in an uproar of voices; and seeing the\nflichtering of the flames glancing on the houses in the opposite side of\nthe street, all the windows of which were filled with the heads of\nhalf-naked folks in round-eared mutches or Kilmarnocks, their mouths\nopen, and their eyes staring with fright; while the sound of the\nfire-engine, rattling through the streets like thunder, seemed like the\ndead cart of the plague come to hurry away the corpses of the deceased\nfor interment in the kirkyard.\n\nNever such a spectacle was witnessed in this world of sin and sorrow\nsince the creation of Adam. I pulled up the window and looked out; and,\nlo and behold! the very next house to our own was all in a lowe from\ncellar to garret; the burning joists hissing and cracking like mad; and\nthe very wind blew along as warm as if it had been out of the mouth of a\nbaker\u2019s oven!\n\nIt was a most awful spectacle! more by token to me, who was likely to be\nintimately concerned with it; and beating my brow with my clenched nieve\nlike a distracted creature, I saw that the labour of my whole life was\nlikely to go for nought, and me to be a ruined man; all the earnings of\nmy industry being laid out on my stock-in-trade, and on the plenishing\nof our bit house. The darkness of the latter days came over my spirit\nlike a vision before the prophet Isaiah; and I could see nothing in the\nyears to come but beggary and starvation; myself a fallen old man, with\nan out-at-the-elbows coat, a greasy hat, and a bald pow, hirpling over a\nstaff, requeeshting an awmous; Nanse a broken-hearted beggar wife, torn\ndown to tatters, and weeping like Rachel when she thought on better\ndays; and poor wee Benjie going from door to door with a meal-pock on\nhis back.\n\nThe thought first dung me stupid, and then drove me to desperation; and\nnot even minding the dear wife of my bosom, that had fainted away as\ndead as a herring, I pulled on my trowsers like mad, and rushed out into\nthe street, bareheaded and barefoot as the day that Lucky Bringthereout\ndragged me into the world.\n\nThe crowd saw in the twinkling of an eyeball that I was a desperate man,\nfierce as Sir William Wallace, and not to be withstood by gentle or\nsimple. So most of them made way for me; they that tried to stop me\nfinding it a bad job, being heeled over from right to left, on the broad\nof their backs, like flounders, without respect of age or person; some\nold women that were obstrepulous being gey sore hurt, and one of them\nhas a pain in her hainch even to this day. When I had got almost to the\ndoorcheek of the burning house, I found one grupping me by the back like\ngrim death; and in looking over my shoulder, who was it but Nanse\nherself, that, rising up from her faint, had pursued me like a\nwhirlwind. It was a heavy trial, but my duty to myself in the first\nplace, and to my neighbours in the second, roused me up to withstand it;\nso, making a spend like a greyhound, I left the hindside of my shirt in\nher grasp, like Joseph\u2019s garment in the nieve of Potiphar\u2019s wife, and up\nthe stairs head-foremost among the flames.\n\nMercy keep us all! what a sight for mortal man to glower at with his\nliving eyes! The bells were tolling amid the dark, like a summons from\nabove for the parish of Dalkeith to pack off to another world; the drums\nwere beat-beating as if the French were coming, thousand on thousand, to\nkill, slay, and devour every maid and mother\u2019s son of us; the\nfire-engine pump-pump-pumping like daft, showering the water like\nrainbows, as if the windows of heaven were opened, and the days of old\nNoah come back again; and the rabble throwing the good furniture over\nthe windows like onion peelings, where it either felled the folk below,\nor was dung to a thousand shivers on the causey. I cried to them for the\nlove of goodness to make search in the beds, in case there might be any\nweans there, human life being still more precious than human means; but\nnot a living soul was seen but a cat, which, being raised and wild with\nthe din, would on no consideration allow itself to be catched. Jacob\nDribble found that to his cost; for right or wrong, having a drappie in\nhis head, he swore like a trooper that he would catch her, and carry her\ndown beneath his oxter; so forward he weired her into a corner,\ncrouching on his hunkers. He had much better have let it alone; for it\nfuffed over his shoulder like wildfire, and, scarting his back all the\nway down, jumped like a lamplighter head-foremost through the flames,\nwhere, in the raging and roaring of the devouring element, its pitiful\ncries were soon hushed to silence for ever and ever.\n\nAt long and last, a woman\u2019s howl was heard on the street, lamenting,\nlike Hagar over young Ishmael in the wilderness of Beersheba, and crying\nthat her old grannie, that was a lameter, and had been bedridden for\nfour years come the Martinmas following, was burning to a cinder in the\nfore-garret. My heart was like to burst within me when I heard this\ndismal news, remembering that I myself had once an old mother, that was\nnow in the mools; so I brushed up the stair like a hatter, and burst\nopen the door of the fore-garret\u2014for in the hurry I could not find the\nsneck, and did not like to stand on ceremony. I could not see my finger\nbefore me, and did not know my right hand from the left, for the smoke;\nbut I groped round and round, though the reek mostly cut my breath, and\nmade me cough at no allowance, till at last I catched hold of something\ncold and clammy, which I gave a pull, not knowing what it was, but found\nout to be the old wife\u2019s nose. I cried out as loud as I was able for the\npoor creature to hoise herself up into my arms; but, receiving no\nanswer, I discovered in a moment that she was suffocated, the foul air\nhaving gone down her wrong hause; and, though I had aye a terror at\nlooking at, far less handling, a dead corpse, there was something brave\nwithin me at the moment, my blood being up; so I caught hold of her by\nthe shoulders, and hurling her with all my might out of her bed, got her\nlifted on my back heads and thraws in the manner of a boll of meal, and\naway as fast as my legs could carry me.\n\nThere was a providence in this haste; for ere I was half-way down the\nstair, the floor fell with a thud like thunder; and such a combustion of\nsoot, stour, and sparks arose, as was never seen or heard tell of in the\nmemory of man since the day that Samson pulled over the pillars in the\nhouse of Dagon, and smoored all the mocking Philistines as flat as\nflounders. For the space of a minute I was as blind as a beetle, and was\nlike to be choked for want of breath; however, as the dust began to\nclear up, I saw an open window, and hallooed down to the crowd for the\nsake of mercy to bring a ladder, to save the lives of two perishing\nfellow-creatures, for now my own was also in imminent jeopardy. They\nwere long of coming, and I did not know what to do; so thinking that the\nold wife, as she had not spoken, was maybe dead already, I was once\ndetermined just to let her drop down upon the street, but I knew that\nthe so doing would have cracked every bone in her body, and the glory of\nmy bravery would thus have been worse than lost. I persevered,\ntherefore, though I was ready to fall down under the dead weight, she\nnot being able to help herself, and having a deal of beef in her skin\nfor an old woman of eighty; but I got a lean, by squeezing her a wee\nbetween me and the wall.\n\nI thought they would never have come, for my shoeless feet were all\nbruised and bleeding from the crunched lime and the splinters of broken\nstones; but, at long and last, a ladder was hoisted up, and having\nfastened a kinch of ropes beneath her oxters, I let her slide down over\nthe upper step, by way of a pillyshee, having the satisfaction of seeing\nher safely landed in the arms of seven old wives, that were waiting with\na cosey warm blanket below. Having accomplished this grand man\u0153uvre,\nwherein I succeeded in saving the precious life of a woman of eighty,\nthat had been four long years bedridden, I tripped down the steps myself\nlike a nine-year-old, and had the pleasure, when the roof fell in, to\nknow that I for one had done my duty; and that, to the best of my\nknowledge, no living creature, except the poor cat, had perished within\nthe jaws of the devouring element.\n\nBut bide a wee; the work was, as yet, only half done. The fire was still\nroaring and raging, every puff of wind that blew through the black\nfirmament driving the red sparks high into the air, where they died away\nlike the tail of a comet, or the train of a sky-rocket; the joisting\ncrazing, cracking, and tumbling down; and now and then the bursting cans\nplaying flee in a hundred flinders from the chimney-heads. One would\nhave naturally enough thought that our engine could have drowned out a\nfire of any kind whatsoever in half a second, scores of folks driving\nabout with pitcherfuls of water, and scaling half of it on one another\nand the causey in their hurry; but, woe\u2019s me! it did not play puh on the\nred-het stones that whizzed like iron in a smiddy trough; so, as soon as\nit was darkness and smoke in one place, it was fire and fury in another.\n\nMy anxiety was great. Seeing that I had done my best for my neighbours,\nit behoved me now, in my turn, to try and see what I could do for\nmyself; so, notwithstanding the remonstrances of my friend James\nBatter\u2014whom Nanse, knowing I had bare feet, had sent out to seek me,\nwith a pair of shoon in his hand, and who, in scratching his head,\nmostly rugged out every hair of his wig with sheer vexation\u2014I ran off,\nand mounted the ladder a second time, and succeeded, after muckle\nspeeling, in getting upon the top of the wall; where, having a bucket\nslung up to me by means of a rope, I swashed down such showers on the\ntop of the flames, that I soon did more good, in the space of five\nminutes, than the engine and the ten men, that were all in a broth of\nperspiration with pumping it, did the whole night over; to say nothing\nof the multitude of drawers of water, men, wives, and weans, with their\ncuddies, leglins, pitchers, pails, and water-stoups; having the\nsatisfaction, in a short time, to observe everything getting as black as\nthe crown of my hat, and the gable of my own house becoming as cool as a\ncucumber.\n\nBeing a man of method, and acquainted with business, I could have liked\nto have given a finishing stitch to my work before descending the\nladder; but, losh me! sic a whingeing, girning, greeting, and roaring\ngot up all of a sudden, as was never seen or heard of since Bowed\nJoseph[23] raised the mealmob, and burned Johnnie Wilkes in effigy, and,\nlooking down, I saw Benjie, the bairn of my own heart, and the callant\nGlen, my apprentice on trial, that had both been as sound as tops till\nthis blessed moment, standing in their nightgowns and their little red\ncowls, rubbing their eyes, cowering with cold and fright, and making an\nawful uproar, crying on me to come down and not be killed. The voice of\nBenjie especially pierced through and through my heart, like a two-edged\nsword, and I could on no manner of account suffer myself to bear it any\nlonger, as I jaloused the bairn would have gone into convulsion fits if\nI had not heeded him; so, making a sign to them to be quiet, I came my\nways down, taking hold of one in ilka hand, which must have been a\nfatherly sight to the spectators that saw us. After waiting on the crown\nof the causey for half-an-hour, to make sure that the fire was\nextinguished, and all tight and right, I saw the crowd scaling, and\nthought it best to go in too, carrying the two youngsters along with me.\nWhen I began to move off, however, siccan a cheering of the multitude\ngot up as would have deafened a cannon; and, though I say it myself, who\nshould not say it, they seemed struck with a sore amazement at my heroic\nbehaviour, following me with loud cheers, even to the threshold of my\nown door.\n\nFootnote 23:\n\n A noted Edinburgh character.\n\nFrom this folk should condescend to take a lesson, seeing that, though\nthe world is a bitter bad world, yet that good deeds are not only a\nreward to themselves, but call forth the applause of Jew and Gentile;\nfor the sweet savour of my conduct, on this memorable night, remained in\nmy nostrils for goodness knows the length of time, many praising my\nbrave humanity in public companies and assemblies of the people, such as\nstrawberry ploys, council meetings, dinner parties, and so forth; and\nmany in private conversation at their own ingle-cheek, by way of\ntwo-handed crack; in stage-coach confab, and in causey talk in the\nforenoon, before going in to take their meridians. Indeed, between\nfriends, the business proved in the upshot of no small advantage to me,\nbringing to me a sowd of strange faces, by way of customers, both gentle\nand simple, that I verily believe had not so muckle as ever heard of my\nname before, and giving me many a coat to cut, and cloth to shape, that,\nbut for my gallant behaviour on the fearsome night aforesaid, would\ndoubtless have been cut, sewed, and shaped by other hands. Indeed,\nconsidering the great noise the thing made in the world, it is no wonder\nthat every one was anxious to have a garment of wearing apparel made by\nthe individual same hands that had succeeded, under Providence, in\nsaving the precious life of an old woman of eighty, that had been\nbedridden, some say, four years come Yule, and others, come Martinmas.\n\nWhen we got to the ingle-side, and, barring the door, saw that all was\nsafe, it was now three in the morning; so we thought it by much the best\nway of managing, not to think of sleeping any more, but to be on the\nlook-out\u2014as we aye used to be when walking sentry in the volunteers\u2014in\ncase the flames should, by ony mischancy accident or other, happen to\nbreak out again. My wife blamed my hardihood muckle, and the rashness\nwith which I had ventured at once to places where even masons and\nslaters were afraid to put foot on; yet I saw, in the interim, that she\nlooked on me with a prouder eye\u2014knowing herself the helpmate of one that\nhad courageously risked his neck, and every bone in his skin, in the\ncause of humanity. I saw this as plain as a pikestaff, as, with one of\nher kindest looks, she insisted on my putting on a better happing to\nscreen me from the cold, and on my taking something comfortable inwardly\ntowards the dispelling of bad consequences. So, after half a minute\u2019s\nstand-out, by way of refusal like, I agreed to a cupful of het-pint, as\nI thought it would be a thing Mungo Glen might never have had the good\nfortune to have tasted, and as it might operate by way of a cordial on\nthe gallant Benjie, who kept aye smally and in a dwining way. No sooner\nsaid than done, and off Nanse brushed in a couple of hurries to make the\nhet-pint.\n\nAfter the small beer was put into the pan to boil, we found, to our\ngreat mortification, that there was no eggs in the house, and Benjie was\nsent out with a candle to the hen-house, to see if any of the hens had\nlaid since gloaming, and fetch what he could get. In the middle of the\nmeantime, I was expatiating to Mungo on what taste it would have, and\nhow he had never seen anything finer than it would be, when in ran\nBenjie, all out of breath, and his face as pale as a dish-clout.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter, Benjie, what\u2019s the matter?\u201d said I to him, rising up\nfrom my chair in a great hurry of a fright. \u201cHas onybody killed ye? or\nis the fire broken out again? or has the French landed? or have ye seen\na ghost? or are\u201d\u2014\n\n\u201cEh, crifty!\u201d cried Benjie, coming till his speech, \u201cthey\u2019re a\u2019 aff\u2014cock\nand hens and a\u2019; there\u2019s naething left but the rotten nest-egg in the\ncorner!\u201d\n\nThis was an awful dispensation. In the midst of the desolation of the\nfire\u2014such is the depravity of human nature\u2014some ne\u2019er-do-weels had taken\nadvantage of my absence to break open the hen-house door; and our whole\nstock of poultry, the cock along with our seven hens\u2014two of them tappit,\nand one muffled\u2014were carried away bodily, stoop and roop.\n\nOn this subject, howsoever, I shall say no more, but merely observe in\nconclusion, that, as to our het-pint, we were obliged to make the best\nof a bad bargain, making up with whisky what it wanted in eggs; though\nour banquet could not be called altogether a merry one, the joys of our\nescape from the horrors of the fire being damped, as it were by a wet\nblanket, on account of the nefarious pillaging of our hen-house.\n\n\n\n\n ROSE JAMIESON.\n\n I looked on thy death-cold face, my lassie,\u2014\n I looked on thy death-cold face;\n Thou seemed a lily new cut i\u2019 the bud,\n And fading at its place.\n\n Thy lips were ruddy and calm, my lassie,\u2014\n Thy lips were ruddy and calm;\n But gane was the holy breath o\u2019 heaven,\n To sing the evening psalm.\u2014_Allan Cunningham._\n\n\nAndrew Jamieson was a thorough-paced Cameronian. He held hats in\nabomination, as they savoured of Erastianism; abhorred boots, because\nthe troopers of 1685 wore them while galloping over the wilds of\nDumfriesshire in quest of the persecuted remnant; testified against the\nuse of \u201cfanners\u201d in the process of separating the chaff from the wheat,\nas a tacit renunciation of the doctrine of a superintending Providence.\nHe judged of the excellences or defects of a sermon by its length; and\non that of prayer by the colloquial familiarity which the clergyman held\nwith the Deity; pronounced on his orthodoxy by the complexion of his\ntext; and lifted up his voice against gowns, bands, and white\npocket-handkerchiefs, as frippery belonging to the scarlet lady.\nAcademical honours were his loathing, as he knew that, like plenary\nindulgences, they are, and were, to be had for money; nor would his\nprejudice allow him to distinguish between the man who received a\nD.D.-ship as the honourable reward of a life devoted to sacred\nliterature, and him who carried it by lodging a professor\u2019s wife and\ndaughter during the race week.\n\nSermons in MS., though they had been the composition of a Chalmers, and\nread with the classic elocution of a Thomson, appeared to him as\nsounding brass and a tinkling cymbal; or, in his own vernacular phrase,\n\u201cin at the tae lug, and out at the tither.\u201d \u2019Twas the pride of his heart\nto travel twenty or thirty miles on foot to hear a favourite preacher;\nor to attend sacramental occasions in the air, in unfrequented\ndistricts, in imitation of the heroes of the covenant, who scorned to\nsquare their creed to the mandates of a tyrannical government; and I\nverily believe that a slight touch of persecution would have added to\nhis enjoyments in this sublunary sphere; but this, as he frequently\nhinted, was too great a privilege to hope for from a government \u201cneither\ncold nor hot.\u201d\n\nAndrew was a small farmer in the uplands of Nithsdale, had been prudent\nto a proverb in worldly matters, and consequently was rich, not only in\nhis hopes of futurity, but in the more tangible currency of this sinful\nworld. Frugality had been one of his most prominent characteristics; and\nwhile many less wealthy neighbours sported broad cloth at fairs and\npreachings, according to his inimitable countryman\u2014\n\n His garb was gude gray hodden,\u2014\n His bonnet was a broad one;\n\nwhich garb, and which bonnet, had been familiar to the frequenters of\n\u201ctent preachings\u201d for the greater part of forty years. Such was the\nfather of Rose Jamieson, the beautiful, the meek, the modest Rose\nJamieson, whose fame extended for many a mile round her father\u2019s\ndwelling; and whose fortune perhaps lent her an additional charm in the\neyes of the less worthy of her suitors. Beautiful women have been so\noften described by master-spirits, that it would be presumptuous in me\nto attempt it. I entreat the reader, therefore, to place before his\nmind\u2019s eye Milton\u2019s Eve, or Thomson\u2019s Lavinia, or Campbell\u2019s Gertrude,\nor some of the still more glorious creations of Scott or Shakspeare;\n\u2019twill serve my purpose a thousand times better, and save me a world of\ntrouble. Having thus briefly disposed of her bodily and mental\nattractions, it is needless to add that she was sought in marriage by\nthe flower of the peasantry, and even by many above that rank in life,\nbut shrunk from their society, as the sensitive plant shrinks from the\nhuman touch, or the sunflower when its idol withdraws to his ocean bed.\n\nHer pursuits were of an intellectual nature. She loved literature\nimmensely; and though her parent was sufficiently rigid and unbending in\ngeneral, relative to what he designated the \u201cvanities,\u201d yet he gladly\nsupplied her with the means of gratifying her taste for books, and even\ncondescended at intervals to direct her in the choice of their \u201cmute\nfriends;\u201d but his selections generally consisted of those tremendous\nfolios of divinity, both doctrinal and controversial, which even yet may\nbe seen on the shelves of our more unsophisticated peasantry; and her\nmasculine mind was not slow in making herself mistress of their\nvoluminous contents.\n\nBy a careful perusal, however, of the immaculate Volume which the great\nFounder of Christianity left as a guide to His followers, she perceived\nthat her father\u2019s favourite authors did not always resemble their Divine\nMaster in the milder virtues\u2014such as charity, which thinketh no evil;\nbrotherly kindness, which is ever and anon ready to bear with an erring\nbeing; and that humility of spirit which is ever ready to esteem another\nbetter than one\u2019s self. As her mind got emancipated from the thraldom of\nthe austere dogmas which had been inculcated on it from infancy, she saw\na very great deal to admire, nay, to love, in the doctrines of those\nvery persons whom her father had branded with the name of \u201cprelatists\u201d\nand \u201cmalignants;\u201d and hence she began to examine more closely into the\nmerits of the controversy which raged with so much violence between\npersons worshipping the same God, through the mediation of the same\nRedeemer.\n\nThe result was, that she saw much to praise and much to blame on both\nsides, and she endeavoured to cover the failings of either party with\nthe mantle of Christian love. That many of the Episcopalian clergy of\nthat unhappy period, when the lieges were forced to attend the parish\nchurch at the point of the bayonet, disgraced their sacred profession,\nand brought obloquy on the holy name by which they were called, can\nneither be denied nor disputed. That some of them acted like\nincarnations of the devil, will not be controverted even in our own\ntimes, when truth, like the meridian sun, has dissipated the clouds of\nerror and prejudice; but it is equally true, that there were men among\nthem who adorned their profession by a walk and conversation becoming\nthe Gospel, and who lamented in secret the evils which their\ncircumscribed influence could not avert. Who does not revere the memory\nof the great and good Leighton, whose philanthropy extended to all\nmankind\u2014whose whole existence was a living commentary on the great\ndoctrine which was ever on his lips\u2014namely, that the Founder of\nChristianity came to proclaim \u201cpeace on earth, good-will to men?\u201d After\nthe Revolution, when Presbyterianism again unfurled her banners to the\nmountain-breezes of our country\u2014banners which, alas! had been wofully\ntrampled under foot, and in defending which the best blood in Scotland\nhad been poured out like water\u2014the son of one of the ejected curates\nsettled in the parish of \u2014\u2014 as a farmer, retaining, however, the\nreligious principles in which he had been educated, and which were now\ndoubly dear to him in the hour of his church\u2019s adversity.\n\nLike his father, he was a Christian, not only in theory, but in\npractice; his faith was evinced, not by vague declamation, not by\nultra-sanctimoniousness, but by its genuine fruits\u2014namely, good works.\n\nSon succeeded sire in the same district and the same principles; and it\nseemed that a peculiar blessing had descended on the whole race; as\nwhatever things were lovely, or of good report, these things they did;\nand the promise to the meek was fulfilled them, for they literally\n\u201cinherited the earth.\u201d\n\nTheir flocks and herds were numerous; their corn and pasture fields\nample;\u2014they enlarged their borders, and, at the time this sketch\ncommences, they mingled with the aristocracy of the county.\n\nThe youngest son of a branch of this family had studied at the\nUniversity of Oxford, with a view to the Church of which his family had\nbeen such distinguished members. He was a youth not only of ardent\npiety, but of intense application; he fearlessly grappled with the most\nabstruse subjects; he divested philosophy of its jargon, and divinity of\nits verbosity; and nothing was so dear to his heart as when he\ndiscovered truth like a diamond amidst the heaps of rubbish which had\nbeen accumulating for ages.\n\nBut, alas! like the gentle Kirke White, while his mind was expanding and\nluxuriating amid the treasures of Greece and Rome, and the still more\nsacred stores of Palestine, his body was declining with corresponding\nrapidity; therefore, with attenuated frame and depressed spirits, he\nsought once more his native vale, to inhale health with its invigorating\nbreezes.\n\nSecluded from the great world, and debarred from pursuing his favourite\nstudies, he sought the society of Rose Jamieson as an antidote to that\n_ennui_ which will inevitably obtrude itself on the mind amid the\nsolitudes of a thinly peopled country. The great poet of nature has told\nus that the recluse may find\u2014\n\n Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,\n Sermons in stones, and good in everything.\n\nAnd I have no doubt that the amiable and interesting student would have\nbeen sufficiently charmed with the beauties of external nature, and\ninstructed by her eloquence, had there not been \u201cmetal more attractive\u201d\nin the beautiful being who shared his walks and his friendship.\n\nThe lovely Rose Jamieson became his ministering angel; her smile chased\naway the languor that brooded over his intelligent countenance; her\nsweet voice quickened his sluggish pulse, and made his heart thrill with\nan indescribable joy\u2014a heretofore unknown rapture; her sunny glances\ndiffused life, light, and gladness through his whole frame.\n\n The golden hours on angel wing\n\nflew over them; the summer day became too short for them;\ntheir walks became Eden, and their day-dreams Elysium; they\nloved\u2014fervently\u2014mutually.\n\nSoon as morning gleamed on the mountains, the fond pair were to be seen\nbrushing the dew from the clover, by the banks of the romantic Nith, or\nclimbing the daisied uplands with elastic steps and buoyant hearts\u2014for\nthe mountain air had already renovated the youth\u2019s enfeebled frame, and\nhope had animated his spirits, and given vivacity to his conversation.\nThey expatiated on the beauty and sublimity of the scenery around\nthem\u2014on the power and goodness of the Deity, displayed alike in the\ncreation of the sun in the firmament, and the production of the myriads\nof wild-flowers which enamelled the green sward beneath their feet. The\nrushing of the mighty river to a still mightier ocean, and the diamond\ndewdrop hid in the petal of the half-opened rose; the wide-spreading and\nvenerable oak of a century, and the lowly gowan of yesterday, afforded\ninexhaustible themes for discussion; and the conclusion which invariably\nforced itself on their attention, was that of the pious Addison\u2014\n\n In Reason\u2019s ear they all rejoice,\n And utter forth a glorious voice;\n For ever singing, as they shine,\n \u201cThe hand that made us is divine.\u201d\n\nThe summer months glided over the youthful pair imperceptibly; but with\nreturning health, imperative duty impelled the enamoured scholar to\nresume his studies; to resign the delicious society of her he loved for\nthe musty tome, the midnight lamp, and the emulation approaching\nhostility, within the time-hallowed walls of Oxford. Already had his\ntrunks been packed, the day of his departure fixed, and his adieus\nuttered\u2014all but _one_.\n\nThey met for this purpose one Sabbath evening in a sequestered glen; the\nlarch and laburnum formed a rude arbour over them, and a nameless\nstreamlet murmured at their feet. The stock-doves uttered mournful\ncadences, and the plovers over the neighbouring heath sent forth ominous\nwailings. The early autumnal breeze moaned through the thick foliage,\nand the rustle of the overhanging leaves gave a dreary response. \u2019Twas a\nsad hour; they vowed eternal fidelity\u2014mingled their tears\u2014exchanged\nBibles\u2014and parted\u2014he to the crowded haunts of science, she to the\nsolitude of her own little apartment, to brood over the waking dreams of\nbliss which she had so lately experienced. On opening the little Bible\nwhich she had received from the hands of her lover, she found the\nfollowing text written on the fly-leaf, in a tremulous hand:\u2014\u201cThou shalt\nnot forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths,\u201d and\nshe could trace, moreover, certain globular stains, the cause of which\nwas not ill to define. \u201cYes!\u201d she exclaimed, while the tears started\nfrom her large blue eyes, \u201cI will perform all I have vowed to thee, to\nthe very letter. I will love thee as woman never loved\u2014in sorrow and in\nsickness, in poverty and in exile\u2014nay, in death itself I will love thee;\nneither shall the influence of wealth, rank, talent, manly beauty, nor\nshall the authority, which preponderates more than all these together,\neven that of my only parent, ever alienate my affections from thee, thou\nchosen of my heart!\u201d\n\nAt this moment the door was opened, and her father stood before her. A\nharsh expression pervaded his rigid countenance; there was a stern\ninflexibility in his eye, and his lip quivered with emotion; he held his\nstaff with a convulsive grasp, and his whole frame trembled with\nconflicting passions.\n\n\u201cDaughter,\u201d said he, in a tremulous and hollow voice, \u201cdaughter, I had\nindeed suspected that the corbie was attempting to gain the dove\u2019s\nnest\u2014that the descendant of the malignant, with malicious wile, was\nendeavouring to secure an interest in thine affections, and bitterly do\nI rue that I did not put a stop to it sooner. But little did I think\nthat thou, the child of my love, the only daughter of thy sainted\nmother, whom I have cherished like the apple of mine eye, wouldst have\nso far forgotten thy duty as to vow love and obedience to a scion of an\nabjured prelatical stock, against whom thy father and thy father\u2019s\nfathers have lifted up their testimony, since the glorious carved work\nof the sanctuary has been defaced by their unhallowed hands. Did they\nnot shed the blood of the saints in torrents? Were they not butchered in\nthe face of the sun, and in cold blood? And did not their cries\nenter\u2014but my blood curdles to enumerate the half of their enormities,\nand I shall therefore refrain from adverting to branding, mutilation,\nfine, imprisonment, exile, and death. Daughter,\u201d said he, in a\nsepulchral voice, \u201cthou must break off all intercourse and connection\nwith this young man instantly; between us there is an impassable gulf.\nAnd if thou perseverest in thine ill-starred choice; if thou art\ndisobedient to thy hoary-headed father; if thou cherish his image in thy\nbosom, or even at some future period, when I am gathered to my fathers,\nbecome his wife, I shall bequeath thee my malison for thy dowry, and my\nban for thine inheritance.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he flung himself out of the chamber in a paroxysm of rage.\nHis beauteous daughter, meanwhile, had become inanimate on the couch.\nThe usual remedies in these cases were promptly resorted to; and after a\nshort interval, she opened her eyes, but it was only to gaze on vacancy.\nThe \u201csilver cord was loosed, and the golden bow was broken.\u201d Her reason\nhad fled, and never returned. In one month she was where the wicked\ncease from troubling, and where the weary are at rest. Her father,\nthough he deemed he had only done an imperative duty, could not\nwithstand the shock. Nature sunk beneath the unlooked-for calamity; he\nmourned, and he _would not_ be comforted. In a few weeks he breathed his\nlast; and another tenant was added to the house appointed for all\nliving.\n\nBut who may paint the misery of the unhappy youth when he learnt the\nharrowing intelligence? Sorrow is sacred, and we shall not enter into\nits detail. Suffice it to say, that he gave up his studies, returned to\nhis native vale with a broken heart; and in the words of his celebrated\ncountryman (who no doubt had the pair in his mind\u2019s eye when he penned\nthe touchingly simple ballad), he is reported to have said\u2014\n\n Low there thou lies, my lassie,\n Low there thou lies;\n A bonnier form ne\u2019er went to the yird,\n Nor frae it will arise!\n\n There\u2019s nought but dust now mine, lassie,\n There\u2019s nought but dust now mine;\n My soul\u2019s with thee in the cauld, cauld grave,\n And why should I stay behin\u2019?\n\n\n\n\n A NIGHT AT THE HERRING FISHING.\n\n BY HUGH MILLER.\n\n\nIn the latter end of August 1819, I went out to the fishing then\nprosecuted on Guilliam in a Cromarty boat. The evening was remarkably\npleasant. A low breeze from the west scarcely ruffled the surface of the\nfrith, which was varied in every direction by unequal stripes and\npatches of a dead calmness. The bay of Cromarty, burnished by the rays\nof the declining sun until it glowed like a sheet of molten fire, lay\nbehind, winding in all its beauty beneath purple hills and jutting\nheadlands; while before stretched the wide extent of the Moray Frith,\nspeckled with fleets of boats which had lately left their several ports,\nand were now all sailing in one direction. The point to which they were\nbound was the bank of Guilliam, which, seen from betwixt the Sutors,\nseemed to verge on the faint blue line of the horizon; and the fleets\nwhich had already arrived on it had, to the naked eye, the appearance of\na little rough-edged cloud resting on the water. As we advanced, this\ncloud of boats grew larger and darker; and soon after sunset, when the\nbank was scarcely a mile distant, it assumed the appearance of a thick\nleafless wood covering a low brown island.\n\nThe tide, before we left the shore, had risen high on the beach, and was\nnow beginning to recede. Aware of this, we lowered sail several hundred\nyards to the south of the fishing ground; and after determining the\npoint from whence the course of the current would drift us direct over\nthe bank, we took down the mast, cleared the hinder part of the boat,\nand began to cast out the nets. Before the Inlaw appeared in the line of\nthe Gaelic Chapel (the landmark by which the southernmost extremity of\nGuilliam is ascertained), the whole drift was thrown overboard and made\nfast to the swing. Night came on. The sky assumed a dead and leaden hue.\nA low dull mist roughened the outline of the distant hills, and in some\nplaces blotted them out from the landscape. The faint breeze that had\nhitherto scarcely been felt now roughened the water, which was of a dark\nblue colour, approaching to black. The sounds which predominated were in\nunison with the scene. The almost measured dash of the waves against the\nsides of the boat and the faint rustle of the breeze were incessant;\nwhile the low dull moan of the surf breaking on the distant beach, and\nthe short sudden cry of an aquatic fowl of the diving species,\noccasionally mingled with the sweet though rather monotonous notes of a\nGaelic song. \u201cIt\u2019s ane o\u2019 the Gairloch fishermen,\u201d said our skipper;\n\u201cpuir folk, they\u2019re aye singin\u2019 an\u2019 thinkin\u2019 o\u2019 the Hielands.\u201d\n\nOur boat, as the tides were not powerful, drifted slowly over the bank.\nThe buoys stretched out from the bows in an unbroken line. There was no\nsign of fish, and the boatmen, after spreading the sail over the beams,\nlaid themselves down on it. The scene was at the time so new to me, and,\nthough of a somewhat melancholy cast, so pleasing, that I stayed up. A\nsingular appearance attracted my notice. \u201cHow,\u201d said I to one of the\nboatmen, who a moment before had made me an offer of his greatcoat, \u201chow\ndo you account for that calm silvery spot on the water, which moves at\nsuch a rate in the line of our drift?\u201d He started up. A moment after he\ncalled on the others to rise, and then replied, \u201cThat moving speck of\ncalm water covers a shoal of herrings. If it advances a hundred yards\nfarther in that direction, we shall have some employment for you.\u201d This\npiece of information made me regard the little patch, which, from the\nlight it caught, and the blackness of the surrounding water, seemed a\nbright opening in a dark sky, with considerable interest. It moved\nonward with increased velocity. It came in contact with the line of the\ndrift, and three of the buoys immediately sunk. A few minutes were\nsuffered to elapse, and we then commenced hauling. The two strongest of\nthe crew, as is usual, were stationed at the cork, the two others at the\nground baulk. My assistance, which I readily tendered, was pronounced\nunnecessary, so I hung over the gunwale watching the nets as they\napproached the side of the boat. The three first, from the phosphoric\nlight of the water, appeared as if bursting into flames of a pale green\ncolour. The fourth was still brighter, and glittered through the waves\nwhile it was yet several fathoms away, reminding me of an intensely\nbright sheet of the aurora borealis. As it approached the side, the pale\ngreen of the phosphoric matter appeared as if mingled with large flakes\nof snow. It contained a body of fish. \u201cA white horse! a white horse!\u201d\nexclaimed one of the men at the cork baulk; \u201clend us a haul.\u201d I\nimmediately sprung aft, laid hold on the rope, and commenced hauling. In\nsomewhat less than half an hour we had all the nets on board, and rather\nmore than twelve barrels of herrings.\n\nThe night had now become so dark, that we could scarcely discern the\nboats which lay within gunshot of our own; and we had no means of\nascertaining the position of the bank except by sounding. The lead was\ncast, and soon after the nets shot a second time. The skipper\u2019s bottle\nwas next produced, and a dram of whisky sent round in a tin measure\ncontaining nearly a gill. We then folded down the sail, which had been\nrolled up to make way for the herrings, and were soon fast asleep.\n\nTen years have elapsed since I laid myself down on this couch, and I was\nnot then so accustomed to a rough bed as I am now, when I can look back\non my wanderings as a journeyman mason over a considerable part of both\nthe Lowlands and Highlands of Scotland. About midnight I awoke quite\nchill, and all over sore with the hard beams and sharp rivets of the\nboat. Well, thought I, this is the tax I pay for my curiosity. I rose\nand crept softly over the sail to the bows, where I stood, and where, in\nthe singular beauty of the scene, which was of a character as different\nfrom that I had lately witnessed as is possible to conceive, I soon lost\nall sense of every feeling that was not pleasure. The breeze had died\ninto a perfect calm. The heavens were glowing with stars, and the sea,\nfrom the smoothness of the surface, appeared a second sky, as bright and\nstarry as the other, but with this difference, that all its stars\nappeared comets. There seemed no line of division at the horizon, which\nrendered the allusion more striking. The distant hills appeared a chain\nof dark thundery clouds sleeping in the heavens. Tn short, the scene was\none of the strangest I ever witnessed; and the thoughts and imaginations\nwhich it suggested were of a character as singular. I looked at the boat\nas it appeared in the dim light of midnight, a dark irregularly-shaped\nmass; I gazed on the sky of stars above, and the sky of comets below,\nand imagined myself in the centre of space, far removed from the earth\nand every other world\u2014the solitary inhabitant of a planetary fragment.\nThis allusion, too romantic to be lasting, was dissipated by an incident\nwhich convinced me that I had not yet left the world. A crew of south\nshore fishermen, either by accident or design, had shot their nets right\nacross those of another boat, and, in disentangling them, a quarrel\nensued. Our boat lay more than half a mile from the scene of contention,\nbut I could hear, without being particularly attentive, that on the one\nside there were terrible threats of violence, immediate and bloody; and\non the other, threats of the still more terrible pains and penalties of\nthe law. In a few minutes, however, the entangled nets were freed, and\nthe roar of altercation gradually sunk into a silence as dead as that\nwhich had preceded it.\n\nAn hour before sunrise, I was somewhat disheartened to find the view on\nevery side bounded by a dense low bank of fog, which hung over the\nwater, while the central firmament remained blue and cloudless. The\nneighbouring boats appeared through the mist huge misshapen things,\nmanned by giants. We commenced hauling, and found in one of the nets a\nsmall rock-cod and a half-starved whiting, which proved the whole of our\ndraught. I was informed by the fishermen, that even when the shoal is\nthickest on the Guilliam, so close does it keep by the bank, that not a\nsolitary herring is to be caught a gunshot from the edge on either side.\n\nWe rowed up to the other boats, few of whom had been more successful in\ntheir last haul than ourselves, and none equally so in their first. The\nmist prevented us from ascertaining, by known landmarks, the position of\nthe bank, which we at length discovered in a manner that displayed much\nof the peculiar art of the fisherman. The depth of the water, and the\nnature of the bottom, showed us that it lay to the south. A faint\ntremulous heave of the sea, which was still calm, was the only remaining\nvestige of the gale which had blown from the west in the early part of\nthe night, and this heave, together with the current, which at this\nstage of the flood runs in a southwestern direction, served as our\ncompass. We next premised how far our boat had drifted down the frith\nwith the ebb-tide, and how far she had been carried back again by the\nflood. We then turned her bows in the line of the current, and in rather\nless than half an hour were, as the lead informed us, on the eastern\nextremity of Guilliam, where we shot our nets for the third time.\n\nSoon after sunrise the mist began to dissipate, and the surface of the\nwater to appear for miles around roughened as if by a smart breeze,\nthough there was not the slightest breath of wind at the time. \u201cHow do\nyou account for that appearance?\u201d said I to one of the fishermen. \u201cAh,\nlad, that is by no means so favourable a token as the one you asked me\nto explain last night. I had as lief see the _Bhodry-more_.\u201d \u201cWhy, what\ndoes it betoken? and what is the _Bhodry-more_?\u201d \u201cIt betokens that the\nshoal have spawned, and will shortly leave the frith; for when the fish\nare sick and weighty they never rise to the surface in that way. But\nhave you never heard of the _Bhodry-more_?\u201d I replied in the negative.\n\u201cWell, but you shall.\u201d \u201cNay,\u201d said another of the crew, \u201cleave that for\nour return; do you not see the herrings playing by thousands round our\nnets, and not one of the buoys sinking in the water? There is not a\nsingle fish swimming so low as the upper baulks of our drift. Shall we\nnot shorten the buoy-ropes, and take off the sinkers?\u201d This did not meet\nthe approbation of the others, one of whom took up a stone, and flung it\nin the middle of the shoal. The fish immediately disappeared from the\nsurface for several fathoms round. \u201cAh, there they go!\u201d he exclaimed;\n\u201cif they go but low enough; four years ago I startled thirty barrels of\nlight fish into my drift just by throwing a stone among them.\u201d\n\nThe whole frith at this time, so far as the eye could reach, appeared\ncrowded with herrings; and its surface was so broken by them as to\nremind one of the pool of a waterfall. They leaped by millions a few\ninches into the air, and sunk with a hollow plumping noise, somewhat\nresembling the dull rippling sound of a sudden breeze; while to the eye\nthere was a continual twinkling, which, while it mocked every effort\nthat attempted to examine in detail, showed to the less curious glance\nlike a blue robe sprinkled with silver. But it is not by such\ncomparisons that so singular a scene is to be described so as to be\nfelt. It was one of those which, through the living myriads of creation,\ntestify of the infinite Creator.\n\nAbout noon we hauled for the third and last time, and found nearly eight\nbarrels of fish. I observed when hauling that the natural heat of the\nherring is scarcely less than that of quadrupeds or birds; that when\nalive its sides are shaded by a beautiful crimson colour which it loses\nwhen dead; and that when newly brought out of the water, it utters a\nsharp faint cry somewhat resembling that of a mouse. We had now twenty\nbarrels on board. The _easterly har_, a sea-breeze so called by\nfishermen, which in the Moray Frith, during the summer months, and first\nmonth of autumn, commonly comes on after ten o\u2019clock A.M., and fails at\nfour o\u2019clock P.M., had now set in. We hoisted our mast and sail, and\nwere soon scudding right before it.\n\nThe story of the _Bhodry-more_, which I demanded of the skipper as soon\nas we had trimmed our sail, proved interesting in no common degree, and\nwas linked with a great many others. The _Bhodry-more_[24] is an active,\nmischievous fish of the whale species, which has been known to attack\nand even founder boats. About eight years ago, a very large one passed\nthe town of Cromarty through the middle of the bay, and was seen by many\nof the townsfolks leaping out of the water in the manner of a salmon,\nfully to the height of a boat\u2019s mast. It appeared about thirty feet in\nlength. This animal may almost be regarded as the mermaid of modern\ntimes: for the fishermen deem it to have fully as much of the demon as\nof the fish. There have been instances of its pursuing a boat under sail\nfor many miles, and even of its leaping over it from side to side. It\nappears, however, that its habits and appetites are unlike those of the\nshark; and that the annoyance which it gives the fisherman is out of no\ndesire of making him its prey, but from its predilection for amusement.\nIt seldom meddles with a boat when at anchor, but pursues one under\nsail, as a kitten would a rolling ball of yarn. The large physalus whale\nis comparatively a dull, sluggish animal; occasionally, however, it\nevinces a partiality for the amusements of the _Bhodry-more_. Our\nskipper said, that when on the Caithness coast, a few years before, an\nenormous fish of the species kept direct in the wake of his boat for\nmore than a mile, frequently rising so near the stern as to be within\nreach of the boat-hook. He described the expression of its large goggle\neyes as at once frightful and amusing; and so graphic was his narrative\nthat I could almost paint the animal stretching out for more than sixty\nfeet behind the boat, with his black marble-looking skin and cliff-like\nfins. He at length grew tired of its gambols, and with a sharp fragment\nof rock struck it between the eyes. It sunk with a sudden plunge, and\ndid not rise for ten minutes after, when it appeared a full mile\na-stern. This narrative was but the first of I no not know how many, of\na similar cast, which presented to my imagination the _Bhodry-more_\nwhale and hun-fish in every possible point of view. The latter, a\nvoracious formidable animal of the shark species, frequently makes great\nhavoc among the tackle with which cod and haddock are caught. Like the\nshark, it throws itself on its back when in the act of seizing its prey.\nThe fishermen frequently see it lying motionless, its white belly\nglittering through the water, a few fathoms from the boat\u2019s side,\nemployed in stripping off every fish from their hooks as the line is\ndrawn over it. This formidable animal is from six to ten feet in length,\nand formed like the common shark.\n\nFootnote 24:\n\n Properly, perhaps, the musculous whale.\n\nOne of the boatmen\u2019s stories, though somewhat in the Munchausen style, I\nshall take the liberty of relating. Two Cromarty men, many years ago,\nwere employed on a fine calm day in angling for coal-fish and rock-cod,\nwith rods and hand-lines. Their little skiff rode to a large oblong\nstone, which served for an anchor, nearly opposite a rocky spire termed\nthe chapel, three miles south of Shandwick. Suddenly the stone was\nraised from the bottom with a jerk, and the boat began to move. \u201cWhat\ncan this mean!\u201d exclaimed the elder of the men, pulling in his rod, \u201cwe\nhave surely broken loose; but who could have thought that there ran such\na current here!\u201d The other, a young daring fellow, John Clark by name,\nremarked in reply, that the apparent course of the skiff was directly\ncontrary to that of the current. The motion, which was at first gentle,\nincreased to a frightful velocity; the rope a-head was straitened until\nthe very stem cracked; and the sea rose upon either bows into a furrow\nthat nearly overtopped the gunwale. \u201cOld man,\u201d said the young fellow,\n\u201cdidst thou ever see the like o\u2019 that!\u201d \u201cGuid save us, boy,\u201d said the\nother; \u201ccut, cut the swing.\u201d \u201cNa, na, bide a wee first, I manna skaith\nthe rape: didst thou ever see the like o\u2019 that!\u201d\n\nIn a few minutes, according to the story, they were dragged in this\nmanner nearly two miles, when the motion ceased as suddenly as it had\nbegun, and the skiff rode to the swing as before.\n\n\n\n\n THE TWIN SISTERS.\n\n BY ALEXANDER BALFOUR.\n\n One of these men is genius to the other;\n And so, of these which is the natural man,\n And which the spirit? Who decyphers them?\n _Shakspeare._\n\n\nEmma and Emily Graham were twin daughters of a respectable farmer and\ncattle-dealer in Perthshire. The girls bore such a striking resemblance\nto each other, that their mother found it necessary to clothe them in\ndifferent colours, as the only method by which they could be\ndistinguished. As they grew up, their similarity became, if possible,\nmore perfect; the colour of their eyes and hair had no shade of\ndifference; and, indeed, every feature of their faces, their form and\nstature, were so exactly alike, that the same distinction of different\ndresses continued necessary. They had a brother, Edward, about fifteen\nmonths younger, who bore as great a likeness to both as they did to each\nother. When the girls arrived at nine or ten years of age, they gave\npromise of being rather above the ordinary stature of their sex, with a\nvery considerable share of personal beauty. But it was only in externals\nthat the resemblance was complete; for, although both had excellent\ndispositions, with a large share of good nature, their minds were in\nmost respects dissimilar.\n\nEmma was sedate and modest, even to bashfulness; while Emily was so free\nand lively, that many thought her forward, and her lightheartedness akin\nto levity. Edward\u2019s mind resembled that of his younger sister as closely\nas his personal appearance. She was all mirth and frolic, and, by\nchanging clothes with her sister, amused, perplexed, and sometimes\nfretted her parents; in all which Edward delighted to bear a part. At\nschool there was an ample field for these sportive tricks; and the\nteacher himself was often sadly teased by their playful metamorphoses.\n\nWhen the sisters completed their seventeenth year, they had more the\nappearance of grown women than is common at that age; and their\nresemblance still continued perfect. Their voices, although slightly\nmasculine, were pleasant and musical; and both had the same tone and\nsound, pitched to the same key. The dispositions which they had\nexhibited in childhood still seemed to \u201cgrow with their growth, and\nstrengthen with their strength.\u201d In one thing they, however, agreed,\nwhich was, that whenever they appeared in public, they dressed perfectly\nalike, and were frequently amused and delighted with the mistakes\nproduced by the uniformity. To distinguish their clothes, every article\nbelonging to Emma was marked Em. G., and those of Emily with E. G. only.\n\nAs Edward grew up, his striking likeness to his sisters continued; even\ntheir difference of voice could be distinguished only by a fine and\ndelicate ear; and with this close resemblance he was so highly pleased,\nthat he used every means by which it could be preserved. To add to the\nperplexity of their friends, Emma would assume more than her usual\nvivacity, while Emily would put herself under some restraint; although\nthe one was apt to become suddenly grave, and the other relax into\nlightheartedness. But they were now divided; for Emma went to reside\nwith an aunt, at fifty miles\u2019 distance, and there she continued for a\nconsiderable time.\n\nBoth the girls had been courted occasionally by the young men of their\nacquaintance; but their hearts had never felt a reciprocal passion.\nThere was, in particular, an old widower, Francis Meldrum, who had\nbecome enamoured of Emily; and, as he was rich, her parents anxiously\nwished to promote the match. But their daughter shrunk from it with the\nmost decided aversion: no repulse, however, could release her from the\nimportunity of his addresses, as he was countenanced and encouraged by\nher parents.\n\nDuring the summer, their father was in the practice of going into\nEngland with a drove of cattle, sometimes not returning till the\napproach of harvest. He now departed on his usual excursion; and, soon\nafter, the mother was called away to visit her sick grandmother, from\nwhom the family had considerable expectations. The farm and house were\nthus left under the charge of Edward and Emily, both willing to do their\nduty, but both thoughtless, and delighting in frolic; which, now that\nthey were relieved from the surveillance and remonstrances of the sedate\nEmma, they had a better opportunity of indulging.\n\nThere was a fair in Perth, only a few miles distant, and Emily requested\nher brother to accompany her thither, that they might have at least one\nday of pleasure. Her proposal was most readily acceded to by Edward; and\nthey departed together. A company of military, part of the \u2014\u2014 regiment,\nwere quartered in Perth, under the command of Captain Munro, who had\nreceived orders to recruit during his stay. The fair was a good\nopportunity for that purpose, and the Captain, with his troop, paraded\nthe streets in their best array. From a window in the inn where they\nwere dining, Edward and his sister saw them pass along the street. Emily\nhad never known what it was to love; but she had a susceptible heart.\nHer hour was now come, and her lively fancy was enraptured with the\nfine, martial appearance of the gallant Captain. Little accustomed to\nreflection, she fell in love at first sight; and unpractised in\ndisguising her feelings, although she did not express her thoughts to\nher brother, she was at little pains to conceal the impression made on\nher heart. This he soon perceived, and began to rally her on the\nsubject, when she frankly acknowledged that she thought the officer the\nmost handsome-looking man she had ever seen, expressing an anxious wish\nto know his rank and name. That information was easily obtained by\nEdward, in a casual conversation with the waiter, who said he was from\nthe same quarter with Captain Munro, who was the son and heir of a\nlanded gentleman in Aberdeenshire, was unmarried, and a great favourite\nwith the ladies in town. When the couple reached home, Emily\u2019s head and\nheart both full of the handsome Captain, they had a message from her\nmother, intimating that the old woman was dying, and that she could not\nreturn till she saw the result. There was also a letter from their\nfather, requesting Edward to follow him into England with a supply of\ncattle, as speedily as possible.\n\nCaptain Munro had occupied Emily\u2019s sleeping and waking thoughts; and she\nbegan to wish that an opportunity might occur for her becoming\nacquainted with him. With her characteristic love of frolic, she formed\na plan which promised to facilitate her wishes; and circumstances seemed\nfavourable for its execution, but it required the assistance of her\nbrother for carrying it into effect. It was communicated to Edward; and\nhe, equally rash and imprudent as herself, was prevailed upon to play\nhis part, which was no less than to enlist himself with Captain Munro as\na recruit, and trust to his sister relieving him, according to a scheme\npointed out by her, and which appeared feasible to Edward. In compliance\nwith the plan which they had concerted, Edward, with a servant, left the\nfarm for the cattle. Having put them on the way, and arranged to rejoin\nthe servant, he rode into Perth, and enlisted with the Captain,\nreceiving a shilling of earnest. Promising to come back next morning to\nreceive his bounty, and be attested, Edward mounted his horse, and\npushed forward to England, leaving Emily to settle the business as best\nshe could.\n\nThe day when he had promised to return passed away without any\nappearance of the recruit. Being a fine-looking fellow, the officer was\nreluctant to loose him; therefore, next morning, he despatched a\nserjeant, with a party, to inquire after him. On their arrival at the\nfarm, they found only Emily and the servants. The serjeant had seen\nEdward when he enlisted, and now believed that he saw, in Emily, the\nsame person in disguise; in consequence of which he threatened to carry\nher before his commanding officer; but, preserving her good humour, she\nheld his threats in defiance, and, for his own sake, requested him to\ntake care what he did. Some of the party had remained in the kitchen,\nand there learned from the servants, that Emily sometimes assumed her\nbrother\u2019s dress; and, they had no doubt, had personated her brother, as\na joke on the Captain. Emily now regaled the party with hospitable\ncheer, and, dismissing them in excellent humour, requested the serjeant\nto make her compliments to Captain Munro, trusting that he would take\nbetter care of his next recruit. The serjeant imparted all this to his\nsuperior, together with what the soldiers had heard in the kitchen, from\nwhich the officer was persuaded, that either himself or the serjeant had\nbeen completely hoaxed, and, determined to investigate the matter fully,\nboth in discharge of his duty, and for the gratification of his\ncuriosity, which had been highly excited, he next morning visited the\nfarm, intending to judge for himself. This was just what Emily wished\nand expected. She had therefore taken care to inform herself, in a short\ninterview with her brother, of almost every circumstance which had\npassed between him and the Captain, the relation of which, she trusted,\nwould convince him of her being the recruit. The moment Captain Munro\nlooked at her, he was convinced of her being the identical person he had\nenlisted, although he still had doubts about her sex; while, at the same\ntime, he felt that he had never seen one of his own with features so\nfine and delicate. Although Captain Munro was in every respect a\ngentleman, yet the extraordinary circumstances which had produced this\ninterview, warranted a freedom of manner which, in other cases, he could\nnot have employed, where he was so much a stranger. He therefore now\ninformed Emily, that he was fully convinced of her being the person who\nhad enlisted with him, and also quite satisfied that she now appeared in\nthe habit which belonged to her sex; still, he presumed he had some\nright to inquire her motive for a step so uncommon, and which she\nappeared so early to relinquish.\n\nThis question, although she had anticipated it, brought deep blushes\ninto Emily\u2019s face; and her heart palpitated as she replied, that,\nalthough she now regretted having adopted a measure so incompatible with\nfemale delicacy, she felt it a duty which she owed to herself, to inform\nhim of her inducement, lest it might be attributed to something still\nmore unbecoming. She then went on to state that she had, for a long time\npast, been persecuted with the odious addresses of a widower, old enough\nto be her father, and whom her parents wished her to marry because he\nwas rich; but, although he had been her equal in age, their dispositions\nwere so opposite, that she must have despised him, for he was a miserly,\nstingy, jealous, and contemptible wretch; and she had availed herself of\nthe absence of her parents to adopt a measure which, she was sure,\nwould, on its coming to his knowledge, have the effect of relieving her\nfrom his offensive importunities; and, although she now saw the\nimprudent folly she had committed, her regret would be diminished, if it\nproduced the consequences she so anxiously wished.\n\nThe part she was now acting, and the situation in which she had placed\nherself, in spite of all Emily\u2019s natural forwardness, called forth that\nmodest timidity which still adds to the loveliness of a young and\nbeautiful woman, suffusing her cheeks with crimson, and softening the\nbrightness of her sparkling eye. Altogether, her appearance and\nbehaviour made a powerful impression on the heart of the gallant\nsoldier; and he contrived to protract the interview till the latest\nperiod that good breeding permitted. When Emily offered to return the\nshilling which her brother had received, the Captain refused it, saying,\nwith a smile, that he had not yet renounced his claim on her, but\nreserved it for further investigation, for the discussion of which he\nproposed repeating his visit.\n\nWith self-possession, but becoming modesty, Emily replied, that although\nshe had already overstepped the bounds of female decorum, she was\nneither ignorant of, nor indifferent to, that propriety of conduct which\nher situation required; and would therefore request, that if he was\nagain inclined to visit the farm of Greenbraes, it might be after the\nreturn of her parents. The Captain now left Emily, nearly as much\nfascinated with her as she had been with his first appearance; while the\nrespectful propriety of his behaviour, in a case where some freedom of\nspeech might have been excusable, raised him in her estimation; and she\nflattered herself that he had not seen her with indifference.\n\nThe Captain was now impatient for the return of her parents; as, afraid\nof incurring the displeasure of Emily, he could not venture to visit\nGreenbraes till that time; but he, oftener than once, threw himself in\nthe way by walking in the vicinity, hoping to meet her whom he now found\nit impossible to forget. Emily had seen him sauntering in the fields,\nand rightly conjectured his purpose; but she, actuated, no doubt, partly\nby a little coquetry, had uniformly disappointed him.\n\nHer father now returned from England; and Emily, who had never before\ndisguised her actions, convinced that her parent must soon hear, from\nsome officious friend, what had already made much noise in the place,\nresolved to tell as much of the truth as suited her purpose. She\ntherefore informed her father that Edward, in a frolic, had enlisted;\nbut that she had sent him out of the way, and represented him when the\nCaptain came to claim his recruit, and that officer had laughed heartily\nat the joke.\n\n\u201cAh, Emily! you are a light-hearted, and lighter-headed lassie,\u201d said\nthe fond father. \u201cYou carry things ower far; and I\u2019m fleyed ye\u2019ll tine\nyour ain character, or render it no worth the keeping. What will Francie\nMeldrum say to that business? I\u2019ll think shame to see him.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear father, if naebody\u2019s angry but Francie, I\u2019ll never rue doing\nthat for my brother. Say that _you\u2019re_ no angry, father, and set my\nheart at ease.\u201d And, looking in her father\u2019s face with a timid, but\naffectionate smile, she laid her arm around his neck, pressing her\nglowing lip to his bronzed cheek.\n\n\u201cI am angry, you little flattering gipsey; but promise to gie ower thae\nlight-headed pranks, and I\u2019ll forgive you for this.\u201d\n\nEmily had reason to congratulate herself on this speedy reconciliation\nwith her father, who she saw was in good humour; for, looking from the\nwindow, she saw Francis, the object of her detestation, approaching,\nalthough he had never tormented her during the absence of her parents.\nLeaving her father to receive the unwelcome visitor, Emily secreted\nherself in an adjoining closet, where she could hear every word of the\nconversation, which soon became more agreeable to her than she had\nexpected; for Francis began to speak of her frolic with an asperity\nwhich her father did not think it merited. They came to high words, the\nresult of which was, that the farmer conducted his guest to the door,\nrequesting him never to enter it again till Emily bade him welcome. This\nwas so far beyond Emily\u2019s expectations, that her heart bounded with\ndelight; and, had it not been that she must have betrayed her being a\nlistener, she would have rushed in, and, kneeling to her father, thanked\nhim for the deliverance.\n\nThe fact was, that her father, on his return from England, had stayed in\nPerth to deposit some money with his banker, who insisted on his dining\nwith him, as he was to see a few friends that day. Captain Munro\nhappened to be of the party, and, hearing the farmer\u2019s name and\nresidence, endeavoured to make himself as agreeable as possible, in\nwhich he succeeded admirably. Before parting, he took an opportunity of\nhaving a private conversation with the farmer, relating circumstantially\nwhat the reader is already acquainted with, as far as consisted with his\nown knowledge. He concluded by confessing the impression which Emily had\nmade on him, which all that he had since heard concerning her had\ncontributed to deepen; and that her motive for the frolic which had\ngiven him the pleasure of knowing her was a sufficient apology; and, as\nit was obvious she would never consent to marry the widower, he begged\nthe farmer to sanction his addresses, instead of a man whose age\ncertainly rendered the match very unsuitable. For his own character and\nfamily he referred him to the banker, under whose roof they were,\nrequesting the pleasure of another interview before he left town.\n\nThe honest farmer was rather vexed at the first part of this relation,\nbut the conclusion put him in good humour; and, in a conversation with\nthe banker, he learned that Captain Munro was the son and heir of a\nlanded gentleman in Aberdeenshire, and that the young officer bore a\nhighly respectable character, both as a man and a soldier. The farmer\nand Captain again met, when the former gave the officer his hearty\npermission to address his daughter, adding, that as she had several\ntimes perplexed him with her harmless tricks, of which the Captain had\nseen and felt a specimen, he wished this interview to be kept secret,\nand, when they met at Greenbraes, that they might appear strangers to\neach other. The Captain approved of the suggestion, esteeming it a good\njoke; and they parted, both in high spirits.\n\nEmily was highly delighted with the dismissal of the importunate\nwidower; and, just as she was wondering whether the Captain knew that\nher father had returned, she, one morning, saw him approaching the\nhouse.\n\nAlthough this was by no means a disagreeable discovery, yet, when\ncommanded by her father to join them in the parlour, she entered with a\npalpitating heart, and her cheeks blushing like a half-blown rose.\n\nThe Captain met her with the respectful ease of a gentleman and an old\nacquaintance, when her father, in rather a severe tone, said, \u201cEmily,\nyou informed me of a joke which you played off upon this gentleman, and\ngave me to understand it was all settled and forgotten; but I find that\nis not the case. Captain Munro insists that you received earnest money\nfrom him, which you still retain; and, therefore, he is entitled either\nto your services, or satisfaction for the insult offered to him. What do\nyou say?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen Captain Munro explains what he wants, I shall then know how to\nanswer,\u201d replied Emily.\n\n\u201cThat is easily done, Miss Graham,\u201d replied the Captain. \u201cYou engaged to\nbe a soldier for life, and I claim the fulfilment of your agreement\u2014wish\nyou to follow the drum. In a word, dear Emily, I love you, and wish to\nmake you a soldier\u2019s wife. When I last had the pleasure of seeing you, I\ninformed you that I reserved my claim for further discussion, and\nrequested permission to visit you, which you very prudently declined\ntill your father\u2019s return. He is now present, and I wait your reply. A\nsoldier hates trifling.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy first engagement with you, Captain, was rash, and I repented,\u201d\nreplied Emily. \u201cI am afraid you have imitated my folly, in the present\ndeclaration, which you would probably regret on reflection. I shall take\ntime to deliberate; and, when we both know each other better, if you\ncontinue in the same mind, I shall then be prepared to reply.\u201d\n\nThis response, while it did credit to Emily\u2019s prudence, was such as gave\nthe suitor every reasonable hope of success; as the expression, \u201cwhen we\nknow each other better,\u201d was sufficiently encouraging to induce him to\ncontinue his visits. Love had already done his work with both hearts,\nand in a short time they perfectly understood each other.\n\nEmily\u2019s mother now returned; and, after the necessary preparations, the\nwedding-day was appointed, when the Captain was called to Edinburgh, as\nmember of a court-martial, to be held in the Castle. They had known each\nother but a short time, and both had been so much engrossed with their\nown affairs, that, although the Captain had heard Emma\u2019s name mentioned,\nhe was ignorant of the striking resemblance which she bore to her\nsister. Emily had also continued unacquainted with the Captain\u2019s first\ninterview with her father, till she happened to overhear the latter\nrelating it to her mother, and chuckling over it as a good joke which he\nand the Captain had played off on Emily. Although not displeased at the\nimposition practised on her, she resolved, sooner or later, to pay both\nher father and lover in their own coin; and her fertile invention soon\ncontrived a scheme, in which, if she could engage her sister as a\nconfederate, she trusted to enjoy the pleasure of full retaliation.\n\nA letter had been despatched to Emma, announcing the intended nuptials,\nand requesting her presence, to officiate as bride\u2019s maid on the\noccasion. This message had, however, been crossed on the road by another\nfrom Emma, to the same tune; informing her parents of her intended\nmarriage, two days before that fixed for Emily\u2019s wedding, and requesting\nthe same service of her sister which had been expected from her.\n\nThis _contretemps_ was a disappointment to both; however, a second\nletter arrived from Emma, congratulating Emily on the approaching event,\nand intimating that she and her husband intended doing themselves the\npleasure of being with them in time to witness the ceremony.\n\nThe absence of some important witnesses in the case before the\ncourt-martial had prevented its sitting; and a letter arrived from\nCaptain Munro, intimating, that, however much it vexed him, he found it\nwould be impossible for him to be at Greenbraes sooner than the day\nappointed for their union; and, even then, the hour of his arrival was\nuncertain, but he hoped to be in time for dinner.\n\nEdward arrived from England on the eve of the wedding-day; and Emma,\nwith her husband, in the morning. After the mutual congratulations among\nso many friends, Emily took an early opportunity of communicating her\nintentions, and requesting their assistance; especially as it was the\nlast opportunity she would have of indulging in frolic; as, in a few\nhours, she should be sworn to love, honour, and obey her husband. Edward\nwas highly delighted with the scheme; and Emma\u2019s husband, who loved a\njoke, prevailed on her to comply with her sister\u2019s request, and perform\nher share in the plot, as explained by Emily; and the striking likeness\nof the two sisters being still as strong as ever, rendered success\nalmost certain. As a necessary preliminary, it was agreed that the\nsisters should be dressed exactly alike, in every, the minutest article,\nexcept that Emma should wear a _bandeau_ of artificial rosebuds, by\nwhich she could be at once distinguished from her sister. All this was\ncarried into effect; and, when dressed, the distinction was pointed out\nto their parents, to prevent, as they said, any ridiculous mistake at\nthe approaching ceremony.\n\nThe farmhouse of Greenbraes had, in former times, been the mansion-house\nof the estate, and still had attached to it an extensive and\nold-fashioned garden. The house stood on a rising ground, and had a\ncommanding view of the road by which the bridegroom must approach. Emily\nhad every thing ready; and, when she saw him at some distance, she\njoined her brother, with Emma and her husband, in the garden, where they\nhad been for some time; but, as she passed out, requested her mother to\nconduct Captain Munro to the garden, on his arrival, contriving some\nexcuse for leaving him as he entered, as she wished to she him\nprivately.\n\nThe party had disposed themselves in order, waiting his approach; and,\nwhen they heard the garden-door open, Edward and Emily withdrew,\nsecreting themselves in a thicket of evergreens; and the Captain\nentering, beheld Emma and her husband sauntering most lovingly, at a\nlittle distance before him. They did not seem to observe the bridegroom;\nbut, on turning the corner of a new-clipped yew-hedge, Emma, as if by\naccident, dropped her handkerchief, and the next moment they were out of\nsight. Captain Munro believed at first glance that it was Emily he had\nseen, but still was reluctant to suppose it possible that she would\npermit any other man to use the freedom he had just witnessed; and\nendeavoured to persuade himself that the lady must be a stranger,\ninvited to the wedding. However, the handkerchief seemed a probable clue\nto solve his doubts; he approached, took it up, and found it marked Em.\nG. In no very pleasant mood, he stepped forward a little farther, when\nhe heard a soft whisper, which he knew proceeded from a rustic bower;\nand he was aware that, by a slight circuit, he could discover the\noccupants without being seen. He now saw, as he believed, Emily seated\nin the bower, her head leaning on the shoulder of a handsome-looking\nyoung man, whose arm encircled her waist. Rage and jealousy now took\npossession of the bridegroom\u2019s soul, and he was at first disposed to\nleave the farm, without speaking to any one, but, standing for a few\nminutes in a stupor, he determined to see the face of him for whom he\nhad been so cruelly deceived. He therefore walked up in front of the\nbower, and, with all the calm respect which he could assume, said,\n\u201cMadam, permit me to present your handkerchief, which you dropped in the\nwalk.\u201d\n\n\u201cI thank you, Sir,\u201d replied Emma; \u201cmay I inquire to whom I am indebted\nfor restoring it to its owner?\u201d\n\nThe cool composure with which this question was put, raised the\nindignation of the maddened bridegroom to its highest pitch; and, with a\nglance of the most sovereign contempt which he could assume, he replied,\n\u201cTo one, madam, who despises you from his soul, and thanks God for his\ntimely discovery of your infamy!\u201d\n\nHer husband now started to his feet, and said, \u201cSir, you bear the\ninsignia, although you want the manners of a gentleman. But were you of\nthe blood-royal, you should not insult my wife with impunity.\u201d\n\nCaptain Munro started at the word, and repeated, \u201cWife! did you say,\nSir? Permit me to ask one question, to which your candid reply will\noblige me. How long has that woman been your wife?\u201d\n\n\u201cFor these two days.\u201d\n\n\u201cEnough. Farewell for ever! infamous woman!\u201d\n\nEdward now sprung from the thicket, and standing right before the\nCaptain, in the exact costume in which he had enlisted, said, with an\narch and good-humoured smile, \u201cMy honoured Captain, excuse the freedom\nof your recruit. I cannot patiently hear those opprobrious epithets\napplied to my sister; perhaps she could explain all this if you had\npatience.\u201d\n\nThe Captain was now fairly bewildered, and stood staring, first at the\none, and then the other, in half-frantic amazement, when, to his relief,\nthe farmer approached; and, seeing the four looking in gloomy silence on\neach other, exclaimed, \u201cWhy, what is the matter with all of you, that\nyou stare as if bewitched?\u201d\n\nCaptain Munro, recovering himself a little, replied, \u201cIt is even so,\nSir; and you are come in time to remove the spell. Say, who are these\nbefore you?\u201d\n\nThe farmer surveyed the group, and observing that Emma had not the\n_bandeau_ of rose-buds by which she was to be distinguished from her\nsister, replied: \u201cCaptain, what do you mean? The young man is my son\nEdward; the other is Dr Malcolm, my son-in-law: you surely do not\nrequire to be told that the female is _my_ daughter, and _your_ bride.\u201d\n\n\u201cShe is no bride of mine\u2014I renounce her for ever!\u201d said the angry\nsoldier, in a most indignant tone.\n\nWhile the farmer stood, as much amazed as the Captain had been, Emily\ncame forward from the thicket, and, standing close beside her sister,\nsaid, \u201cDear father, let not the gentlemen quarrel; you have certainly a\ndaughter for each of them; and as both of us are quite willing to have\nhusbands, have the goodness to give our hands to those for whom you\nintend us;\u201d and both sisters stood with the stillness, gravity, and\nsilence of statues. The astonished father found the distinguishing badge\nwanting in both, and replied, \u201cI must confess I am fairly bewildered;\ngentlemen, choose for yourselves, for I cannot!\u201d\n\nEdward now put on Emily\u2019s playful smile, and looked at the Captain in a\nmanner which made him at once clasp the youth in his arms, crying, \u201cMy\ndear Emily! I know you now.\u201d\n\nThe loud laughter of the party again renewed the confusion of the\nbridegroom and farmer, which was enjoyed for a considerable time before\nthey condescended to give any explanation. It was, however, at last\nmade; all was set right, and the evening passed at Greenbraes in\nhilarity and unclouded happiness.\n\n\n\n\n ALBERT BANE:\n _AN INCIDENT OF THE BATTLE OF CULLODEN_.\n\n BY HENRY MACKENZIE.\n\n\nWhen I was, last autumn, at my friend Colonel Caustic\u2019s in the country,\nI saw there, on a visit to Miss Caustic, a young gentleman and his\nsister, children of a neighbour of the Colonel\u2019s, with whose appearance\nand manner I was particularly pleased.\n\nThe history of their parents, said my friend, is somewhat particular,\nand I love to tell it, as I do everything that is to the honour of our\nnature. Man is so poor a thing, taken in the gross, that when I meet\nwith an instance of nobleness in detail, I am fain to rest upon it long,\nand to recall it often, as in coming thither over our barren hills you\nwould look with double delight on a spot of cultivation or of beauty.\n\nThe father of those young folks, whose looks you were struck with, was a\ngentleman of considerable domains and extensive influence on the\nnorthern frontier of our country. In his youth he lived, as it was then\nmore the fashion than it is now, at the seat of his ancestors,\nsurrounded with Gothic grandeur, and compassed with feudal followers and\ndependants, all of whom could trace their connection at a period more or\nless remote with the family of their chief. Every domestic in his house\nbore the family-name, and looked on himself as in a certain degree\npartaking its dignity, and sharing its fortunes. Of these, one was in a\nparticular manner the favourite of his master. Albert Bane (the surname,\nyou know, is generally lost in a name descriptive of the individual) had\nbeen his companion from his infancy. Of an age so much more advanced as\nto enable him to be a sort of tutor to his youthful lord, Albert had\nearly taught him the rural exercises and rural amusements, in which\nhimself was eminently skilful; he had attended him in the course of his\neducation at home, of his travels abroad, and was still the constant\ncompanion of his excursions, and the associate of his sports.\n\nOn one of those latter occasions, a favourite dog of Albert\u2019s, whom he\nhad trained himself, and of whose qualities he was proud, happened to\nmar the sport which his master expected, who, irritated at the\ndisappointment, and having his gun ready cocked in his hand, fired at\nthe animal, which, however, in the hurry of his resentment, he missed.\nAlbert, to whom Oscar was a child, remonstrated against the rashness of\nthe deed in a manner rather too warm for his master, ruffled as he was\nwith the accident, and conscious of being in the wrong, to bear. In his\npassion he struck his faithful attendant, who suffered the indignity in\nsilence: and retiring, rather in grief than in anger, left his native\ncountry that very night; and when he reached the nearest town, enlisted\nwith a recruiting party of a regiment then on foreign service. It was in\nthe beginning of the war with France, which broke out in 1744, rendered\nremarkable for the rebellion which the policy of the French court\nexcited, in which some of the first families of the Highlands were\nunfortunately engaged. Among those who joined the standard of Charles,\nwas the master of Albert.\n\nAfter the battle of Culloden, so fatal to that party, this gentleman,\nalong with others who had escaped the slaughter of the field, sheltered\nthemselves from the rage of the unsparing soldiery among the distant\nrecesses of their country. To him his native mountains offered an\nasylum; and thither he naturally fled for protection. Acquainted, in the\npursuits of the chase, with every secret path and unworn track, he lived\nfor a considerable time, like the deer of his forest, close hid all day,\nand only venturing down at the fall of evening, to obtain from some of\nhis cottagers, whose fidelity he could trust, a scanty and precarious\nsupport. I have often heard him (for he is one of my oldest\nacquaintances) describe the scene of his hiding-place, at a later\nperiod, when he could recollect it in its sublimity, without its horror.\n\u201cAt times,\u201d said he, \u201cwhen I ventured to the edge of the wood, among\nsome of those inaccessible crags which you remember a few miles from my\nhouse, I have heard, in the pauses of the breeze which rolled solemn\nthrough the pines beneath me, the distant voices of the soldiers,\nshouting in answer to one another amidst their inhuman search. I have\nheard their shouts re-echoed from cliff to cliff, and seen reflected\nfrom the deep still lake below the gleam of those fires which consumed\nthe cottages of my people. Sometimes shame and indignation wellnigh\novercame my fear, and I have prepared to rush down the steep, unarmed as\nI was, and to die at once by the swords of my enemies; but the\ninstinctive love of life prevailed, and starting, as the roe bounded by\nme, I have again shrunk back to the shelter I had left.\n\n\u201cOne day,\u201d continued he, \u201cthe noise was nearer than usual; and at last,\nfrom the cave in which I lay, I heard the parties immediately below so\nclose upon me, that I could distinguish the words they spoke. After some\ntime of horrible suspense, the voices grew weaker and more distant; and\nat last I heard them die away at the further end of the wood. I rose and\nstole to the mouth of the cave, when suddenly a dog met me, and gave\nthat short quick bark by which they indicate their prey. Amidst the\nterror of the circumstance, I was yet master enough of myself to\ndiscover that the dog was Oscar; and I own to you I felt his appearance\nlike the retribution of justice and of heaven. \u2018Stand!\u2019 cried a\nthreatening voice, and a soldier pressed through the thicket, with his\nbayonet charged. It was Albert! Shame, confusion, and remorse stopped my\nutterance, and I stood motionless before him. \u2018My master!\u2019 said he, with\nthe stifled voice of wonder and of fear, and threw himself at my feet. I\nhad recovered my recollection. You are revenged, said I, and I am your\nprisoner. \u2018Revenged! Alas! you have judged too harshly of me; I have not\nhad one happy day since that fatal one on which I left my master; but I\nhave lived, I hope, to save him. The party to which I belong are passed;\nfor I lingered behind them among those woods and rocks, which I remember\nso well in happier days. There is, however, no time to be lost. In a few\nhours this wood will blaze, though they do not suspect that it shelters\nyou. Take my dress, which may help your escape, and I will endeavour to\ndispose of yours. On the coast, to the westward, we have learned there\nis a small party of your friends, which, by following the river\u2019s track\ntill dusk, and then striking over the shoulder of the hill, you may join\nwithout much danger of discovery.\u2019 I felt the disgrace of owing so much\nto him I had injured, and remonstrated against exposing him to such\nimminent danger of its being known that he favoured my escape, which,\nfrom the temper of his commander, I knew would be instant death. Albert,\nin an agony of fear and distress, besought me to think only of my own\nsafety. \u2018Save us both,\u2019 said he, \u2018for if you die, I cannot live. Perhaps\nwe may meet again; but whatever comes of Albert, may the blessing of God\nbe with his master!\u2019\u201d\n\nAlbert\u2019s prayer was heard. His master, by the exercise of talents which,\nthough he had always possessed, adversity only taught him to use,\nacquired abroad a station of equal honour and emolument; and when the\nproscriptions of party had ceased, returned home to his own country,\nwhere he found Albert advanced to the rank of a lieutenant in the army,\nto which his valour and merit had raised him, married to a lady, by whom\nhe had got some little fortune, and the father of an only daughter, for\nwhom nature had done much, and to whose native endowments it was the\nchief study and delight of her parents to add everything that art could\nbestow. The gratitude of the chief was only equalled by the happiness of\nhis follower, whose honest pride was not long after gratified by his\ndaughter becoming the wife of that master whom his generous fidelity had\nsaved. That master, by the clemency of more indulgent and liberal times,\nwas again restored to the domains of his ancestors, and had the\nsatisfaction of seeing the grandson of Albert enjoy the hereditary\nbirthright of his race. I accompanied Colonel Caustic on a visit to this\ngentleman\u2019s house, and was delighted to observe his grateful attention\nto his father-in-law, as well as the unassuming happiness of the good\nold man, conscious of the perfect reward which his former fidelity had\nmet with. Nor did it escape my notice, that the sweet boy and girl, who\nhad been our guests at the Colonel\u2019s, had a favourite brown and white\nspaniel, whom they caressed much after dinner, whose name was Oscar.\n\n\n\n\n THE PENNY-WEDDING.\n\n BY ALEX. CAMPBELL.\n\n\nIf any of our readers have ever seen a Scottish penny-wedding, they will\nagree with us, we daresay, that it is a very merry affair, and that its\nmirth and hilarity is not a whit the worse for its being, as it\ngenerally is, very homely and unsophisticated. The penny-wedding is not\nquite so splendid an affair as a ball at Almack\u2019s; but, from all we have\nheard and read of these aristocratic exhibitions, we for our own parts\nwould have little hesitation about our preference, and what is more, we\nare quite willing to accept the imputation of having a horrid bad taste.\n\nIt is very well known to those who know anything at all of\npenny-weddings, that, when a farmer\u2019s servant is about to be\nmarried\u2014such an occurrence being the usual, or, at least, the most\nfrequent occasion of these festivities\u2014all the neighbouring farmers,\nwith their servants, and sometimes their sons and daughters, are invited\nto the ceremony; and to those who know this, it is also known that the\nfarmers so invited are in the habit of contributing each something to\nthe general stock of good things provided for the entertainment of the\nwedding guests\u2014some sending one thing and some another, till materials\nare accumulated for a feast, which, both for quantity and quality, would\nextort praise from Dr Kitchener himself, than whom no man ever knew\nbetter what good living was. To all this a little money is added by the\nparties present, to enable the young couple to _plenish_ their little\ndomicile.\n\nHaving given this brief sketch of what is called a penny-wedding, we\nproceed to say that such a merry doing as this took place, as it had\ndone a thousand times before, in a certain parish (we dare not be more\nparticular) in the south of Scotland, about five-and-twenty years ago.\nThe parties\u2014we name them, although it is of no consequence to our\nstory\u2014were Andrew Jardine and Margaret Laird, both servants to a\nrespectable farmer in that part of the country of the name of Harrison,\nand both very deserving and well-doing persons.\n\nOn the wedding-day being fixed, Andrew went himself to engage the\nservices of blind Willie Hodge, the parish fiddler, as he might with all\npropriety be called, for the happy occasion; and Willie very readily\nagreed to attend gratuitously, adding, that he would bring his best\nfiddle along with him, together with an ample supply of fiddle-strings\nand rosin.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 a wee bit box o\u2019 elbow grease, Willie,\u201d said Andrew, slily; \u201cfor\nye\u2019ll hae gude aught hours o\u2019t, at the very least.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll be sure to bring that too, Andrew,\u201d replied Willie, laughing; \u201cbut\nit\u2019s no aught hours that\u2019ll ding me, I warrant. I hae played saxteen\nwithout stoppin, except to rosit.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd to weet your whistle,\u201d slipped in Andrew.\n\n\u201cPho, that wasna worth coontin. It was just a mouthfu\u2019 and at it again,\u201d\nsaid Willie. \u201cI just tak, Andrew,\u201d he went on, \u201cprecisely the time o\u2019 a\ndemisemiquaver to a tumbler o\u2019 cauld liquor, such as porter or ale; and\ntwa minims or four crochets to a tumbler o\u2019 het drink, such as toddy;\nfor the first, ye see, I can tak aff at jig time, but the other can only\nget through wi\u2019 at the rate o\u2019 \u2018Roslin Castle,\u2019 or the \u2018Dead March in\nSaul,\u2019 especially when its brought to me scadding het, whilk sude never\nbe done to a fiddler.\u201d\n\nNow, as to this very nice chromatic measurement by Willie, of the time\nconsumed in his potations, while in the exercise of his calling, we have\nnothing to say. It may be perfectly correct for aught we know; but when\nWillie said that he played at one sitting, and with only the stoppages\nhe mentioned, for sixteen hours, we rather think he was drawing fully a\nlonger bow than that he usually played with. At all events, this we\nknow, that Willie was a very indifferent, if not positively a very bad\nfiddler; but he was a good-humoured creature, harmless and inoffensive,\nand, moreover, the only one of his calling in the parish, so that he was\nfully as much indebted to the necessities of his customers for the\nemployment he obtained, as to their love or charity.\n\nThe happy day which was to see the humble destinies of Andrew Jardine\nand Margaret Laird united having arrived, Willie attired himself in his\nbest, popped his best fiddle\u2014which was, after all, but a very sober\narticle, having no more tone than a salt-box\u2014into a green bag, slipped\nthe instrument thus secured beneath the back of his coat, and proceeded\ntowards the scene of his impending labours. This was a large barn, which\nhad been carefully swept and levelled for the \u201clight fantastic _toes_\u201d\nof some score of ploughmen and dairymaids, not formed exactly after the\nChinese fashion. At the further end of the barn stood a sort of\nplatform, erected on a couple of empty herring-barrels; and on this\nagain a chair was placed. This distinguished situation, we need hardly\nsay, was designed for Willie, who from that elevated position was to\npour down his heel-inspiring strains amongst the revellers below. When\nWillie, however, came first upon the ground, the marriage party had not\nyet arrived. They were still at the manse, which was hard by, but were\nevery minute expected. In these circumstances, and it being a fine\nsummer afternoon, Willie seated himself on a stone at the door, drew\nforth his fiddle, and struck up with great vigour and animation, to the\ninfinite delight of some half-dozen of the wedding guests, who, not\nhaving gone with the others to the manse, were now, like himself,\nwaiting their arrival. These immediately commenced footing it to\nWillie\u2019s music on the green before the door, and thus presented a very\nappropriate prelude to the coming festivities of the evening.\n\nWhile Willie was thus engaged, an itinerant brother in trade, on the\nlook-out for employment, and who had heard of the wedding, suddenly\nappeared, and stealing up quietly beside him, modestly undid the mouth\nof his fiddle-bag, laid the neck of the instrument bare, and drew his\nthumb carelessly across the strings, to intimate to him that a rival was\nnear his throne. On hearing the sound of the instrument, Willie stopped\nshort.\n\n\u201cI doubt, frien, ye hae come to the wrang market,\u201d he said, guessing at\nonce the object of the stranger. \u201cAn\u2019 ye hae been travellin too, I\ndaresay?\u201d he continued, good-naturedly, and not at all offended with the\nintruder, for whom and all of his kind he entertained a fellow feeling.\n\n\u201cAy,\u201d replied the new Orpheus, who was a tall, good-looking man of about\neight-and-twenty years of age, but very poorly attired, \u201cI hae been\ntravellin, as ye say, neebor, an\u2019 hae came twa or three miles out o\u2019 my\nway to see if I could pick up a shilling or twa at this weddin.\u201d\n\n\u201cI am sorry now, man, for that,\u201d said Willie, sympathisingly. \u201cI doot\nye\u2019ll be disappointed, for I hae been engaged for\u2019t this fortnight past.\nBut I\u2019ll tell ye what: if ye\u2019re onything guid o\u2019 the fiddle, ye may\nremain, jist to relieve me now an\u2019 then, an\u2019 I\u2019ll mind ye when a\u2019s ower;\nan\u2019 at ony rate ye\u2019ll aye pick up a mouthfu\u2019 o\u2019 guid meat and drink\u2014an\u2019\nthat ye ken\u2019s no to be fand at every dyke-side.\u201d\n\n\u201cA bargain be\u2019t,\u201d said the stranger, \u201can\u2019 much obliged to you, frien. I\nmaun just tak pat-luck and be thankfu. But isna your waddin folks lang\no\u2019 comin?\u201d he added.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019ll be here belyve,\u201d replied Willie, and added, \u201cYe\u2019ll no be blin,\nfrien?\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, no,\u201d said the stranger; \u201cthank goodness I hae my sight; but I am\notherwise in such a bad state o\u2019 health, that I canna work, and am\nobliged to tak the fiddle for a subsistence.\u201d\n\nWhile this conversation was going on, the wedding folks were seen\ndropping out of the manse in twos and threes, and making straight for\nthe scene of the evening\u2019s festivities, where they all very soon after\nassembled. Ample justice having been done to all the good things that\nwere now set before the merry party, and Willie and his colleague having\nhad their share, and being thus put in excellent trim for entering on\ntheir labours, the place was cleared of all encumbrances, and a fair and\nopen field left for the dancers. At this stage of the proceedings,\nWillie was led by his colleague to his station, and helped up to the\nelevated chair which had been provided for him, when the latter handed\nhim his instrument, while he himself took up his position, fiddle in\nhand, on his principal\u2019s left, but standing on the ground, as there was\nno room for him on the platform.\n\nEverything being now ready, and the expectant couples ranged in their\nrespective places on the floor, Willie was called upon to begin, an\norder which he instantly obeyed by opening in great style.\n\nOn the conclusion of the first reel, in the musical department of which\nthe strange fiddler had not interfered, the latter whispered to his\ncoadjutor, that if he liked he would relieve him for the next.\n\n\u201cWeel,\u201d replied the latter, \u201cif ye think ye can gae through wi\u2019t\nonything decently, ye may try your hand.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll no promise much,\u201d said the stranger, now for the first time\ndrawing his fiddle out of its bag; \u201cbut, for the credit o\u2019 the craft,\nI\u2019ll do the best I can.\u201d\n\nHaving said this, Willie\u2019s colleague drew his bow across the strings of\nhis fiddle, with a preparatory flourish, when instantly every face in\nthe apartment was turned towards him with an expression of delight and\nsurprise. The tones of the fiddle were so immeasurably superior to those\nof poor Willie\u2019s salt-box, that the dullest and most indiscriminating\near amongst the revellers readily distinguished the amazing difference.\nBut infinitely greater still was their surprise and delight when the\nstranger began to play. Nothing could exceed the energy, accuracy, and\nbeauty of his performances. He was, in short, evidently a perfect master\nof the instrument, and this was instantly perceived and acknowledged by\nall, including Willie himself, who declared, with great candour and\ngoodwill, that he had never heard a better fiddler in his life.\n\nThe result of this discovery was, that the former was not allowed to\nlift a bow during the remainder of the night, the whole burden of its\nlabours being deposited on the shoulders, or perhaps we should rather\nsay the finger-ends, of the stranger, who fiddled away with an\napparently invincible elbow.\n\nFor several hours the dance went on without interruption, and without\nany apparent abatement whatever of vigour on the part of the performers;\nbut, at the end of this period, some symptoms of exhaustion began to\nmanifest themselves, which were at length fully declared by a temporary\ncessation of both the mirth and music.\n\nIt was at this interval in the revelries that the unknown fiddler, who\nhad been, by the unanimous voice of the party, installed in Willie\u2019s\nelevated chair, while the latter was reduced to his place on the floor,\nstretching himself over the platform, and tapping Willie on the hat with\nhis bow, to draw his attention, inquired of him, in a whisper, if he\nknew who the lively little girl was that had been one of the partners in\nthe last reel that had been danced.\n\n\u201cIs she a bit red-cheeked, dark-ee\u2019d, and dark-haired lassie, about\nnineteen or twenty?\u201d inquired Willie, in his turn.\n\n\u201cThe same,\u201d replied the fiddler.\n\n\u201cOu, that\u2019s Jeanie Harrison,\u201d said Willie, \u201ca kind-hearted, nice bit\nlassie. No a better nor a bonnier in a\u2019 the parish. She\u2019s a dochter o\u2019\nMr Harrison o\u2019 Todshaws, the young couple\u2019s maister, an\u2019 a very\nrespectable man. He\u2019s here himsel, too, amang the lave.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust so,\u201d replied his colleague. And he began to rosin his bow, and to\nscrew his pegs anew, to prepare for the second storm of merriment, which\nhe saw gathering, and threatening to burst upon him with increased fury.\nAmongst the first on the floor was Jeanie Harrison.\n\n\u201cIs there naebody\u2019ll tak me out for a reel?\u201d exclaimed the lively girl;\nand without waiting for an answer, \u201cWeel, then, I\u2019ll hae the fiddler.\u201d\nAnd she ran towards the platform on which the unknown performer was\nseated. But he did not wait her coming. He had heard her name her\nchoice, laid down his fiddle, and sprang to the floor with the agility\nof a harlequin, exclaiming, \u201cThank ye, my bonny lassie, thank ye for the\nhonour. I\u2019m your man at a moment\u2019s notice, either for feet or fiddle.\u201d\n\nIt is not quite certain that Jeanie was in perfect earnest when she made\nchoice of the musician for a partner, but it was now too late to\nretract, for the joke had taken with the company, and, with one voice,\nor rather shout, they insisted on her keeping faithful to her\nengagement, and dancing a reel with the fiddler; and on this no one\ninsisted more stoutly than the fiddler himself. Finding that she could\ndo no better, the good-natured girl put the best face on the frolic she\ncould, and prepared to do her partner every justice in the dance. Willie\nhaving now taken bow in hand, his colleague gave him the word of\ncommand, and away the dancers went like meteors; and here again the\nsurprise of the party was greatly excited by the performances of our\nfriend the fiddler, who danced as well as he played. To say merely that\nhe far surpassed all in the room would not, perhaps, be saying much; for\nthere were none of them very great adepts in the art. But, in truth, he\ndanced with singular grace and lightness, and much did those who\nwitnessed it marvel at the display. Neither was his bow to his partner,\nnor his manner of conducting her to her seat on the conclusion of the\nreel, less remarkable. It was distinguished by an air of refined\ngallantry certainly not often to be met with in those in his humble\nstation in life. He might have been a master of ceremonies; and where\nthe beggarly-looking fiddler had picked up these accomplishments every\none found it difficult to conjecture.\n\nOn the termination of the dance, the fiddler\u2014as we shall call him, _par\nexcellence_, and to distinguish him from Willie\u2014resumed his seat and his\nfiddle, and began to drive away with even more than his former spirit;\nbut it was observed by more than one that his eye was now almost\nconstantly fixed, for the remainder of the evening, as, indeed, it had\nbeen very frequently before, on his late partner, Jeanie Harrison. This\ncircumstance, however, did not prevent him giving every satisfaction to\nthose who danced to his music, nor did it in the least impair the spirit\nof his performances; for he was evidently too much practised in the use\nof the instrument, which he managed with such consummate skill, to be\nput out, either by the contemplation of any chance object which might\npresent itself, or by the vagaries of his imagination.\n\nLeaving our musician in the discharge of his duty, we shall step over to\nwhere Jeanie Harrison is seated, to learn what she thinks of her\npartner, and what the Misses Murray, the daughters of a neighbouring\nfarmer, between whom she sat, think of him, and of Jeanie having danced\nwith a fiddler.\n\nPremising that the Misses Murray, not being by any means beauties\nthemselves, entertained a very reasonable and justifiable dislike and\njealousy of all their own sex to whom nature had been more bountiful in\nthis particular; and finding, moreover, that, from their excessively bad\ntempers (this, however, of course, not admitted by the ladies\nthemselves), they could neither practise nor share in the amenities\nwhich usually mark the intercourse of the sexes, they had set up for\nconnoisseurs in the articles of propriety and decorum, of which they\nprofessed to be profound judges\u2014premising this, then, we proceed to\nquote the conversation that passed between the three ladies\u2014that is, the\nMisses Murray and Miss Harrison; the latter taking her seat between them\nafter dancing with the fiddler.\n\n\u201cMy certy!\u201d exclaimed the elder, with a very dignified toss of the head,\n\u201cye warna nice, Jeanie, to dance wi\u2019 a fiddler. I wad hae been very ill\naff, indeed, for a partner before I wad hae taen up wi\u2019 such a\nragamuffin.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 to go an\u2019 ask him too!\u201d said the younger, with an imitative toss.\n\u201cI wadna ask the best man in the land to dance wi\u2019 me, let alane a\nfiddler! If they dinna choose to come o\u2019 their ain accord, they may\nstay.\u201d\n\n\u201cTuts, lassies, it was a\u2019 a piece o\u2019 fun,\u201d said the good-humoured girl.\n\u201cI\u2019m sure everybody saw that but yersels. Besides, the man\u2019s well\naneugh\u2014na, a gude deal mair than that, if he was only a wee better clad.\nThere\u2019s no a better-lookin man in the room; and I wish, lassies,\u201d she\nadded, \u201cye may get as guid dancers in your partners\u2014that\u2019s a\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cUmph! a bonny like taste ye hae, Jeanie, an\u2019 a very strange notion o\u2019\npropriety!\u201d exclaimed the elder, with another toss of the head.\n\n\u201cTo dance wi\u2019 a fiddler!\u201d simpered out the younger\u2014who, by the way, was\nno chicken either, being but a trifle on the right side of thirty.\n\n\u201cAy, to be sure, dance wi\u2019 a fiddler or a piper either. I\u2019ll dance wi\u2019\nbaith o\u2019 them\u2014an\u2019 what for no?\u201d replied Jeanie. \u201cThere\u2019s neither sin nor\nshame in\u2019t; and I\u2019ll dance wi\u2019 him again, if he\u2019ll only but ask me.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 faith he\u2019ll do that wi\u2019 a\u2019 the pleasure in the warld, my bonny\nlassie,\u201d quoth the intrepid fiddler, leaping down once more from his\nhigh place; for, there having been a cessation of both music and dancing\nwhile the conversation above recorded was going on, he had heard every\nword of it. \u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 the pleasure in the warld,\u201d he said, advancing\ntowards Jeanie Harrison, and making one of his best bows of invitation;\nand again a shout of approbation from the company urged Jeanie to accept\nit, which she readily did, at once to gratify her friends and to provoke\nthe Misses Murray.\n\nHaving accordingly taken her place on the floor, and other couples\nhaving been mustered for the set, Jeanie\u2019s partner again called on\nWillie to strike up; again the dancers started, and again the fiddler\nastonished and delighted the company with the grace and elegance of his\nperformances. On this occasion, however, the unknown musician\u2019s\npredilection for his fair partner exhibited a more unequivocal\ncharacter; and he even ventured to inquire if he might call at her\nfather\u2019s, to amuse the family for an hour or so with his fiddle.\n\n\u201cNae objection in the warld,\u201d replied Jeanie. \u201cCome as aften as ye like;\nand the aftener the better, if ye only bring yer fiddle wi\u2019 ye, for\nwe\u2019re a\u2019 fond o\u2019 music.\u201d\n\n\u201cA bargain be\u2019t,\u201d said the gallant fiddler; and, at the conclusion of\nthe reel, he again resumed his place on the platform and his fiddle.\n\n\u201cTime and the hour,\u201d says Shakspeare, \u201cwill wear through the roughest\nday;\u201d and so they will, also, through the merriest night, as the joyous\nparty of whom we are speaking now soon found.\n\nExhaustion and lassitude, though long defied, finally triumphed; and\neven the very candles seemed wearied of giving light; and, under the\ninfluence of these mirth-destroying feelings, the party at length broke\nup, and all departed, excepting the two fiddlers.\n\nThese worthies now adjourned to a public-house, which was close by, and\nset very gravely about settling what was to them the serious business of\nthe evening. Willie had received thirty-one shillings as payment in full\nfor their united labours; and, in consideration of the large and\nunexpected portion of them which had fallen to the stranger\u2019s share, he\ngenerously determined, notwithstanding that he was the principal party,\nas having been the first engaged, to give him precisely the one-half of\nthe money, or fifteen shillings and sixpence.\n\n\u201cVery fair,\u201d said the stranger, on this being announced to him by his\nbrother in trade\u2014\u201cvery fair; but what would ye think of our drinking the\nodd sixpences?\u201d\n\n\u201cWi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart,\u201d replied Willie, \u201cwi\u2019 a\u2019 my heart. A very guid\nnotion.\u201d\n\nAnd a jug of toddy, to the value of one shilling, was accordingly\nordered and produced, over which the two got as thick as ben-leather.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019re a guid fiddler\u2014I\u2019ll say that o\u2019 ye,\u201d quoth Willie, after tossing\ndown the first glass of the warm, exhilarating beverage. \u201cI would never\nwish to hear a better.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have had some practice,\u201d said the other modestly, and at the same\ntime following his companion\u2019s example with his glass.\n\n\u201cNae doot, nae doot, sae\u2019s seen on your playin,\u201d replied the latter.\n\u201cHow do you fend wi\u2019 yer fiddle? Do ye mak onything o\u2019 a guid leevin\no\u2019t?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo that ill ava,\u201d said the stranger. \u201cI play for the auld leddy at the\ncastle\u2014Castle Gowan, ye ken; indeed, I\u2019m sometimes ca\u2019d the leddy\u2019s\nfiddler, and she\u2019s uncommon guid to me. I neither want bite nor sowp\nwhen I gang there.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s sae far weel,\u201d replied Willie. \u201cShe\u2019s a guid judge o\u2019 music that\nLeddy Gowan, as I hear them say; and I\u2019m tauld her son, Sir John, plays\na capital bow.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo amiss, I believe,\u201d said the stranger; \u201cbut the leddy, as ye say, is\nan excellent judge o\u2019 music, although whiles, I think, rather ower fond\no\u2019t, for she maks me play for hours thegither, when I wad far rather be\nwi\u2019 Tam Yule, her butler, a sonsy, guid-natured chiel, that\u2019s no sweer\no\u2019 the cap. But, speaking o\u2019 that, I\u2019ll tell ye what, frien,\u201d he\ncontinued, \u201cif ye\u2019ll come up to Castle Gowan ony day, I\u2019ll be blithe to\nsee you, for I\u2019m there at least ance every day, and I\u2019ll warrant ye\u2014for\nye see I can use every liberty there\u2014in a guid het dinner, an\u2019 a jug o\u2019\nhetter toddy to wash it ower wi\u2019.\u201d\n\n\u201cA bargain be\u2019t,\u201d quoth Willie; \u201cwill the morn do?\u201d\n\n\u201cPerfectly,\u201d said the stranger; \u201cthe sooner the better.\u201d\n\nThis settled, Willie proceeded to a subject which had been for some time\nnear his heart, but which he felt some delicacy in broaching. This\nfeeling, however, having gradually given way before the influence of the\ntoddy, and of his friend\u2019s frank and jovial manner, he at length\nventured, though cautiously, to step on the ice.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s an uncommon guid instrument o\u2019 yours, frien,\u201d he said.\n\n\u201cVery good,\u201d replied his companion, briefly.\n\n\u201cBut ye\u2019ll hae mair than that ane, nae doot?\u201d rejoined the other.\n\n\u201cI hae ither twa.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn that case,\u201d said Willie, \u201cmaybe ye wad hae nae objection to pairt\nwi\u2019 that ane, an\u2019 the price offered ye wur a\u2019 the mair temptin. I\u2019ll gie\nye the fifteen shillins I hae won the nicht, an\u2019 my fiddle, for\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cThank ye, frien, thank ye for your offer,\u201d replied the stranger; \u201cbut I\ndaurna accept o\u2019t, though I war willin. The fiddle was gien to me by\nLeddy Gowan, and I daurna pairt wi\u2019t. She wad miss\u2019t, and then there\nwould be the deevil to pay.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, an\u2019 that\u2019s the case,\u201d said Willie, \u201cI\u2019ll sae nae mair aboot it; but\nit\u2019s a first-rate fiddle\u2014sae guid a ane, that it micht amaist play the\nlane o\u2019t.\u201d\n\nIt being now very late, or rather early, and the toddy jug emptied, the\nblind fiddler and his friend parted, on the understanding, however, that\nthe former would visit the latter at the castle (whither he was now\ngoing, he said, to seek a night\u2019s quarters) on the following day.\n\nTrue to his appointment, Willie appeared next day at Gowan House, or\nCastle Gowan, as it was more generally called, and inquired for \u201cthe\nfiddler.\u201d His inquiry was met with great civility and politeness by the\nfootman who opened the door. He was told \u201cthe fiddler\u201d was there, and\ndesired to walk in. Obeying the invitation, Willie, conducted by the\nfootman, entered a spacious apartment, where he was soon afterwards\nentertained with a sumptuous dinner, in which his friend the fiddler\njoined him.\n\n\u201cMy word, neighbour,\u201d said Willie, after having made a hearty meal of\nthe good things that were set before him, and having drank in\nproportion, \u201cbut ye\u2019re in noble quarters here. This is truly fiddlin to\nsome purpose, an\u2019 treatin the art as it ought to be treated in the\npersons o\u2019 its professors. But what,\u201d he added, \u201cif Sir John should come\nin upon us? He wadna like maybe a\u2019 thegither to see a stranger wi\u2019 ye?\u201d\n\n\u201cDeil a bodle I care for Sir John, Willie! He\u2019s but a wild harum-scarum\nthroughither chap at the best, an\u2019 no muckle to be heeded.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, he\u2019s fond o\u2019 a frolic, they tell me,\u201d quoth Willie; \u201can\u2019 there\u2019s a\nheap o\u2019 gie queer anes laid to his charge, whether they be true or no;\nbut his heart\u2019s in the richt place, I\u2019m thinkin, for a\u2019 that. I\u2019ve heard\no\u2019 mony guid turns he has dune.\u201d\n\n\u201cOu, he\u2019s no a bad chiel, on the whole, I daresay,\u201d replied Willie\u2019s\ncompanion. \u201cHis bark\u2019s waur than his bite\u2014an\u2019 that\u2019s mair than can be\nsaid o\u2019 a rat-trap, at ony rate.\u201d\n\nIt was about this period, and then for the first time, that certain\nstrange and vague suspicions suddenly entered Willie\u2019s mind regarding\nhis entertainer. He had remarked that the latter gave his orders with an\nair of authority which he thought scarcely becoming in one who occupied\nthe humble situation of \u201cthe lady\u2019s fiddler;\u201d but, singular as this\nappeared to him, the alacrity and silence with which these orders were\nobeyed, was to poor Willie still more unaccountable. He said nothing,\nhowever; but much did he marvel at the singular good fortune of his\nbrother-in-trade. He had never known a fiddler so quartered before; and,\nlost in admiration of his friend\u2019s felicity, he was about again to\nexpress his ideas on the subject, when a servant in splendid livery\nentered the room, and bowing respectfully, said, \u201cThe carriage waits\nyou, Sir John.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will be with you presently, Thomas,\u201d replied who? inquires the\nreader.\n\nWhy, Willie\u2019s companion!\n\nWhat! is he then Sir John Gowan\u2014he, the fiddler at the penny-wedding,\nSir John Gowan of Castle Gowan, the most extensive proprietor and the\nwealthiest man in the county?\n\nThe same and no other, good reader, we assure thee.\n\nA great lover of frolic, as he himself said, was Sir John; and this was\none of the pranks in which he delighted. He was an enthusiastic fiddler;\nand, as has been already shown, performed with singular skill on that\nmost difficult, but most delightful, of all musical instruments.\n\nWe will not attempt to describe poor Willie\u2019s amazement and confusion\nwhen this singular fact became known to him; for they are indescribable,\nand therefore better left to the reader\u2019s imagination. On recovering a\nlittle from his surprise, however, he endeavoured to express his\nastonishment in such broken sentences as these\u2014\u201cWha in earth wad hae\never dreamed o\u2019t? Rosit an\u2019 fiddle-strings!\u2014this beats a\u2019. Faith, a\u2019n\nI\u2019ve been fairly taen in\u2014clean dune for. A knight o\u2019 the shire to play\nat a penny-waddin wi\u2019 blin Willie Hodge the fiddler! The like was ne\u2019er\nheard tell o\u2019.\u201d\n\nAs it is unnecessary, and would certainly be tedious, to protract the\nscene at this particular point in our story, we cut it short by saying,\nthat Sir John presented Willie with the fiddle he had so much coveted,\nand which he had vainly endeavoured to purchase; that he then told down\nto him the half of the proceeds of the previous night\u2019s labours which he\nhad pocketed, added a handsome _douceur_ from his own purse, and finally\ndismissed him with a pressing and cordial invitation to visit the castle\nas often as it suited his inclination and convenience.\n\nHaving arrived at this landing-place in our tale, we pause to explain\none or two things, which is necessary for the full elucidation of the\nsequel. With regard to Sir John Gowan himself, there is little to add to\nwhat has been already said of him; for, brief though these notices of\nhim are, they contain nearly all that the reader need care to know about\nhim. He was addicted to such pranks as that just recorded; but this, if\nit was a defect in his character, was the only one. For the rest, he was\nan excellent young man\u2014kind, generous, and affable; of the strictest\nhonour, and the most upright principles. He was, moreover, an\nexceedingly handsome man, and highly accomplished. At this period, he\nwas unmarried, and lived with his mother, Lady Gowan, to whom he was\nmost affectionately attached. Sir John had, at one time, mingled a good\ndeal with the fashionable society of the metropolis; but soon became\ndisgusted with the heartlessness of those who composed it, and with the\nfrivolity of their pursuits; and in this frame of mind he came to the\nresolution of retiring to his estate, and of giving himself up entirely\nto the quiet enjoyments of a country life, and the pleasing duties which\nhis position as a large landed proprietor entailed upon him.\n\nSimple in all his tastes and habits, Sir John had been unable to\ndiscover, in any of the manufactured beauties to whom he had been, from\ntime to time, introduced while he resided in London, one to whom he\ncould think of intrusting his happiness. The wife he desired was one\nfresh from the hand of nature, not one remodelled by the square and rule\nof art; and such a one he thought he had found during his adventure of\nthe previous night.\n\nBringing this digression, which we may liken to an interlude, to a\nclose, we again draw up the curtain, and open the second act of our\nlittle drama with an exhibition of the residence of Mr Harrison at\nTodshaws.\n\nThe house or farm-steading of this worthy person was of the very best\ndescription of such establishments. The building itself was substantial,\nnay, even handsome, while the excellent garden which was attached to it,\nand all the other accessories and appurtenances with which it was\nsurrounded, indicated wealth and comfort. Its situation was on the\nsummit of a gentle eminence that sloped down in front to a noisy little\nrivulet, that careered along through a narrow rugged glen overhanging\nwith hazel, till it came nearly opposite the house, where it wound\nthrough an open plat of green sward, and shortly after again plunged\ninto another little romantic ravine similar to the one it had left.\n\nThe approach to Mr Harrison\u2019s house lay along this little rivulet, and\nwas commanded, for a considerable distance, by the view from the\nformer\u2014a circumstance which enabled Jeanie Harrison to descry, one fine\nsummer afternoon, two or three days after the occurrence of the events\njust related, the approach of the fiddler with whom she had danced at\nthe wedding. On making this discovery, Jeanie ran to announce the joyful\nintelligence to all the other members of the family, and the prospect of\na merry dancing afternoon opened on the delighted eyes of its younger\nbranches.\n\nWhen the fiddler\u2014with whose identity the reader is now as well\nacquainted as we are\u2014had reached the bottom of the ascent that led to\nthe house, Jeanie, with excessive joy beaming in her bright and\nexpressive eye, and her cheek glowing with the roseate hues of health,\nrushed down to meet him, and to welcome him to Todshaws.\n\n\u201cThank ye, my bonny lassie\u2014thank ye,\u201d replied the disguised baronet,\nexpressing himself in character, and speaking the language of his\nassumed station. \u201cAre ye ready for anither dance?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, a score o\u2019 them\u2014a thousand o\u2019 them,\u201d said the lively girl.\n\n\u201cBut will your faither, think ye, hae nae objections to my comin?\u201d\ninquired the fiddler.\n\n\u201cNane in the warld. My faither is nane o\u2019 your sour carles that wad deny\nither folk the pleasures they canna enjoy themsels. He likes to see\na\u2019body happy around him\u2014every ane his ain way.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 your mother?\u201d\n\n\u201cJist the same. Ye\u2019ll find her waur to fiddle doun than ony o\u2019 us.\nShe\u2019ll dance as lang\u2019s a string hauds o\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen, I may be quite at my ease,\u201d rejoined Sir John.\n\n\u201cQuite so,\u201d replied Jeanie\u2014and she slipped half-a-crown into his\nhand\u2014\u201cand there\u2019s your arles; but ye\u2019ll be minded better ere ye leave\nus.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy word, no an ill beginnin,\u201d quoth the musician, looking with\nwell-affected delight at the coin, and afterwards putting it carefully\ninto his pocket. \u201cBut ye could hae gien me a far mair acceptable arles\nthan half-a-crown,\u201d he added, \u201cand no been a penny the poorer either.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s that?\u201d said Jeanie, laughing and blushing at the same time, and\nmore than half guessing, from the looks of the _pawky_ fiddler, what was\nmeant.\n\n\u201cWhy, my bonny leddie,\u201d he replied, \u201cjist a kiss o\u2019 that pretty little\nmou o\u2019 yours.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, ye gowk!\u201d exclaimed Jeanie, with a roguish glance at her humble\ngallant; for, disguised as he was, he was not able to conceal a very\nhandsome person, nor the very agreeable expression of a set of\nremarkably fine features\u2014qualities which did not escape the vigilance of\nthe female eye that was now scanning their possessor. Nor would we say\nthat these qualities were viewed with total indifference, or without\nproducing their effect, even although they did belong to a fiddler.\n\n\u201cOh, ye gowk!\u201d said Jeanie; \u201cwha ever heard o\u2019 a fiddler preferring a\nkiss to half-a-crown?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut _I_ do, though,\u201d replied the disguised knight; \u201cand I\u2019ll gie ye\nyours back again for\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe mair fule you,\u201d exclaimed Jeanie, rushing away towards the house,\nand leaving the fiddler to make out the remainder of the way by himself.\n\nOn reaching the house, the musician was ushered into the kitchen, where\na plentiful repast was instantly set before him, by the kind and\nconsiderate hospitality of Jeanie, who, not contented with her guest\u2019s\nmaking a hearty meal at table, insisted on his pocketing certain pieces\nof cheese, cold meat, &c., which were left. These the fiddler steadily\nrefused; but Jeanie would take no denial, and with her own hands crammed\nthem into his capacious pockets, which, after the operation, stuck out\nlike a well-filled pair of saddle-bags. But there was no need for any\none who might be curious to know what they contained, to look into them\nfor that purpose. Certain projecting bones of mutton and beef, which it\nwas found impossible to get altogether out of sight, sufficiently\nindicated their contents. Of this particular circumstance, however\u2014we\nmean the projection of the bones from the pockets\u2014we must observe, the\nowner of the said pockets was not aware, otherwise, we daresay, he would\nhave been a little more positive in rejecting the provender which\nJeanie\u2019s warmheartedness and benevolence had forced upon him.\n\nBe this as it may, however, so soon as the musician had finished his\nrepast, he took fiddle in hand, and opened the evening with a slow\npathetic Scottish air, which he played so exquisitely that Jeanie\u2019s eye\nfilled with a tear, as she listened in raptures to the sweet but\nmelancholy turns of the affecting tune.\n\nTwice the musician played over the touching strain, delighted to\nperceive the effects of the music on the lovely girl who stood before\nhim, and rightly conceiving it to be an unequivocal proof of a\nsusceptible heart and of a generous nature.\n\nA third time he began the beautiful air; but he now accompanied it with\na song, and in this accomplishment he was no less perfect than in the\nothers which have been already attributed to him. His voice was at once\nmanly and melodious, and he conducted it with a skill that did it every\njustice. Having played two or three bars of the tune, his rich and\nwell-regulated voice chimed in with the following words:\u2014\n\n Oh, I hae lived wi\u2019 high-bred dames,\n Each state of life to prove,\n But never till this hour hae met\n The girl that I could love.\n\n It\u2019s no in fashion\u2019s gilded ha\u2019s\n That she is to be seen;\n Beneath her father\u2019s humble roof\n Abides my bonny Jean.\n\n Oh, wad she deign ae thought to wair,\n Ae kindly thought on me,\n Wi\u2019 pearls I wad deck her hair,\n Though low be my degree.\n\n Wi\u2019 pearls I wad deck her hair,\n Wi\u2019 gowd her wrists sae sma\u2019;\n An\u2019 had I lands and houses, she\u2019d\n Be leddy ower them a\u2019.\n\n The sun abune\u2019s no what he seems,\n Nor is the night\u2019s fair queen;\n Then wha kens wha the minstrel is\n That\u2019s wooin bonny Jean?\n\nJeanie could not help feeling a little strange as the minstrel proceeded\nwith a song which seemed to have so close a reference to herself.\n\nShe, of course, did not consider this circumstance otherwise than as\nmerely accidental; but she could not help, nevertheless, being somewhat\nembarrassed by it; and this was made sufficiently evident by the blush\nthat mantled on her cheek, and by the confusion of her manner under the\nfixed gaze of the singer, while repeating the verses just quoted.\n\nWhen he had concluded, \u201cWell, good folks all,\u201d he said, \u201cwhat think ye\nof my song?\u201d And without waiting for an answer, about which he seemed\nvery indifferent, he added, \u201cand how do you like it, Jeanie?\u201d directing\nthe question exclusively to the party he named.\n\n\u201cVery weel,\u201d replied Jeanie, again blushing, but still more deeply than\nbefore; \u201cthe song is pretty, an\u2019 the air delightfu\u2019; but some o\u2019 the\nverses are riddles to me. I dinna thoroughly understand them.\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t you?\u201d replied Sir John, laughing; \u201cthen I\u2019ll explain them to you\nby-and-by; but, in the meantime, I must screw my pegs anew, and work for\nmy dinner, for I see the good folk about me here are all impatience to\nbegin.\u201d A fact this which was instantly acknowledged by a dozen voices;\nand straightway the whole party proceeded, in compliance with a\nsuggestion of Mr Harrison, to the green in front of the house, where Sir\nJohn took up his position on the top of an inverted wheelbarrow, and\nimmediately commenced his labours.\n\nFor several hours the dance went on with uninterrupted glee, old Mr\nHarrison and his wife appearing to enjoy the sport as much as the\nyoungest of the party, and both being delighted with the masterly\nplaying of the musician. But although, as on a former occasion, Sir John\ndid not suffer anything to interfere with, or interrupt the charge of\nthe duties expected of him, there was but a very small portion of his\nmind or thoughts engrossed by the employment in which he was engaged.\nAll, or nearly all, were directed to the contemplation of the object on\nwhich his affections had now become irrevocably fixed.\n\nNeither was his visit to Todshaws, on this occasion, by any means\ndictated solely by the frivolous object of affording its inmates\nentertainment by his musical talents. His purpose was a much more\nserious one. It was to ascertain, as far as such an opportunity would\nafford him the means, the dispositions and temper of his fair enslaver.\nOf these, his natural shrewdness had enabled him to make a pretty\ncorrect estimate on the night of the wedding; but he was desirous of\nseeing her in other circumstances, and he thought none more suitable for\nhis purpose than those of a domestic nature.\n\nIt was, then, to see her in this position that he had now come; and the\nresult of his observations was highly gratifying to him.\n\nHe found in Miss Harrison all that he, at any rate, desired in woman. He\nfound her guileless, cheerful, gentle, kind-hearted, and good-tempered,\nbeloved by all around her, and returning the affection bestowed on her\nwith a sincere and ardent love.\n\nSuch were the discoveries which the disguised baronet made on this\noccasion; and never did hidden treasure half so much gladden the heart\nof the fortunate finder, as these did that of him who made them. It is\ntrue that Sir John could not be sure, nor was he, that his addresses\nwould be received by Miss Harrison, even after he should have made\nhimself known; but he could not help entertaining a pretty strong\nconfidence in his own powers of persuasion, nor being, consequently,\ntolerably sanguine of success. All this, however, was to be the work of\nanother day. In the meantime, the dancers having had their hearts\u2019\ncontent of capering on the green sward, the fiddle was put up, and the\nfiddler once more invited into the house, where he was entertained with\nthe same hospitality as before, and another half-crown slipped into his\nhand. This he also put carefully into his pocket; and having partaken\nlightly of what was set before him, rose up to depart, alleging that he\nhad a good way to go, and was desirous of availing himself of the little\ndaylight that still remained. He was pressed to remain all night, but\nthis he declined; promising, however, in reply to the urgent entreaties\nwith which he was assailed on all sides to stay, that he would very soon\nrepeat his visit. Miss Harrison he took by the hand, and said, \u201cI\npromised to explain to you the poetical riddle which I read, or rather\nattempted to sing, this evening. It is now too late to do this, for the\nexplanation is a long one; but I will be here again, without fail, in a\nday or two, when I shall solve all, and, I trust, to your satisfaction.\nTill then, do not forget your poor fiddler.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I winna forget ye,\u201d said Jeanie. \u201cIt wadna be easy to forget ane\nthat has contributed so much to our happiness. Neither would it be more\nthan gratefu\u2019 to do so, I think.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you are too kind a creature to be ungrateful to any one, however\nhumble may be their attempts to win your favour; of that I feel\nassured.\u201d Having said this, and perceiving that he was unobserved, he\nquickly raised the fair hand he held to his lips, kissed it, and hurried\nout of the door.\n\nWhat Jane Harrison thought of this piece of gallantry from a fiddler, we\nreally do not know, and therefore will say nothing about it. Whatever\nher thoughts were, she kept them to herself. Neither did she mention to\nany one the circumstance which gave rise to them. Nor did she say, but\nfor what reason we are ignorant, how much she had been pleased with the\ngeneral manners of the humble musician, with the melodious tones of his\nvoice, and the fine expression of his dark hazel eye. Oh, love, love!\nthou art a leveller, indeed, else how should it happen that the pretty\ndaughter of a wealthy and respectable yeoman should think for a moment,\nwith certain indescribable feelings, of a poor itinerant fiddler? Mark,\ngood reader, however, we do not say that Miss Harrison was absolutely in\nlove with the musician. By no means. That would certainly be saying too\nmuch. But it is as certainly true, that she had perceived something\nabout him that left no disagreeable impression\u2014nay, something which she\nwished she might meet with in her future husband, whoever he might be.\n\nLeaving Jeanie Harrison to such reflections as these, we will follow the\nfootsteps of the disguised baronet. On leaving the house, he walked at a\nrapid pace for an hour or so, till he came to a turn in the road, at the\ndistance of about four miles from Todshaws, where his gig and\nman-servant, with a change of clothes, were waiting him by appointment.\nHaving hastily divested himself of his disguise, and resumed his own\ndress, he stepped into the vehicle, and about midnight arrived at Castle\nGowan.\n\nIn this romantic attachment of Sir John Gowan\u2019s, or rather in the\nromantic project which it suggested to him of offering his heart and\nhand to the daughter of a humble farmer, there was but one doubtful\npoint on his side of the question, at any rate. This was, whether he\ncould obtain the consent of his mother to such a proceeding. She loved\nhim with the utmost tenderness; and, naturally of a mild, gentle, and\naffectionate disposition, her sole delight lay in promoting the\nhappiness of her beloved son. To secure this great object of her life,\nthere was scarcely any sacrifice which she would not make, nor any\nproposal with which she would not willingly comply. This Sir John well\nknew, and fully appreciated; but he felt that the call which he was now\nabout to make on her maternal love was more than he ought to expect she\nwould answer. He, in short, felt that she might, with good reason, and\nwithout the slightest infringement of her regard for him, object to his\nmarrying so far beneath his station. It was not, therefore, without some\nmisgivings that he entered his mother\u2019s private apartment on the day\nfollowing his adventure at Todshaws, for the purpose of divulging the\nsecret of his attachment, and hinting at the resolution he had formed\nregarding it.\n\n\u201cMother,\u201d he said, after a pause which had been preceded by the usual\naffectionate inquiries of the morning, \u201cyou have often expressed a wish\nthat I would marry.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have, John,\u201d replied the good old lady. \u201cNothing in this world would\nafford me greater gratification than to see you united to a woman who\nshould be every way deserving of you\u2014one with whom you could live\nhappily.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, that last is the great, the important consideration, at least with\nme. But where, mother, am I to find that woman? I have mingled a good\ndeal with the higher ranks of society, and there, certainly, I have not\nbeen able to find her. I am not so uncharitable as to say\u2014nay, God\nforbid I should\u2014that there are not as good, as virtuous, as amiable\nwomen, in the upper classes of society as in the lower. I have no doubt\nthere are. All that I mean to say is, that I have not been fortunate\nenough to find one in that sphere to suit my fancy, and have no hopes of\never doing so. Besides, the feelings, sentiments, and dispositions of\nthese persons, both male and female, are so completely disguised by a\nfactitious manner, and by conventional rules, that you never can\ndiscover what is their real nature and character. They are still\nstrangers to you, however long you may be acquainted with them. You\ncannot tell who or what they are. The roller of fashion reduces them all\nto one level; and, being all clapped into the same mould, they become\nmere repetitions of each other, as like as peas, without exhibiting the\nslightest point of variety. Now, mother,\u201d continued Sir John, \u201cthe wife\nI should like is one whose heart, whose inmost nature, should be at once\nopen to my view, unwarped and undisguised by the customs and fashions of\nthe world.\u201d\n\n\u201cUpon my word, John, you are more than usually eloquent this morning,\u201d\nsaid Lady Gowan, laughing. \u201cBut pray now, do tell me, John, shortly and\nunequivocally, what is the drift of this long, flowery, and very\nsensible speech of yours? for that there is a drift in it I can clearly\nperceive. You are aiming at something which you do not like to plump\nupon me at once.\u201d\n\nSir John looked a good deal confused on finding that his mother\u2019s\nshrewdness had detected a latent purpose in his remarks, and endeavoured\nto evade the acknowledgment of that purpose, until he should have her\nopinion of the observations he had made; and in this he succeeded.\nHaving pressed her on this point\u2014\n\n\u201cWell, my son,\u201d replied Lady Gowan, \u201cif you think that you cannot find a\nwoman in a station of life corresponding to your own that will suit your\ntaste, look for her in any other you please; and, when found, take her.\nConsult your own happiness, John, and in doing so you will consult mine.\nI will not object to your marrying whomsoever you please. All that I\nbargain for is, that she be a perfectly virtuous woman, and of\nirreproachable character; and I don\u2019t think this is being unreasonable.\nBut do now, John, tell me at once,\u201d she added, in a graver tone, and\ntaking her son solemnly by the hand, \u201chave you fixed your affections on\na woman of humble birth and station? I rather suspect this is the case.\u201d\n\n\u201cI have then, mother,\u201d replied Sir John, returning his mother\u2019s\nexpressive and affectionate pressure of the hand; \u201cthe daughter of a\nhumble yeoman, a woman who\u2014\u2014\u201d But we will spare the reader the\ninfliction of the high-flown encomiums of all sorts which Sir John\nlavished on the object of his affections. Suffice it to say, that they\nincluded every quality of both mind and person which go to the adornment\nof the female sex.\n\nWhen he had concluded, Lady Gowan, who made the necessary abatements\nfrom the panegyric her son had passed on the lady of his choice, said\nthat, with regard to his attachment, she could indeed have wished it had\nfallen on one somewhat nearer his own station in life, but that,\nnevertheless, she had no objection whatever to accept of Miss Harrison\nas a daughter-in-law, since she was his choice. \u201cNay,\u201d she added,\nsmiling, \u201cif she only possesses one-tenth\u2014ay, one-tenth, John\u2014of the\ngood qualities with which you have endowed her, I must say you are a\nsingularly fortunate man to have fallen in with such a treasure. But,\nJohn, allow me to say that, old woman as I am, I think that I could very\neasily show you that your prejudices, vulgar prejudices I must call\nthem, against the higher classes of society, are unreasonable, unjust,\nand, I would add, illiberal, and therefore wholly unworthy of you. Does\nthe elegance, the refinement, the accomplishments, the propriety of\nmanner and delicacy of sentiment, to be met with in these circles, go\nfor nothing with you? Does\u2014\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear mother,\u201d here burst in Sir John, \u201cif you please, we will not\nargue the point; for, in truth, I do not feel disposed just now to argue\nabout anything. I presume I am to understand, my ever kind and indulgent\nparent, that I have your full consent to marry Miss Harrison\u2014that is, of\ncourse, if Miss Harrison will marry me?\u201d\n\n\u201cFully and freely, my child,\u201d said the old lady, now flinging her arms\naround her son\u2019s neck, while a tear glistened in her eye; \u201cand may God\nbless your union, and make it happy!\u201d\n\nSir John with no less emotion returned the embrace of his affectionate\nparent, and, in the most grateful language he could command, thanked her\nfor her ready compliance with his wishes.\n\nOn the day following that on which the preceding conversation between\nSir John Gowan and his mother took place, the inmates of Todshaws were\nsurprised at the appearance of a splendid equipage driving up towards\nthe house.\n\n\u201cWha in a\u2019 the world\u2019s this?\u201d said Jeanie to her father, as they both\nstood at the door, looking at the glittering vehicle, as it flashed in\nthe sun and rolled on towards them. \u201cSome travellers that hae mistaen\ntheir road.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery likely,\u201d replied her father; \u201cyet I canna understand what kind o\u2019\na mistake it could be that should bring them to such an out-o\u2019-the-way\nplace as this. It\u2019s no a regular carriage road\u2014that they micht hae seen;\nan\u2019 if they hae gane wrang, they\u2019ll find some difficulty in getting\nricht again. But here they are, sae we\u2019ll sune ken a\u2019 about it.\u201d\n\nAs Mr Harrison said this, the carriage, now at the distance of only some\ntwenty or thirty yards from the house, stopped; a gentleman stepped out,\nand advanced smiling towards Mr Harrison and his daughter. They looked\nsurprised, nay confounded; for they could not at all comprehend who\ntheir visitor was.\n\n\u201cHow do you do, Mr Harrison?\u201d exclaimed the latter, stretching out his\nhand to the person he addressed; \u201cand how do you do, Miss Harrison?\u201d he\nsaid, taking Jeanie next by the hand.\n\nIn the stranger\u2019s tones and manner the acute perceptions of Miss\nHarrison recognised something she had heard and seen before, and the\nrecognition greatly perplexed her; nor was this perplexity lessened by\nthe discovery which she also made, that the countenance of the stranger\nrecalled one which she had seen on some former occasion. In short, the\nperson now before her she thought presented a most extraordinary\nlikeness to the fiddler\u2014only that he had no fiddle, that he was\ninfinitely better dressed, and that his pockets were not sticking out\nwith lumps of cheese and cold beef. That they were the same person,\nhowever, she never dreamed for a moment.\n\nIn his daughter\u2019s perplexity on account of the resemblances alluded to,\nMr Harrison did not participate, as, having paid little or no attention\nto the personal appearance of the fiddler, he detected none of them; and\nit was thus that he replied to the stranger\u2019s courtesies with a gravity\nand coolness which contrasted strangely with the evident embarrassment\nand confusion of his daughter, although she herself did not well know\nhow this accidental resemblance, as she deemed it, should have had such\nan effect upon her.\n\nImmediately after the interchange of the commonplace civilities above\nmentioned had passed between the stranger and Mr Harrison and his\ndaughter\u2014\n\n\u201cMr Harrison,\u201d he said, \u201cmay I have a private word with you?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertainly, sir,\u201d replied the former. And he led the way into a little\nback parlour.\n\n\u201cExcuse us for a few minutes, Miss Harrison,\u201d said the stranger, with a\nsmile, ere he followed, and bowing gallantly to her as he spoke.\n\nOn entering the parlour, Mr Harrison requested the stranger to take a\nseat, and placing himself in another, he awaited the communication of\nhis visitor.\n\n\u201cMr Harrison,\u201d now began the latter, \u201cin the first place, it may be\nproper to inform you that I am Sir John Gowan of Castle Gowan.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d said Mr Harrison, rising from his seat, approaching Sir John, and\nextending his hand towards him; \u201cI am very happy indeed to see Sir John\nGowan. I never had the pleasure of seeing you before, sir; but I have\nheard much of you, and not to your discredit, I assure you, Sir John.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, that is some satisfaction, at any rate, Mr Harrison,\u201d replied the\nbaronet, laughing. \u201cI am glad that my character, since it happens to be\na good one, has been before me. It may be of service to me. But to\nproceed to business. You will hardly recognise in me, my friend, I\ndaresay,\u201d continued Sir John, \u201ca certain fiddler who played to you at a\ncertain wedding lately, and to whose music you and your family danced on\nthe green in front of your own house the other night.\u201d\n\nMr Harrison\u2019s first reply to this extraordinary observation was a broad\nstare of amazement and utter non-comprehension. But after a few minutes\u2019\npause thus employed, \u201cNo, certainly not, sir,\u201d he said, still greatly\nperplexed and amazed. \u201cBut I do not understand you. What is it you mean,\nSir John?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d replied the latter, laughing, \u201cI mean very distinctly that _I_\nwas the musician on both of the occasions alluded to. The\npersonification of such a character has been one of my favourite\nfrolics; and however foolish it may be considered, I trust it will at\nleast be allowed to have been a harmless one.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, this is most extraordinary,\u201d replied Mr Harrison, in great\nastonishment. \u201cCan it be possible? Is it really true, Sir John, or are\nye jesting?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot a bit of that, I assure you, sir. I am in sober earnest. But all\nthis,\u201d continued Sir John, \u201cis but a prelude to the business I came\nupon. To be short, then, Mr Harrison: I saw and particularly marked your\ndaughter on the two occasions alluded to, and the result, in few words,\nis, that I have conceived a very strong attachment to her. Her beauty,\nher cheerfulness, her good temper, and simplicity, have won my heart,\nand I have now come to offer her my hand.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sir John, this\u2014this,\u201d stammered out the astonished farmer, \u201cis\nmore extraordinary still. You do my daughter and myself great honour,\nSir John\u2014great honour, indeed.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot a word of that,\u201d replied the knight, \u201cnot a word of that, Mr\nHarrison. My motives are selfish. I am studying my own happiness, and\ntherefore am not entitled to any acknowledgments of that kind. You, I\nhope, sir, have no objection to accept of me as a son-in-law; and I\ntrust your daughter will have no very serious ones either. Her\naffections, I hope, are not preengaged?\u201d\n\n\u201cNot that I know of, Sir John,\u201d replied Mr Harrison; \u201cindeed, I may\nventure to say positively that they are not. The girl has never yet,\nthat I am aware of, thought of a husband\u2014at least, not more than young\nwomen usually do; and as to my having any objections, Sir John, so far\nfrom that, I feel, I assure you, extremely grateful for such a singular\nmark of your favour and condescension as that you have just mentioned.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd you anticipate no very formidable ones on the part of your\ndaughter?\u201d\n\n\u201cCertainly not, Sir John; it is impossible there should.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you, then, my dear sir,\u201d added Sir John, \u201cbe kind enough to go to\nMiss Harrison and break this matter to her, and I will wait your\nreturn?\u201d\n\nWith this request the farmer instantly complied; and having found his\ndaughter, opened to her at once the extraordinary commission with which\nhe was charged. We would fain describe, but find ourselves wholly\nincompetent to the task, the effect which Mr Harrison\u2019s communication\nhad upon his daughter, and on the other female members of the family, to\nall of whom it was also soon known. There was screaming, shouting,\nlaughing, crying, fear, joy, terror, and amazement, all blended together\nin one tremendous medley, and so loud that it reached the ears of Sir\nJohn himself, who, guessing the cause of it, laughed very heartily at\nthe strange uproar.\n\n\u201cBut, oh! the cauld beef an\u2019 the cheese that I crammed into his pockets,\nfather,\u201d exclaimed Jeanie, running about the room in great agitation.\n\u201cHe\u2019ll never forgie me that\u2014never, never,\u201d she said, in great distress\nof mind. \u201cTo fill a knight\u2019s pockets wi\u2019 dauds o\u2019 beef and cheese! Oh!\ngoodness, goodness! I canna marry him. I canna see him after that. It\u2019s\nimpossible, father\u2014impossible, impossible!\u201d\n\n\u201cIf that be a\u2019 your objections, Jeanie,\u201d replied her father, smiling,\n\u201cwe\u2019ll soon get the better o\u2019t. I\u2019ll undertake to procure ye Sir John\u2019s\nforgiveness for the cauld beef and cheese\u2014that\u2019s if ye think it\nnecessary to ask a man\u2019s pardon for filling his pockets wi\u2019 most\nunexceptionable provender. I wish every honest man\u2019s pouches war as weel\nlined, lassie, as Sir John\u2019s was that nicht.\u201d Saying this, Mr Harrison\nreturned to Sir John, and informed him of the result of his mission,\nwhich was\u2014but this he had rather made out than been told, for Jeanie\ncould not be brought to give any rational answer at all\u2014that his\naddresses would not, he believed, be disagreeable to his daughter,\n\u201cwhich,\u201d he added, \u201cis, I suppose, all that you desire in the meantime,\nSir John.\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing more, nothing more, Mr Harrison; she that\u2019s not worth wooing\u2019s\nnot worth winning. I only desired your consent to my addresses, and a\nregular and honourable introduction to your daughter. The rest belongs\nto me. I will now fight my own battle, since you have cleared the way,\nand only desire that you may wish me success.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat I do with all my heart,\u201d replied the farmer; \u201cand, if I can lend\nyou a hand, I will do it with right good will.\u201d\n\n\u201cThank you, Mr Harrison, thank you,\u201d replied Sir John; \u201cand now, my dear\nsir,\u201d he continued, \u201csince you have so kindly assisted me thus far, will\nyou be good enough to help me just one step farther? Will you now\nintroduce me in my new character to your daughter? Hitherto she has\nknown me only,\u201d he said, smiling as he spoke, \u201cas an itinerant fiddler,\nand I long to meet her on a more serious footing\u2014and on one,\u201d he added,\nagain laughing, \u201cI hope, a trifle more respectable.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat I\u2019ll very willingly do, Sir John,\u201d replied Mr Harrison, smiling in\nhis turn; \u201cbut I must tell you plainly, that I have some doubts of being\nable to prevail on Jane to meet you at this particular moment. She has\none most serious objection to seeing you.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed!\u201d replied Sir John, with an earnestness that betokened some\nalarm. \u201cPray, what is that objection?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, sir,\u201d rejoined the latter, \u201callow me to reply to that question by\nasking you another. Have you any recollection of carrying away out of my\nhouse, on the last night you were here, a pocketful of cheese and cold\nbeef?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! perfectly, perfectly,\u201d said Sir John, laughing, yet somewhat\nperplexed. \u201cMiss Harrison was kind enough to furnish me with the very\nliberal supply of the articles you allude to; cramming them into my\npocket with her own fair hands.\u201d\n\n\u201cJust so,\u201d replied Mr Harrison, now laughing in his turn. \u201cWell, then,\nto tell you a truth, Sir John, Jane is so dreadfully ashamed of that\ncircumstance, that she positively will not face you.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh ho! is that the affair?\u201d exclaimed the delighted baronet. \u201cWhy,\nthen, if she won\u2019t come to us, we\u2019ll go to her; so lead the way, Mr\nHarrison, if you please.\u201d Mr Harrison did lead the way, and Jane was\ncaught.\n\nBeyond this point our story need not be prolonged, as here all its\ninterest ceases. We have only now to add, then, that the winning\nmanners, gentle dispositions, and very elegant person of Sir John Gowan,\nvery soon completed the conquest he aimed at; and Jeanie Harrison, in\ndue time, became LADY GOWAN.\n\n\n\n\n PEAT-CASTING TIME.\n\n BY THOMAS GILLESPIE.\n\n\nIn the olden times, there were certain fixed occasions when labour and\nfrolic went hand in hand\u2014when professional duty and kindhearted glee\nmutually kissed each other. The \u201crockin\u2019\u201d mentioned by Burns\u2014\n\n On Fasten e\u2019en we had a rockin\u2019\u2014\n\nI still see in the dim and hazy distance of the past. It is only under\nthe refractive medium of vigorous recollection that I can again bring up\nto view (as the Witch of Endor did Samuel) those images that have been\nreposing, \u201c\u2019midst the wreck of things that were,\u201d for more than fifty\nyears. Yet my early boyhood was familiar with these social senile and\njuvenile festivities. _There_ still sits Janet Smith, in her toy-mutch\nand check-apron, projecting at intervals the well-filled spindle into\nthe distance. Beside her is Isabel Kirk, elongating and twirling the yet\nunwound thread. Nanny Nivison occupies a _creepy_ on the further side of\nthe fire (making the third Fate!), with her shears. Around, and on\nbedsides, are seated Lizzy Gibson, with her favoured lad; Tam\nKirkpatrick, with his jo Jean on his knee; Rob Paton the stirk-herd; and\nyour humble servant. And \u201cnow the crack gaes round, and who so wilful as\nto put it by?\u201d The story of past times; the report of recent\nlove-matches and miscarriages; the gleeful song, bursting unbid from the\nyoung heart, swelling forth in beauty and in brightness like the waters\nfrom the rock of Meribah; the occasional female remonstrance against\ncertain _welcome_ impertinences, in shape of, \u201cCome now, Tam\u2014nane o\u2019 yer\nnonsense.\u201d \u201cWill! I say, be peaceable, and behave yersel afore folk.\n\u2019Od, ye\u2019ll squeeze the very breath out o\u2019 a body.\u201d\n\n Till, in a social glass o\u2019 strunt,\n They parted off careering\n On sic a night.\n\n I\u2019ve heard a lilting at our ewe-milking.\n\nHow few of the present generation have ever heard of this \u201clilting,\u201d\nexcept in song. It is the gayest and sunniest season of the year. The\nyoung lambs, in their sportive whiteness, are coursing it, and bleating\nit, responsive to their dams, on the hill above. The old ewes on the\nplain are marching\u2014\n\n The labour much of man and dog\u2014\n\nto the pen or fold. The response to the clear-toned bleat of their\nwoolly progeny is given, anon and anon, in a short, broken, low bass. It\nis the raven conversing with the jackdaw! All is bustle, excitement, and\nbadinage.\n\n\u201cWeer up that ewe, Jenny, lass. Wha kens but her woo may yet be a\nblanket for you and ye ken wha to sleep in!\u201d\n\n\u201cHaud yer tongue, Tammie, and gang hame to yer books and yer schoolin.\nTroth, it will be twa days ere the craws dirty your kirk riggin!\u201d\n\nWouf, wouf, wouf!\u2014hee, hee, hee!\u2014hoch, hoch, hoch!\u2014there _in_ they go,\nand in they are, their horny heads wedged over each other, and a trio of\nstout, well-made damsels, with petticoats tied up \u201c_\u00e0 la breeches_,\u201d\ntugging away at their well-filled dugs.\n\n\u201cTroth, Jenny, that ewe will waur ye; \u2019od, I think ye hae gotten haud o\u2019\nthe auld tup himsel. He\u2019s as powerfu, let me tell ye, as auld Francie,\nwham ye kissed sae snug last nicht ayont the peat-mou.\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth, at weel, Tam, ye\u2019re a fearfu liar. They wad be fonder than I am\no\u2019 cock birds wha wad gie tippence for the stite o\u2019 a howlet.\u201d\n\n\u201cHowlet here, howlet there, Jenny, ye ken weel his auld brass will buy\nyou a new pan.\u201d\n\nAt this crisis the crack becomes general and inaudible from its\nuniversality, mixed as it is with the bleating of ewes, the barking of\ndogs, together with the singing of herd-laddies and of your humble\nservant.\n\nHarvest is a blithe time! May all the charms of \u201cSycorax, toads,\nbeetles, bats, light on him\u201d who shall first invent a reaping-machine!\nThe best of all reaping-machines is \u201cthe human _arm_ divine,\u201d whether\nbrawny or muscular, or soft and rounded. The old woman of sixty sits all\nyear long at her domestic occupations\u2014you would deem her incapable of\nany out-door exertions; but, at the sound of the harvest-horn, she\nrenews her youth, and sallies forth into the harvest-field, with hook\nover shoulder, and a heart buoyant with the spirit of the season, to\ntake her place and drive her rig with the youngest there. The half-grown\nboy and girl of fourteen are mingled up in duty and in frolic, in jest\nand jibe, and jeer and laugh, with the stoutest and the most matured.\nMothers and daughters, husbands and wives, and, above and beyond all,\n\u201clads and lasses, lovers gay!\u201d mix and mingle in one united band, for\nhonest labour and exquisite enjoyment; and when at last the joyous kirn\nis won\u2014when the maiden of straw is borne aloft and in triumph, to adorn\nfor twelve months the wall of the farmer\u2019s ben\u2014when the rich and cooling\ncurds-and-cream have been ramhorn-spooned into as many mouths as there\nare persons in the \u201ctoun\u201d\u2014then comes the mighty and long-anticipated\nfestival, the roasted ox, the stewed sheep, the big pot enriched with\nthe cheering and elevating draught, the punch dealt about in ladles and\nin jugs, the inspiring fiddle, the maddening reel, and the Highland\nfling.\n\n _We_ cannot but remember such things were,\n And were most dear to us!\n\nHay harvest, too, had its soft and delicate tints, resembling those of\nthe grain harvest. As the upper rainbow curves and glows with fainter\ncolouring around the interior and the brighter, so did the hay harvest\nof yore anticipate and prefigure, as it were, the other. The hay tedded\nto the sun; the barefooted lass, her locks floating in the breeze, her\ncheeks redolent of youth, and her eyes of joy, scattering or collecting,\ncarting or ricking, the sweetly-scented meadow produce, under a June sun\nand a blue sky!\n\n Oh, to feel as I have felt,\n Or be what I have been!\u2014\n\nthe favoured lover, namely, of that youthful purity, now in its\nfourteenth summer\u2014myself as pure and all unthinking of aught but\naffection the most intense, and feelings the most soft and\nunaccountable.\n\n Ah, little did thy mother think,\n That day she cradled thee,\n What lands thou hadst to travel in,\n What death thou hadst to dee!\n\nPoor Jeanie Johnston! I have seen her, only a few weeks ago, during the\nsittings of the General Assembly, sunk in poverty, emaciated by disease,\nthe wife of an old soldier, himself disabled from work, tenanting a dark\nhovel in Pipe\u2019s Close, Castlehill of Edinburgh.\n\nIn the upper district of Dumfriesshire\u2014the land of my birth, and of all\nthose early associations which cling to me as the mistletoe to the oak,\nand which are equally hallowed with that druidical excrescence\u2014there are\nno coals, but a superabundance of moss; consequently peat-fires _are_\nvery _generally_ still, and _were_, at the time of which I speak,\n_universally_, made use of; and a peat-fire, on a cold, frosty night of\nwinter, when every star is glinting and goggling through the blue, or\nwhen the tempest raves, and\n\n There\u2019s no a star in a\u2019 the cary,\n\nis by no means to be despised. To be sure, it is short-lived\u2014but then it\nkindles soon; it does not, it is true, entertain us with fantastic and\nplayful jets of flame\u2014but then its light is full, united, and steady;\nthe heat which it sends out on all sides is superior to that of coals.\nWood is sullen and sulky, whether in its log or faggot form. It eats\naway into itself, in a cancer ignition. But the blazing peat\u2014\n\n The bleezing ingle, and the clean hearth-stane\u2014\n\nis the very soul of cheerfulness and comfort. But then peats must be\nprepared. They do not grow in hedges, nor vegetate in meadows. They\nmust be cut from the black and consolidated moss; and a\npeculiarly-constructed spade, with a sharp edge and crooked ear, must\nbe made use of for that purpose; and into the field of operation must\nbe brought, at casting-time, the spademen, with their spades; and the\nbarrowmen, and women, boys, and girls, with their barrows; and the\nbreakfast sowans, with their creamy milk, cut and crossed into circles\nand squares; and the dinner stew, with its sappy potatoes and\ngusty-onioned mutton fragments; and the rest at noon, with its active\nsports and feats of agility; and, in particular, with its jumps from\nthe moss-brow into the soft, marshy substance beneath\u2014and _thereby\nhangs my tale_, which shall be as short and simple as possible.\n\nOne of the loveliest visions of my boyhood is Nancy Morrison. She was a\nyear or so older than me; but we went and returned from school together.\nShe was the only daughter of a poor widow woman, who supported herself\nin a romantic glen on the skirts of the Queensberry Hills, by bleaching\nor whitening webs. In those days, the alkalies and acids had not yet\nsuperseded the slower progress of whitening green linen by soap-boiling,\ntrampling, and alternate drying in the sun, and wetting with pure\nrunning water. Many is the time and oft that Nanny and I have wielded\nthe watering-pan, in this fairy, sunny glen, all day long. Whilst the\nhumble-bee boomed past us, the mavis occupied the thorn-tree, and the\nmother of Nanny employed herself in some more laborious department of\nthe same process, Nanny and I have set us down on the greensward\u2014_in\ntenaci gramine_\u2014played at chucks, \u201chead him and cross him,\u201d or some such\namusement. At school, Nanny had ever a faithful defender and avenger in\nme; and I have even purloined apples and gooseberries from the castle\ngarden\u2014and all for the love I bore \u201cto my Nanny, oh!\u201d\n\nI know not that any one has rightly described a first love. It is not\nthe love of man and woman, though that be fervent and terrible; it is\nnot the love of mere boy and girlhood, though that be disinterested and\nengrossing; but it is the love of the period of life which unites the\ntwo. \u201cIs there a man whose blood is warm within him\u201d who does not\nrecollect it? Is there a woman who has passed through the novitiate of\nfifteen, who has not still a distinct impression of the feeling of which\nI speak? It is not sexual, and yet it can only exist betwixt the sexes.\nIt is the sweetest delusion under which the soul of a created being can\npass. It is modest, timid, retiring, bashful; yet, in absence of the\nadored\u2014in seclusion, in meditation, and in dreams\u2014it is bold, resolute,\nand determined. There is no plan, no design, no right conception of\n_cause_; yet the _effect_ is sure and the bliss perfect. Oh, for one\nhour\u2014one little hour\u2014from the thousands which I have idled, sported,\ndreamed away in the company of my darling school-companion, Nancy!\n\nWill Mather was about two years older than Nancy\u2014a fine youth, attending\nthe same school, and evidently an admirer of Nancy. Mine was the love of\ncomparative boyhood; but his was a passion gradually ripening (as the\ncharms of Nancy budded into womanhood) into a manly and matrimonial\nfeeling. I loved the girl merely as such\u2014his eye, his heart, his whole\nsoul were in his future bride. Marriage in no shape ever entered into my\ncomputations; but his eager look and heaving bosom bespoke the definite\npurpose\u2014the anticipated felicity. I don\u2019t know exactly why, but I was\nnever jealous of Will Mather. We were companions; and he was high-souled\nand generous, and stood my friend in many perilous quarrels. I knew that\n_my_ pathway in life was to be afar from that in which Nancy and Will\nwere likely to walk; and I felt in my heart that, dear as this beautiful\nrosebud was to me, I was not _man_ enough\u2014I was not _peasant_ enough to\nwear it in my bosom. Had Nancy on any occasion turned round to be kissed\nby me, I would have fled over muir and dale to avoid her presence; and\nyet I had often a great desire to obtain that favour. Once, indeed, and\nonly once, did I obtain, or rather steal it. She was sitting beside a\nbird\u2019s nest, the young ones of which she was feeding and cherishing\u2014for\nthe parent birds, by the rapacity of a cat, had recently perished. As\nthe little bills were expanding to receive their food, her countenance\nbeamed with pity and benevolence. I never saw even _her_ so lovely; so,\nin a moment, I had her round the neck, and clung to her lips with the\ntenacity of a creature drowning. But, feeling at once the awkwardness of\nmy position, I took to my heels, becoming immediately invisible amidst\nthe surrounding brushwood.\n\nSuch was Will Mather, and such was Nancy Morrison, at the period of\nwhich I am speaking. We must now advance about two or three years in our\nchronology, and find Will possessed of a piece of information which bore\nmaterially on his future fortunes. Will was an illegitimate child. His\nmother had kept the secret so well that he did not know his father,\nthough he had frequently urged her to reveal to him privately all that\nshe knew of his parentage. In conversing, too, with Nancy, his now\naffianced bride, he had expressed similar wishes; whilst she, with a\nbecoming and feminine modesty, had urged him not to press an aged parent\non so delicate a point. At last the old woman was taken seriously ill,\nand, on her death-bed and at midnight, revealed to her son the secret of\nhis birth. He was the son of a proprietor in the parish, and a\nmuch-respected man. The youth, so soon as he had closed his mother\u2019s\neyes, hurried off, amidst the darkness, to the abode of his father, and,\nentering by a window, was in his father\u2019s bed-chamber and over his body\nere he was fully awake.\n\n\u201cJohn Scott!\u201d said the son, in a firm and terrible tone, grasping his\nparent meantime convulsively round the neck, \u201cJohn Scott of\nAuchincleuch, _I am thy son_!\u201d\n\nThe conscience-stricken culprit, being taken by surprise, and almost\nimagining this a supernatural intimation from Heaven, exclaimed, in\ntrembling accents:\n\n\u201cBut who are you that makes this averment?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am thy son, father\u2014oh, I am thy son!\u201d\n\nWill could say no more; for his heart was full, and his tears dropped\nhot and heavy on a father\u2019s face.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d replied the parent, after a convulsive solemn sob\u2014(O Heaven! thou\nart just!)\u2014\u201cyes, thou _art_ indeed my son\u2014my long-denied and ill-used\nboy\u2014whom the fear of the world\u2019s scorn has tempted me, against all the\nyearnings of my better nature, to use so unjustly. But come to my\nbosom\u2014to a father\u2019s bosom _now_, for I know that voice too well to\ndistrust thee.\u201d\n\nIn a few months after this interesting disclosure, John Scott was\nnumbered with his fathers, and Will Scott (no longer Mather) became\nLaird of Auchincleuch.\n\nPoor Nancy was at first somewhat distressed at this discovery, which put\nher betrothed in a position to expect a higher or genteeler match. But\nthere was no cause of alarm. Will was true to the backbone, and would as\nsoon have burned his Bible as have sacrificed his future bride. After\nmuch pressing for an early day on the part of the lover, it was agreed,\nat last, that the marriage should take place at \u201cPeatcasting Time,\u201d and\nthat Nancy should, for the last time, assist at the casting of her\nmother\u2019s peats.\n\nI wish I could stop here, or at least proceed to give you an account of\nthe happy nuptials of Will Scott and Nancy Morrison, the handsomest\ncouple in the parish of Closeburn. But it may not be! These eyes, which\nare still filled (though it is forty-eight years since) with tears, and\nthis pen, which trembles as I proceed, must attest and record the\ncatastrophe.\n\nNancy, the beautiful bride, and I (for I was now on the point of leaving\nschool for college) agreed to have a jump for the last time (often had\nwe jumped before) from a suitable moss-brow.\n\n\u201cMy frolicsome days will sune be ower,\u201d she cried, laughing; \u201cthe\nGudewife of Auchincleuch will hae something else to do than jump frae\nthe moss-brow; and, while my name is Nancy Morrison, I\u2019ll hail the\ndules, or jump wi\u2019 the best o\u2019 my auld playmates.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel dune, Nancy!\u201d cried I; \u201cyou are now to be the wife o\u2019 the Laird o\u2019\nAuchincleuch, when your jumping days will be at an end; and I am soon to\nbe sent to college, where the only jump I may get may be from the top of\na pile of old black-letter folios\u2014no half sae gude a point of advantage\nas the moss-brow.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s the Laird o\u2019 Auchincleuch coming,\u201d cried Peggy Chalmers, one of\nthe peat-casters, who was standing aside, along with several others.\n\u201cHe\u2019s nae langer the daft Will Mather, wha liked a jump as weel as the\nblithest swankie o\u2019 the barnyard. Siller maks sair changes; and yet, wha\nwad exchange the Will Scott of Auchincleuch, your rich bridegroom,\nNancy, for the Will Mather, your auld lover? Dinna tempt Providence, my\nhinny! The laird winna like to see his bride jumpin frae knowe to knowe\nlike a daft giglet, within a week o\u2019 her marriage.\u201d\n\n\u201cTout!\u201d cried Nancy, bursting out into a loud laugh; \u201csee, he\u2019s awa\nround by the Craw Plantin, and winna see us\u2014and whar\u2019s the harm if he\ndid? Come now, Tammie, just ae spring and the last, and I\u2019ll wad ye my\nkame against your cravat, that I beat ye by the length o\u2019 my marriage\nslipper.\u201d\n\n\u201cWeel dune, Nancy!\u201d cried several of the peat-casters, who, leaning on\ntheir spades, stood and looked at us with pleasure and approbation.\n\nThe Laird had, as Nancy said, crossed over by what was called the Craw\nPlantin, and was now out of sight. To make the affair more ludicrous\n(for we were all bent on fun), Nancy took out, from among her high-built\nlocks of auburn hair, her comb\u2014a present from her lover\u2014and impledged it\nin the hands of Billy Watson, along with my cravat, which I had taken\noff, and handed to the umpire.\n\n\u201cHere is a better moss-brow,\u201d cried one, at a distance.\n\nAnd so to be sure it was, for it was much higher than the one we had\nfixed upon, and the landing-place was soft and elastic. Our practice\nwas, always to jump together, so that the points of the toes could be\nmeasured when both the competitors\u2019 feet were still fixed in the moss.\nWe mounted the mossbrow. I was in high spirits, and Nancy could scarcely\ncontain herself for pure, boisterous, laughing glee. I went off, but the\nmad girl could not follow, for she was still holding her sides, and\nlaughing immoderately. I asked her what she laughed at. She could not\ntell. She was under the influence of one of those extraordinary\ncachinations that sometimes convulse our diaphragms, without our being\nable to tell why, and certainly without our being able to put a stop to\nthem. Her face was flushed, and the fire of her glee shone bright in her\neye. I took my position again.\n\n\u201cNow!\u201d cried I; and away we flew, and stuck deeply in the soft and\nspongy moss.\n\nI stood with my feet in the ground, that the umpire might come and mark\nthe distance. A loud scream broke on my ear. I looked round, and,\ndreadful sight! I saw Nancy lying extended on the ground, with the blood\npouring out at her mouth in a large stream! She had burst a\nblood-vessel. The fit of laughing which preceded her effort to leap had,\nin all likelihood, distended her delicate veins, and predisposed her to\nthe unhappy result.\n\nThe loud scream had attracted the notice of the bridegroom, who came\nrunning from the back of the Craw Plantin. The sight appalled and\nstupefied him. He cried for explanation, and ran forward to his dead or\ndying bride, in wild confusion. Several voices essayed an explanation,\nbut none were intelligible. I was as unable as the rest to satisfy the\nunhappy man; but, though we could not speak intelligibly, we could act,\nand several of us lifted her up. This step sealed her fate. The change\nin her position produced another stream of blood. She opened her eyes\nonce, and fixed them for a moment on Will Scott. She then closed them,\nand for ever.\n\nI saw poor Nancy carried home. Will Scott, who upheld her head, fainted\nbefore he proceeded twenty yards, and I was obliged to take his place. I\nwas almost as unfit for the task as himself; for I reproached myself as\nthe cause of her death. I have lived long. Will the image of that\nprocession ever pass from my mind? The blood-stained moss-ground, the\nbleeding body, the trailing clothes, the unbound locks, are all before\nme. I can proceed no further. Would that I could stop the current of my\nthoughts as easily as that of this feathered chronicler of sorrow! But\u2014\n\n There is a silent sorrow here,\n A grief I\u2019ll ne\u2019er impart;\n It breathes no sigh, it sheds no tear,\n But it consumes my heart.\n\nI have taken up my pen to add, that Will Mather still remains a\nbachelor, and that on every visit I make to Dumfriesshire, I take my\ndinner, _solus cum solo_, at Auchincleuch, and that many tears are\nannually shed, over a snug bottle, for poor Nancy.\n\n\n\n\n AN ADVENTURE WITH THE PRESS-GANG.\n\n\nHow goes the press? was, as usual, our first and most anxious inquiry\nwhen the pilot boat came alongside to the westward of Lundy Island. The\nbrief but emphatic reply was, \u201cAs hot as blazes.\u201d Knowing therefore what\nwe had to expect, the second mate and I, and one or two others, applied\nto the captain to set us ashore at Ilfracomb, but he would not listen to\nus. A double-reefed topsail breeze was blowing from the westward, and a\nvigorous flood-tide was setting up channel, enabling us to pass over the\nground about fifteen knots. Such advantages the captain was no way\ndisposed to forego, so that there was nothing for us but to trust to\nProvidence and our stow holes. The breeze flagged towards sunset, and it\nwas not until an hour after dusk that we dropped anchor in Kingroad.\n\nAs soon as the ship was brought up, I stepped in the main rigging to\nlend a hand to furl the topsail, but had not reached the top, when I\nheard the cabin boy calling out in an Irish whisper, \u201cBobstay, down,\ndown, the press-boat is alongside.\u201d I was on deck in a twinkling, and\nwas springing to the after scuttle, when I found myself seized violently\nby the arm. I trembled. It was the same boy that had called me down.\n\u201cThey are already in the mizen chains,\u201d said he; \u201cto the fore scuttle,\nor you are a gone man.\u201d\n\nDown the fore peak I went with the rapidity of lightning, and down\njumped three of the gang after me with little less velocity.\n\n\u201cOho, my tight little fellow,\u201d said one of them, thrusting his cutlass\ndown a crevice over my head; \u201cI see you; out you must come, or here goes\nan inch or two of cold steel into your bread-bag.\u201d\n\nI knew well that I was beyond his reach, and took care to let him have\nall the talk to himself. They rummaged about all over the hold,\nthrusting their cutlasses down every chink they could perceive, but no\none could they find give a single squeak. In about half an hour I heard\nthe well-known voice of the cabin boy calling me on deck. On reaching\nthe deck, I found that the gang had carried off three of our hands, and\nhad expressed their determination to renew their search next day. Of\ncourse my grand object was to get ashore without delay. The moment we\nanchored, the captain had gone off to Bristol to announce his arrival to\nhis owners; and as the mate and I were not on good terms, he refused to\nallow me the use of the ship\u2019s boat. None of the watermen whose boats we\nhailed would come alongside, because if they had been found assisting\nthe crew of merchant vessels to escape the press, they themselves would\nhave been subjected to its grasp. About midnight, however, one waterman\ncame alongside, with whom the love of money overcame the fear of danger,\nand he agreed to pull the second mate, boatswain, and myself ashore, for\nhalf a guinea each. I had brought from the West Indies a small venture\nin sugar, a cask of which, about a hundredweight, I took into the boat\nwith me, to clear present expenses.\n\nShortly after we had shoved off, we found ourselves chased by a long\nboat, which the waterman knew, by the sound of the oars, to be the\nguard-boat. How we did pull! But it seemed in vain; we found it would be\nimpossible to reach the landing-place, so we pulled for the nearest\npoint of land. The moment the boat touched the ground, I took the cask\nof sugar on my shoulder, and expecting solid ground under the boat\u2019s\nbows, jumped ashore. Instead of solid ground, I found myself above the\nknees in mud. The guard-boat was within a hundred yards of the shore,\nand what was to be done! All that a man has will he give for his\nliberty, so away went the cask of sugar. Thus lightened, I soon\nscrambled out, when the three of us scampered off as fast as it was\npossible for feet to carry us. What became of the waterman, or his boat,\nor my cask of sugar, we never knew; nor did we think of stopping to\nbreathe or look round us, till we reached the town of Peel, where by a\nblazing fire and over a dish of beef-steaks, and a few tankards of brown\nstout, we soon forgot our dangers and our fears.\n\nOur residence here, as far as liberty was concerned, was pretty nearly\non a par with prison residence. The second mate and I lodged together,\nand during daylight we never durst show our faces, except, perhaps,\nbetween four and six in the morning, when we sometimes took a ramble in\na neighbouring burying-ground, to read epitaphs; and this, from the love\nof the English to poetical ones, was equivalent to the loan of a volume\nof poetry. But Time\u2019s pinions seemed in our eyes loaded with lead, and\nwe were often inclined to sing with the plaintive swain,\n\n Ah! no, soft and slow\n The time it winna pass,\n The shadow of the trysting thorn,\n Is tether\u2019d on the grass.\n\nAnd had it not been for the kindly attentions of our landlord\u2019s two\nhandsome daughters, to whose eyebrows we indited stanzas, I know not how\nwe would have got the time killed.\n\nSnug as we thought ourselves, the press-gang had by some means or other\nbeen put on the scent, and one day very nearly pounced on us. So\ncautious had they been in their visit, that their approach was not\nperceived until they were actually in the kitchen. Fortunately we were\nat this time in an upper room, and one of the daughters rightly judging\nof the purpose of their visit, flew upstairs to warn us of our danger,\nand point out a place of safety. This place was above the ceiling, and\nthe only access to it was through a hole in the wall a little way up the\nvent. It was constructed as a secure place to lodge a little brandy or\ngeneva, that sometimes found its way to the house, without having been\npolluted with the exciseman\u2019s rod. It was excellently adapted to our\npurpose, and the entrance to it was speedily pointed out by our pretty\nlittle guardian angel. Up the vent we sprung like a brace of chimney\nsweeps, and had scarcely reached our place of concealment, when the gang\nrushed upstairs, burst open the door, and began to rummage every corner\nof the room. The bed was turned out, the presses all minutely examined,\nand even the vent itself underwent a scrutiny, but no seamen could be\nfound.\n\n\u201cTell us, my young lady, whereabout you have stowed away them there\nfellows, for we knows they are in the house?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat fellows?\u201d said the dear little girl, with a composure which we\nthought it impossible for her to assume so soon after her violent\ntrepidation.\n\n\u201cWhy, them there fellows as came ashore from one of the West Indiamen\nt\u2019other day; we knows they are here, and are determined to have \u2019em.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou have certainly been misinformed,\u201d said she; \u201cyou are welcome to\nsearch the house, but be assured you will find no such men here.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome, come, my little fair un, that is all in my eye and Betty Martin.\nHere they are, this is certain, and we are determined to make our\nquarters good till we find them out;\u201d and away they went to search the\nother apartments of the house.\n\nMeanwhile our charming little protectress, alarmed at the threatened\nsiege, and fearing that we would be starved into a surrender, took the\nopportunity, while the gang were rummaging the parlour and some other\nbedrooms, to supply our garrison with provisions. A basket with boiled\nham, a couple of capons, a household loaf of ample dimensions,\nhalf-a-dozen of brown stout, the family bottle of excellent stingo, and\na can of water, were expeditiously handed up the vent. This supply set\nour minds quite at ease, as we knew it would enable us to stand a week\u2019s\nclose siege. Our patience, however, was not put to this trial, for the\ngang, after a two hours\u2019 vigilant search, abandoned their pursuit in\ndespair, and departed.\n\nWe could not, of course, think of venturing up to Bristol to look after\nour wages, so we employed our landlord to perform this duty. After a\ngood many vexatious delays, we succeeded in getting our money, paid off\nall scores, and began to think how we were to dispose of ourselves. My\ncompanion Lindsay was so deeply smitten with the charms of one of the\nyouthful sirens, that he found it impossible to depart; and I had to\nconcert all my future projects alone, and leave him bound in Cupid\u2019s\nsilken chain.\n\nMy blue jacket and fringed dimity trousers, my check shirt and scarlet\nvest, were at once discarded, and their places supplied by articles of a\nmore landward appearance. I knew that it would be impossible to travel\nthe country safely in seaman\u2019s dress, so I determined to try my fortune\nas a beau. The body of Bill Bobstay incased in a ruffled shirt, silk\nvest, white stockings, breeches buttoned at the knees, and a\nswallow-tailed coat, presented such a curious spectacle, that he himself\ncould scarcely help laughing at it, and it seemed to produce the same\neffects on the landlord\u2019s daughter, as she with a witching smile chucked\nup my chin, until she arranged the bights and ends of my white\nneckcloth, according to the most approved form. She took as long to\nperform this little office as I could have rigged _in toto_, and seamen\nare never backward in acts of courtesy, when the ladies are concerned.\nHer ruby lips were all the while within marlingspike\u2019s length of my own,\nand how could I avoid saluting them?\n\nThus equipped, I set out on foot for Bath, but as I had no business to\nperform in that city of invalided nabobs, I immediately took coach for\nLondon, and after travelling all night, I, on awaking from a short nap,\nfound myself rattling over the stones at Hyde Park corner.\n\nMy object was to procure a passage to the northward, in one of the Leith\nor Berwick smacks, and I expected in eight or ten days, after an absence\nof as many years, to set foot once more on my native soil. As soon\ntherefore as the coach stopped in Piccadilly, I alighted, and knowing\nthe bearing by compass of London Bridge, I, without waiting to\nbreakfast, winded my way through the Haymarket, past Charing Cross,\nalong the Strand, Fleet Street, and Ludgate Hill, till I arrived at St\nPaul\u2019s. From this point I took a fresh departure, and holding as nearly\nas cross streets would admit, a south-easterly course, gained Thames\nStreet, and soon found myself in the vicinity of the Tower.\n\nSmartly as I had moved my body along, my imagination, as is usual with\nme, had got a long way a-head. It had obtained a passage, secured a fair\nwind, landed me on the pier of Leith, and was arranging my introductory\nvisit to my friends, so as to produce the greatest sum of agreeable\nsurprise. But there is much, says the old proverb, between the cup and\nthe lip. In the midst of this agreeable reverie, as I was crossing Tower\nHill, I found myself tapped on the shoulder, and on looking round, was\naccosted by a man in seaman\u2019s dress in the words, \u201cWhat ship?\u201d I assumed\nan air of gravity and surprise, and told him I apprehended he was under\nsome mistake, as my business did not lie among shipping. But the fellow\nwas too well acquainted with his business to be thus easily put off. He\ngave a whistle, the sound of which still vibrates in my ear, and in a\nmoment I was surrounded by half-a-dozen ruffians, whom I immediately\nsuspected, and soon found out to be the press-gang. They dragged me\nhurriedly through several lanes and alleys, amid the mingled sympathy\nand execrations of a numerous crowd, which had collected to witness my\nfate, and soon landed me in the rendezvous. I was immediately ushered\ninto the presence of the lieutenant of the gang, who questioned me as to\nmy name, country, profession, and what business had led me to Tower\nHill. Totally unexpecting any such interruption, I had not thought of\nconcocting any plausible story, and my answers were evasive and\ncontradictory. I did not acknowledge having been at sea; but my hands\nwere examined, found hard with work, and discoloured with tar. This\ncircumstance condemned me, and I was remanded for further examination.\n\nSome of the gang then offered me spirits, affected to pity me, and\npretended to comfort me under my misfortune, but like the comforters of\nJob, miserable comforters were they all. The very scoundrel who first\nseized me put on a sympathising look, and observed what a pity it was to\nbe disappointed when so near the object of my wishes. Such sympathy from\nsuch a source was truly provoking; but having no way of showing my\nresentment, I was constrained to smother it.\n\nIn a short time I was reconducted into the presence of the lieutenant,\nwho told me, as I was already in his hands, and would assuredly be kept,\nI might as well make a frank confession of my circumstances. It would\nsave time, and insure me better treatment. What could I do? I might\nindeed have continued silent and sullen, but of what service could this\nprove? It might, or might not, have procured me worse treatment, but one\nthing I knew well, it would not restore me to liberty. I therefore\nacknowledged that I had been a voyage to the West Indies, and had come\nhome carpenter of a ship. His eye brightened at this intelligence.\n\n\u201cI am glad of this, my lad. We are very much in want of carpenters. Step\nalong with these lads, and they will give you a passage aboard.\u201d\n\nThe same fellows who had first seized me led me along the way we came,\nhanded me into a pinnace lying at Tower Wharf, and before mid-day I was\nsafely handed on board the Enterprize.\n\nWhat crosses and vexations, and reverses and disappointments, are we\nmortals destined to meet with in life\u2019s tempestuous voyage! At eight in\nthe morning I entered London a free agent, elated with joy, and buoyed\nup with hope. At noon I entered a prison ship, a miserable slave,\noppressed with sorrow, and ready to despair.\n\nDespair, did I say? No. I will have nothing to do with that disturber of\nhuman peace. When misfortune befalls us, we are not to sit down in\ndespondency and sigh. Up and be doing, is the wise man\u2019s maxim, and it\nwas the maxim I was resolved to observe. What befell me on my arrival on\nboard the Enterprize, what reception I met with, and what mirth I\nexcited as I was lowered into the press-room, with my short breeches and\nswallow-tailed coat\u2014what measures I exerted to regain my liberty, and\nwhat success attended these measures\u2014the space at my disposal prevents\nme setting forth.\u2014_Paisley Magazine._\n\n\n\n\n THE LAIRD OF COOL\u2019S GHOST.\n\n\nUpon the 3d day of February 1722 at seven o\u2019clock in the evening, after\nI had parted with Thurston, and coming up the burial road, one came up\nriding after me. Upon hearing the noise of the horse\u2019s feet, I took it\nto be Thurston; but looking back, and seeing the horse of a gray colour,\nI called, \u201cWho\u2019s there?\u201d The answer was, \u201cThe Laird of Cool; be not\nafraid.\u201d Looking to him with the little light the moon afforded, I took\nhim to be Collector Castlelaw, who had a mind to put a trick upon me,\nand immediately I struck with all my force with my cane, thinking I\nwould leave a mark upon him that would make him remember his\npresumption; but although sensible I aimed as well as ever I did in my\nlife, yet my cane finding no resistance, but flying out of my hand to\nthe distance of sixty feet, and observing it by its white head, I\ndismounted and took it up, but had some difficulty in mounting again,\npartly by reason of a certain sort of trembling throughout my whole\njoints, something also of anger had its share in my confusion; for\nthough he laughed when my staff flew out of my hand, coming up with him\nagain (who halted all the time I was seeking my staff), I asked him once\nmore who he was? He answered, \u201cThe Laird of Cool.\u201d I inquired, first, if\nhe was the Laird of Cool; secondly, what brought him thither? and\nthirdly, what was his business with me? He answered, \u201cThe reason that I\nwant you is, that I know you are disposed to do for me what none of your\nbrethren in Nithsdale will so much as attempt, though it serve never so\ngood a purpose.\u201d I told him I would never refuse to do anything to serve\na good purpose, if I thought I was obliged to do it as my duty. He\nanswered, that I had undertaken what few in Nithsdale would, for he had\ntried several persons on that subject, who were more obliged to him than\nI was to any person living. Upon this I drew my bridle reins, and asked\nin surprise, what I had undertaken? He answered, \u201cThat on Sabbath last,\nI heard you condemned Mr Paton, and the other ministers of Dumfries, for\ndissuading Mr Menzies from keeping his appointment with me; and if you\nhad been in their place, would have persuaded the lad to do as I\ndesired, and that you would have gone with him yourself, if he had been\nafraid; and if you had been in Mr Paton\u2019s place, you would have\ndelivered my commissions yourself, as they tended to do several persons\njustice.\u201d I asked him, \u201cPray, Cool, who informed you that I talked at\nthat rate?\u201d to which he answered, \u201cYou must know that we are acquainted\nwith many things that the living know nothing about; these things you\ndid say, and much more to that purpose, and deliver my commissions to my\nloving wife.\u201d Upon this I said, \u201c\u2019Tis a pity, Cool, that you who know so\nmany things should not know the difference between an absolute and\nconditional promise; I did, indeed, at the time you mention, blame Mr\nPaton, for I thought him justly blamable, in hindering the lad to meet\nwith you, and if I had been in his place, I would have acted quite the\nreverse; but I did never say, that if you would come to Innerwick and\nemploy me, that I would go all the way to Dumfries on such an errand;\nthat is what never so much as entered into my thoughts.\u201d He answered,\n\u201cWhat were your thoughts I don\u2019t pretend to know, but I can depend on my\ninformation these were your words. But I see you are in some disorder; I\nwill wait upon you when you have more presence of mind.\u201d\n\nBy this time we were at James Dickson\u2019s enclosure, below the churchyard;\nand when I was recollecting in my mind, if ever I had spoken these words\nhe alleged, he broke off from me through the churchyard, with greater\nviolence than any man on horseback is capable of, with such a singing\nand buzzing noise, as put me in greater disorder than I was in all the\ntime I was with him. I came to my house, and my wife observed more than\nordinary paleness in my countenance, and alleged that something ailed\nme. I called for a dram, and told her I was a little uneasy. After I\nfound myself a little refreshed, I went to my closet to meditate on this\nmost astonishing adventure.\n\nUpon the 5th of March 1722, being at Harehead, baptizing the shepherd\u2019s\nchild, I came off about sunsetting, and near William White\u2019s march, the\nLaird of Cool came up with me as formerly; and after his first\nsalutation bade me not be afraid. I told him I was not in the least\nafraid, in the name of God and Christ my Saviour, that he would do me\nthe least harm; for I knew that He in whom I trusted was stronger than\nall they put together; and if any of them should attempt to do, even to\nthe horse that I ride upon, as you have done to Doctor Menzies\u2019 man, I\nhave free access to complain to my Lord and Master, to the lash to whose\nresentment you are as liable now as before.\n\n_Cool._ You need not multiply words on that head, for you are safe with\nme; and safer, if safer can be, than when I was alive.\n\n_Ogil._ Well then, Cool, let me have a peaceable and easy conversation\nwith you for the time we ride together, and give me some information\nconcerning the affairs of the other world, for no man inclines to lose\nhis time in conversing with the dead, without hearing or learning\nsomething useful.\n\n_Cool._ Well, sir, I will satisfy you as far as I think proper and\nconvenient. Let me know what information you want.\n\n_Ogil._ May I then ask you, if you be in a state of happiness or not?\n\n_Cool._ There are a great many things I can answer that the living are\nignorant of; there are a great many things that, notwithstanding the\nadditional knowledge I have acquired since my death, I cannot answer;\nand there are a great many questions you may start, of which the last is\none that I will not answer.\n\n_Ogil._ Then I know how to manage our conversation; whatever I inquire\nof you, I see you can easily shift me; to that I might profit more by\nconversing with myself.\n\n_Cool._ You may try.\n\n_Ogil._ Well, then, what sort of a body is that you appear in; and what\nsort of a horse is that you ride upon, which appears to be so full of\nmettle?\n\n_Cool._ You may depend upon it, it is not the same body that I was\nwitness to your marriage in, nor in which I died, for that is in the\ngrave rotting; but it is such a body as serves me in a moment, for I can\nfly as fleet with it as my soul can do without it; so that I can go to\nDumfries, and return again, before you can ride twice the length of your\nhorse; nay, if I have a mind to go to London, or Jerusalem, or to the\nmoon, if you please, I can perform all these journeys equally soon, for\nit costs me nothing but a thought or wish: for this body is as fleet as\nyour thought, for in the moment of time you can turn your thoughts on\nRome, I can go there in person; and as for my horse, he is much like\nmyself, for he is Andrew Johnston, my tenant, who died forty-eight hours\nbefore me.\n\n_Ogil._ So it seems when Andrew Johnston inclines to ride, you must\nserve him in the quality of a horse, as he does you now.\n\n_Cool._ You are mistaken.\n\n_Ogil._ I thought that all distinctions between mistresses and maids,\nlairds and tenants, had been done away at death.\n\n_Cool._ True it is, but you do not take up the matter.\n\n_Ogil._ This is one of the questions you won\u2019t answer.\n\n_Cool._ You are mistaken, for the question I can answer, and after you\nmay understand it.\n\n_Ogil._ Well then, Cool, have you never yet appeared before God, nor\nreceived any sentence from Him as a Judge?\n\n_Cool._ Never yet.\n\n_Ogil._ I know you was a scholar, Cool, and \u2019tis generally believed\nthere is a private judgment, besides the general at the great day, the\nformer immediately after death. Upon this he interrupted me, arguing.\n\n_Cool._ No such thing, no such thing! No trial; no trial till the great\nday! The heaven which good men enjoy after death consists only in the\nserenity of their minds, and the satisfaction of a good conscience; and\nthe certain hopes they have of eternal joy, when that day shall come.\nThe punishment or hell of the wicked, immediately after death, consists\nin the stings of an awakened conscience, and the terrors of facing the\ngreat Judge, and the sensible apprehensions of eternal torments ensuing!\nAnd this bears still a due proportion to the evils they did when living.\nSo indeed the state of some good folks differ but little in happiness\nfrom what they enjoyed in the world, save only that they are free from\nthe body, and the sins and sorrows that attended it. On the other hand,\nthere are some who may be said rather not to have been good, than that\nthey are wicked; while living, their state is not easily distinguished\nfrom that of the former; and under that class comes a great herd of\nsouls\u2014a vast number of ignorant people, who have not much minded the\naffairs of eternity, but at the same time have lived in much indolence,\nignorance, and innocence.\n\n_Ogil._ I thought that their rejecting the terms of salvation offered\nwas sufficient ground for God to punish them with eternal displeasure;\nand as to their ignorance, that could never excuse them, since they live\nin a place of the world where the true knowledge of these things might\nhave been easily attained.\n\n_Cool._ They never properly rejected the terms of salvation; they never,\nstrictly speaking, rejected Christ; poor souls, they had as great a\nliking both to Him and heaven, as their gross imaginations were capable\nof. Impartial reason must make many allowances, as the stupidity of\ntheir parents, want of education, distance from people of good sense and\nknowledge, and the uninterrupted applications they were obliged to give\nto their secular affairs for their daily bread, the impious treachery of\ntheir pastors, who persuaded them, that if they were of such a party all\nwas well; and many other considerations which God, who is pure and\nperfect reason itself, will not overlook. These are not so much under\nthe load of Divine displeasure, as they are out of His grace and favour;\nand you know it is one thing to be discouraged, and quite another thing\nto be persecuted with all the power and rage of an incensed earthly\nking. I assure you, men\u2019s faces are not more various and different in\nthe world, than their circumstances are after death.\n\n_Ogil._ I am loath to believe all that you have said at this time, Cool\n(but I will not dispute those matters with you), because some things you\nhave advanced seem to contradict the Scriptures, which I shall always\nlook upon as the infallible truth of God. For I find, in the parable of\nDives and Lazarus, that the one was immediately after death carried up\nby the angels into Abraham\u2019s bosom, and the other immediately thrust\ndown to hell.\n\n_Cool._ Excuse me, sir, that does not contradict one word that I have\nsaid; but you seem not to understand the parable, whose only end is to\nillustrate the truth, that a man may be very happy and flourishing in\nthis world, and wretched and miserable in the next; and that a man maybe\nmiserable in this world, and happy and glorious in the next.\n\n_Ogil._ Be it so, Cool, I shall yield that point to you, and pass to\nanother, which has afforded me much speculation since our last\nencounter; and that is, How you came to know that I talked after the\nmanner that I did concerning Mr Paton, on the first Sabbath of February\nlast? Was you present with me, but invisible? He answered very\nhaughtily, No, sir, I was not present myself. I answered, I would not\nhave you angry, Cool. I proposed this question for my own satisfaction;\nbut if you don\u2019t think proper to answer, let it pass. After he had\npaused, with his eyes on the ground, for three or four minutes of time\nat most, with some haste and seeming cheerfulness, he says\u2014\n\n_Cool._ Well, sir, I will satisfy you in that point. You must know that\nthere are sent from heaven angels to guard and comfort, and to do other\ngood services to good people, and even the spirits of good men departed\nare employed in that errand.\n\n_Ogil._ And do you not think that every man has a good angel?\n\n_Cool._ No, but a great many particular men have: there are but few\nhouses of distinction especially, but what have at least one attending\nthem; and from what you have already heard of spirits, it is no\ndifficult matter to understand how they may be serviceable to each\nparticular member, though at different places at a great distance. Many\nare the good offices which the good angels do to them that fear God,\nthough many times they are not sensible of it: and I know assuredly,\nthat one powerful angel, or even an active clever soul departed, may be\nsufficient for some villages; but for your great cities, such as London,\nEdinburgh, or the like, there is one great angel that has the\nsuperintendence of the whole; and there are inferior angels, or souls\ndeparted, to whose particular care such a man, of such a particular\nweight or business, is committed. Now, sir, the kingdom of Satan does\nape the kingdom of Christ as much in matters of politics as can be, well\nknowing that the court of wisdom is from above; so that from thence are\nsent out missionaries in the same order. But because the kingdom of\nSatan is much better replenished than the other, instead of one devil\nthere are in many instances two or three commissioned to attend a\nparticular family of influence and distinction.\n\n_Ogil._ I read that there are ten thousand times ten thousand of angels\nthat wait upon God, and sing His praise and do His will; and I cannot\nunderstand how the good angels can be inferior in number to the evil.\n\n_Cool._ Did not I say, that whatever the number be, the spirits departed\nare employed in the same business; so that as to the number of original\ndeities, whereof Satan is chief, I cannot determine, but you need not\ndoubt but there are more souls departed in that place, which in a loose\nsense you call hell, by almost an infinity, than what are gone to that\nplace, which, in a like sense, you call heaven, which likewise are\nemployed in the same purpose; and I can assure you that there is as\ngreat a difference between angels, both good and bad, as there is among\nmen, with respect to their sense, knowledge, cunning, cleverness, and\naction; nay, which is more, the departed souls on both sides outdo\nseverals, from their very first departure, of the original angels. This\nyou will perhaps think a paradox, but is true.\n\n_Ogil._ I do not doubt it; but what is that to my question, about which\nI am solicitous?\n\n_Cool._ Take a little patience, sir; from what I have said you might\nhave understood me, if you had your thoughts about you; but I shall\nexplain myself to you. Both the good and the bad angels have stated\ntimes of rendezvous, and the principal angels, who have the charge\neither of towns, cities, or kingdoms, not to mention particular persons,\nvillages, and families, and all that is transacted in these several\nparts of the country, are there made open; and at their re-encounter on\neach side, every thing is told, as in your parish, in milns, kilns, and\nsmithies, with this difference, that many things false are talked at the\nliving re-encounters, but nothing but what is exact truth is said or\ntold among the dead; only I must observe to you, that, as I am credibly\ninformed, several of the inferior bad angels, and souls of wicked men\ndeparted, have told many things that they have done, and then when a\nmore intelligent spirit is sent out upon inquiry, and the report of the\nformer seeming doubtful, he brings in a contrary report, and makes it\nappear truth, the former fares very ill: nevertheless their regard to\ntruth prevents it; for while they observe the truth, they do their\nbusiness and keep their station, for God is truth.\n\n_Ogil._ So much truth being among the good angels, I am apt to think\nthat lies and falsehood will be as much in vogue among the bad.\n\n_Cool._ A gross mistake, and it is not alone the mistake which the\nliving folks fall under with respect to the other world; for the case\nplainly is this: an ill man will not stick at a falsehood to promote his\ndesign; as little will an evil soul departed stop at anything that can\nmake himself successful; but in admitting report he must tell the truth,\nor woe be to him. But besides their monthly, quarterly, or yearly\nmeetings, or whatever they be, departed souls acquainted may take a trip\nto see one another yearly, weekly, daily, or oftener, if they please.\nThus, then, I answer your question that you was so much concerned about;\nfor my information was from no less than three persons, viz., Aikman,\nwho attends Thurston\u2019s family; James Corbet, who waits upon Mr Paton;\nfor at that time he was then looking after Mrs Sarah Paton, who was at\nyour house, and an original emissary appointed to wait upon yours.\n\nAt this I was much surprised, and after a little thinking, I asked him,\nAnd is their really, Cool, an emissary from hell, in whatever sense you\ntake it, that attends my family?\n\n_Cool._ You may depend upon it.\n\n_Ogil._ And what do you think is his business?\n\n_Cool._ To divert you from your duty, and cause you to do as many ill\nthings as he can; for much depends on having the minister on their side.\n\nUpon this I was struck with a sort of terror, which I cannot account\nfor. In the meantime he said several things I did not understand. But\nafter coming to my former presence of mind, said\u2014\n\n_Ogil._ But, Cool, tell me, in earnest, if there be a devil that attends\nmy family, though invisible.\n\n_Cool._ Just as sure as you are breathing; but be not so much dejected\nupon this information, for I tell you likewise that there is a good\nangel who attends you, who is stronger than the other.\n\n_Ogil._ Are you sure of that, Cool?\n\n_Cool._ Yes; there is one riding on your right hand, who might as well\nhave been elsewhere, for I meant you no harm.\n\n_Ogil._ And how long has he been with me?\n\n_Cool._ Only since we passed Brand\u2019s Lee, but now he is gone.\n\n_Ogil._ We are just upon Elenscleugh, and I desire to part with you,\nthough perhaps I have gained more by conversation than I could have\notherwise done in a twelvemonth. I choose rather to see you another\ntime, when you\u2019re at leisure, and I wish it were at as great a distance\nfrom Innerwick as you can.\n\n_Cool._ Be it so, sir; but I hope you will be as obliging to me next\nre-encounter, as I have been to you this.\n\n_Ogil._ I promise you I will, as far as is consistent with my duty to my\nLord and Master Christ Jesus; and since you have obliged me so much by\ninformation, I will answer all the questions you propose, as far as\nconsists with my knowledge; but I believe you want no information from\nme.\n\n_Cool._ I came not here to be instructed by you, but I want your help of\nanother kind.\n\nUpon the 5th of April 1722, as I was returning from Old Hamstocks, Cool\ncame up with me on horseback at the foot of the ruinous enclosure,\nbefore we came to Dod. I told him his last conversation had proved so\nacceptable to me, that I was well pleased to see him again; that there\nwas a number of things that I wanted to inform myself further of, if he\nwould be so good as satisfy me.\n\n_Cool._ Last time we met, I refused you nothing you asked; and now I\nexpect that you shall refuse me nothing that I shall ask.\n\n_Ogil._ Nothing, sir, that is in my power, or that I can do with safety\nto my reputation and character. What, then, are your demands?\n\n_Cool._ All that I desire of you is, that as you promised that on a\nSabbath-day you would go to my wife, who now possesses all my effects,\nand tell her the following particulars\u2014tell her in my name to rectify\nthese matters:\u2014First, That I was owing justly to Provost Crosby \u00a350\nScots, and three years\u2019 interest, but on hearing of his death, my\ngood-brother the Laird of C\u2014l and I forged a discharge, narrated the\nbond, the sum, and other particulars, with this honourable clause, \u201cAnd\nat the time it had fallen by, and could not be found;\u201d with an\nobligation on the provost\u2019s part to deliver up this bond as soon as he\ncould hit upon it. And this discharge was dated three months before the\nprovost\u2019s death. And when his son and successor, Andrew Crosby, wrote to\nme concerning this bond, I came to him and showed him the forged\ndischarge, which silenced him; so that I got up my bond without more\nado. And when I heard of Robert Kennedy\u2019s death, with the same help of\nC\u2014l, I got a bill upon him for \u00a3190, of which I got full and complete\npayment. C\u2014l got the half. When I was at Dumfries, the same day that\nRobert Grier died, to whom I was owing an account of \u00a336, C\u2014l, my\ngood-brother, was then at London; and not being able of myself, being\nbut a bad writer, to make out a discharge of the account, which I\nwanted, I met accidently with one Robert Boyd, a poor writer lad in\nDumfries; I took him to Mrs Carnock\u2019s, and gave him a bottle of wine,\nand told him I had paid Thomas Grier\u2019s account, but had neglected to get\na discharge, and if he would help me to one I would reward him. He flew\naway from me in a great passion, saying, he would rather be hanged; but\nif I had a mind for these things, I had better wait till C\u2014l came home.\nThis gave me great trouble, fearing what C\u2014l and I had done formerly was\nno secret. I followed Boyd to the street, and made an apology, saying, I\nwas jesting, commending him for his honesty, and got his promise never\nto repeat what had passed. I sent for my Cousin B\u2014m H\u2014rie, your\ngood-brother, who, with no difficulty, for a guinea and a half,\nundertook and performed all that I wanted; and for a guinea more made me\nup a discharge for \u00a3200 Scots that I was owing to your father-in-law and\nhis friend Mr Muirhead, which discharge I gave to John Ewart, when he\ndesired the money; and he, at my desire, produced it to you, which you\nsustained.\n\nA great many of the like instances were told, of which I cannot remember\nthe persons, names, and things; but, says he, what vexes me more than\nall these, is the injustice I did Homer Maxwell, tenant to my Lord\nNithsdale, for whom I was factor. I borrowed \u00a32000 from him, \u00a3500 of\nwhich he borrowed from another hand: I gave him my bond, and, for\nreasons I contrived, I obliged him to secrecy. He died within the year,\nand left nine children, his wife being dead before himself. I came to\nseal up his papers for my lord\u2019s security; his eldest daughter entreated\nme to look through them all, and to give her an account of what was\ntheir stock and what was their debt. I very willingly undertook it; and\nin going through the papers, I put my own bond in my pocket. His\ncircumstances proving bad, his nine children are now starving. These\nthings I desire you to represent to my wife, and take her brother with\nyou, and let them be immediately rectified, for she has a sufficient\nfund to do it upon; and if it were done, I think I would be easy, and\ntherefore I hope you will make no delay.\n\nAfter a short pause, I answered, \u2019Tis a good errand, Cool, you are\nsending me to do justice to the oppressed and injured; but\nnotwithstanding I see myself come in for \u00a3200 Scots, yet I beg a little\ntime to consider the matter. And since I find you are as much master of\nreason now as ever, and more than ever, I will reason upon the matter in\nits general view, and then with respect to the expediency of my being\nthe messenger; and this I will do with all manner of frankness. From\nwhat you have said, I see clearly what your present condition is, so\nthat I need not ask any more questions on that head; and you need not\nbid me take courage, for at this moment I am no more afraid of you than\na new-born child.\n\n_Cool._ Well, say on.\n\n_Ogil._ Tell me, then, since such is your ability that you can fly a\nthousand miles in the twinkling of an eye, if your desire to do the\noppressed justice be as great as you pretend, what\u2019s the reason you\ndon\u2019t fly to the coffers of some rich Jew or banker, where are thousands\nof gold and silver, invisibly lift, and invisibly return it to the\ncoffers of the injured? And since your wife has sufficient funds, and\nmore, why cannot you empty her purse invisibly, to make these people\namends?\n\n_Cool._ Because I cannot.\n\n_Ogil._ You have satisfied me entirely upon that head. But pray, Cool,\nwhat is the reason that you cannot go to your wife yourself, and tell\nher what you have a mind? I should think this a more sure way to gain\nyour point.\n\n_Cool._ Because I will not.\n\n_Ogil._ That is not an answer to me, Cool.\n\n_Cool._ That is one of the questions that I told you long ago I would\nnot answer: but if you go as I desire, I promise to give you full\nsatisfaction after you have done your business. Trust me for once, and\nbelieve me I will not disappoint you.\n\nUpon the 10th of April 1722, coming from Old Cambus, upon the post-road,\nI met with Cool on the head of the heath called the Pees. He asked me,\nif I had considered the matter he had recommended? I told him I had, and\nwas in the same opinion I was in when we parted; that I would not\npossibly undertake his commissions, unless he could give me them in\nwriting under his hand. I told him that the list of his grievances were\nso great that I could not possibly remember them without being put in\nwriting; and that I wanted nothing but reason to determine me in that,\nand all other affairs of my life.\n\n\u201cI know,\u201d says he, \u201cthis is a mere evasion: but tell me if the Laird of\nThurston will do it?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am sure,\u201d said I, \u201che will not; and if he should, I would do all that\nI could to hinder him; for I think he has as little to do in these\nmatters as myself. But tell me, Cool, is it not as easy to write your\nstory as tell it, or ride on what-do-ye-call-him? for I have forgot your\nhorse\u2019s name.\u201d\n\n_Cool._ No, sir, it is not; and perhaps I may convince you of the\nreasonableness of it afterwards.\n\n_Ogil._ I would be glad to hear a reason that is solid for not speaking\nto your wife yourself; but, however, any rational creature may see what\na fool I would make of myself, if I would go to Dumfries, and tell your\nwife you had appeared to me, and told so many forgeries and villanies\nthat you had committed, and that she behoved to make reparation; the\nconsequence might perhaps be, that she would scold me; for she would be\nloath to part with any money she possesses, and therefore tell me I was\nmad, or possibly pursue me for calumny. How would I vindicate myself;\nhow could I prove that you ever spoke with me? Mr Paton and other\nministers in Dumfries would tell me the devil had spoken with me; and\nwhy should I repeat these things for truth which he, that was a liar\nfrom the beginning, had told me? C\u2014p\u2014l and B\u2014r\u2014 H\u2014rie would be upon me,\nand pursue me before the commissary; everybody would look upon me as\nbrain-sick or mad: therefore, I entreat you, do not insist upon sending\nme so ridiculous an errand. The reasonableness of my demands I leave to\nyour own consideration, as you did your former to mine. But dropping the\nmatter till our next interview, give me leave to enter upon some more\ndiverting subject. I do not know, Cool, but the information you have\ngiven may do as much service to mankind, as the redress of all these\ngrievances I would amount to. Mr Ogilvie died very soon after.\u2014_Old Chap\nBook._\n\n\n\n\n ALLAN-A-SOP.\n\n BY SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n\nThe MacLeans, a bold and hardy race, who, originally followers of the\nLords of the Isles, had assumed independence, seized upon great part\nboth of the Isle of Mull and the still more valuable island of Islay,\nand made war on the MacDonalds with various success. There is a story\nbelonging to this clan, which I may tell you, as giving another striking\npicture of the manners of the Hebrideans.\n\nThe chief of the clan, MacLean of Duart, in the Isle of Mull, had an\nintrigue with a beautiful young woman of his own clan, who bore a son to\nhim. In consequence of the child\u2019s being, by some accident, born on a\nheap of straw, he received the name of Allan-a-Sop, or Allan of the\nStraw, by which he was distinguished from others of his clan. As his\nfather and mother were not married, Allan was, of course, a bastard, or\nnatural son, and had no inheritance to look for, save that which he\nmight win for himself.\n\nBut the beauty of the boy\u2019s mother having captivated a man of rank in\nthe clan, called MacLean of Torloisk, he married her, and took her to\nreside with him at his castle of Torloisk, situated on the shores of the\nsound, or small strait of the sea, which divides the smaller island of\nUlva from that of Mull. Allan-a-Sop paid his mother frequent visits at\nher new residence, and she was naturally glad to see the poor boy, both\nfrom affection, and on account of his personal strength and beauty,\nwhich distinguished him above other youths of his age. But she was\nobliged to confer marks of her attachment on him as privately as she\ncould, for Allan\u2019s visits were by no means so acceptable to her husband\nas to herself. Indeed, Torloisk liked so little to see the lad, that he\ndetermined to put some affront on him, which should prevent his\nreturning to the castle for some time. An opportunity for executing his\npurpose soon occurred.\n\nThe lady one morning, looking from the window, saw her son coming\nwandering down the hill, and hastened to put a girdle cake upon the\nfire, that he might have hot bread for breakfast. Something called her\nout of the apartment after making this preparation, and her husband,\nentering at the same time, saw at once what she had been about, and\ndetermined to give the boy such a reception as should disgust him for\nthe future. He snatched the cake from the girdle, thrust it into his\nstepson\u2019s hands, which he forcibly closed on the scalding bread, saying,\n\u201cHere, Allan, here is a cake which your mother has got ready for your\nbreakfast.\u201d Allan\u2019s hands were severely burnt; and, being a sharp-witted\nand proud boy, he resented this mark of his step-father\u2019s ill-will, and\ncame not again to Torloisk.\n\nAt this time the western seas were covered with the vessels of pirates,\nwho, not unlike the sea-kings of Denmark at an early period, sometimes\nsettled and made conquests on the islands. Allan-a-Sop was young,\nstrong, and brave to desperation. He entered as a mariner on board of\none of these ships, and in process of time obtained the command, first\nof one galley, then of a small flotilla, with which he sailed round the\nseas and collected considerable plunder, until his name became both\nfeared and famous. At length he proposed to himself to pay a visit to\nhis mother, whom he had not seen for many years; and setting sail for\nthis purpose, he anchored one morning in the sound of Ulva, and in front\nof the house of Torloisk. His mother was dead, but his step-father, to\nwhom he was now as much an object of fear as he had been formerly of\naversion, hastened to the shore to receive his formidable stepson, with\ngreat affectation of kindness and interest in his prosperity; while\nAllan-a-Sop, who, though very rough and hasty, does not appear to have\nbeen sullen or vindictive, seemed to take his kind reception in good\npart.\n\nThe crafty old man succeeded so well, as he thought, in securing Allan\u2019s\nfriendship, and obliterating all recollections of the former affront put\non him, that he began to think it possible to employ his stepson in\nexecuting his own private revenge upon MacQuarrie of Ulva, with whom, as\nwas usual between such neighbours, he had some feud. With this purpose,\nhe offered what he called the following good advice to his stepson:\u2014\u201cMy\ndear Allan, you have now wandered over the seas long enough: it is time\nyou should have some footing upon land\u2014a castle to protect yourself in\nwinter, a village and cattle for your men, and a harbour to lay up your\ngalleys. Now, here is the island of Ulva, near at hand, which lies ready\nfor your occupation, and it will cost you no trouble, save that of\nputting to death the present proprietor, the Laird of MacQuarrie, a\nuseless old carle, who has cumbered the world long enough.\u201d\n\nAllan-a-Sop thanked his step-father for so happy a suggestion, which he\ndeclared he would put in execution forthwith. Accordingly, setting sail\nthe next morning, he appeared before MacQuarrie\u2019s house an hour before\nnoon. The old chief of Ulva was much alarmed at the menacing apparition\nof so many galleys, and his anxiety was not lessened by the news that\nthey were commanded by the redoubted Allan-a-Sop. Having no effectual\nmeans of resistance, MacQuarrie, who was a man of shrewd sense, saw no\nalternative save that of receiving the invaders, whatever might be their\npurpose, with all outward demonstrations of joy and satisfaction; the\nmore especially as he recollected having taken some occasional notice of\nAllan during his early youth, which he now resolved to make the most of.\nAccordingly, MacQuarrie caused immediate preparations to be made for a\nbanquet, as splendid as circumstances admitted, hastened down to the\nshore to meet the rover, and welcomed him to Ulva with such an\nappearance of sincerity, that the pirate found it impossible to pick any\nquarrel, which might afford a pretence for executing the violent purpose\nwhich he had been led to meditate.\n\nThey feasted together the whole day; and, in the evening, as Allan-a-Sop\nwas about to retire to his ships, he thanked the laird for his\nhospitality, but remarked, with a sigh, that it had cost him very dear.\n\n\u201cHow can that be,\u201d said MacQuarrie, \u201cwhen I bestowed this entertainment\nupon you in free goodwill?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is true, my friend,\u201d replied the pirate, \u201cbut then it has quite\ndisconcerted the purpose for which I came hither; which was to put you\nto death, my good friend, and seize upon your house and island, and so\nsettle myself in the world. It would have been very convenient for me,\nthis island of Ulva; but your friendly reception has rendered it\nimpossible for me to execute my purpose, so that I must be a wanderer on\nthe seas for some time longer.\u201d\n\nWhatever MacQuarrie felt at learning he had been so near to destruction,\nhe took care to show no emotion save surprise, and replied to his\nvisitor: \u201cMy dear Allan, who was it that put into your mind so unkind a\npurpose towards your old friend; for I am sure it never arose from your\nown generous nature? It must have been old Torloisk, who made such an\nindifferent husband to your mother, and such an unfriendly step-father\nto you when you were a helpless boy; but now, when he sees you a bold\nand powerful leader, he desires to make a quarrel betwixt you and those\nwho were the friends of your youth. If you consider this matter rightly,\nAllan, you will see that the estate and harbour of Torloisk lie to the\nfull as conveniently for you as those of Ulva, and that, if you are\ndisposed (as is very natural) to make a settlement by force, it is much\nbetter it should be at the expense of the old churl, who never showed\nyou kindness or countenance, than at that of a friend like me, who\nalways loved and honoured you.\u201d\n\nAllan-a-Sop was struck with the justice of this reasoning; and the old\noffence of his scalded fingers was suddenly recalled to his mind. \u201cIt is\nvery true what you say, MacQuarrie,\u201d he replied, \u201cand, besides, I have\nnot forgotten what a hot breakfast my step-father treated me to one\nmorning. Farewell for the present; you shall soon hear news of me from\nthe other side of the Sound.\u201d Having said thus much, the pirate got on\nboard, and commanding his men to unmoor the galleys, sailed back to\nTorloisk, and prepared to land in arms. MacLean hastened to meet him, in\nexpectation to hear of the death of his enemy, MacQuarrie. But Allan\ngreeted him in a very different manner from what he expected.\n\n\u201cYou hoary old traitor,\u201d he said, \u201cyou instigated my simple good-nature\nto murder a better man than yourself! But have you forgotten how you\nscorched my fingers twenty years ago with a burning cake? The day is\ncome that that breakfast must be paid for.\u201d\n\nSo saying, he dashed out the old man\u2019s brains with a battle-axe, took\npossession of his castle and property, and established there a\ndistinguished branch of the clan of MacLean.\u2014_From Tales of a\nGrandfather._\n\n\n\n\n JOHN HETHERINGTON\u2019S DREAM.\n\n\nIn a certain small town in the south of Scotland, there lived, about\nthree years ago, a very respectable tailor, of the name of John\nHetherington\u2014that is to say, John wore well with the world; but, like\ntoo many of his craft, he was sorely addicted to cabbaging. Not a coat\ncould he make, not a pair of trousers could he cut out, not a waistcoat\ncould he stitch up, but he must have a patch of this, that, and t\u2019other,\nwere it for no other purpose but just to serve as a bit of a memorial.\nOne very warm evening towards the end of August 1826, John had gone to\nbed rather earlier than usual, but not without having laid in a very\ngood share of a very tasty Welsh rabbit; which said rabbit, being\ncomposed of about a pound of tough cheese, of course furnished the poor\ntailor, after he had fairly tumbled over into the land of Nod, with\nsomething of a very curious Welsh-rabbit vision. It suddenly struck him\nthat this life, with all its cares and anxieties, was over with him;\nthat the finishing stitch had been put to the great work of life, and\nthe thread of his existence cut through. In the other world, to his\nmisfortune, he found things not moving so comfortably as he would have\nwished; and the old gentleman with the short horns and the long tail,\nrigged out in his best suit of black, was the first friend he\nforgathered with after passing the border.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s a fine morning,\u201d said the wily old dog; \u201chow do you find\nyourself after long travel?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo that weel,\u201d stammered out the half-dead son of a goose; \u201cno that\nweel; and I dinna think, all things considered, it would benefit me much\nto be found in such company, no offence to your reverence,\u201d as he saw\nhis new friend\u2019s choler rise; \u201cno offence to your reverence, I trust;\nbut if I may be so bold, I would thank you to tell me the reason of my\nbeing here; and, above all, who\u2019s to be thankit for the honour of an\nintroduction to your reverence?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat you will know shortly, friend; nay, John Hetherington, for you see\nI know you;\u201d and taking a large parcel from below his left arm, he\ncommenced to unroll it, and to the astonishment of poor John, unfolded a\nlong sheet of patchwork, in which were found scraps of every hue, a web\nof many colours, all neatly stitched together; and in the middle, by way\nof a set off, a large bit of most excellent blue cloth, which had been\ncabbaged that very morning from a prime piece which he had got into his\nhands for the purpose of making a marriage coat for his neighbour the\nblacksmith.\n\n\u201cWas all this stuff got fairly and honestly, good man?\u201d said the old\ngentleman, with a sneer quite worthy of Beelzebub. \u201cI suppose you will\nbe able to recognise some of these old bits. What think you now of that\npiece in the middle which your eyes are fixed on\u2014cabbaged no farther\nback than this morning? Come along, my old boy, come along; you are a\ntrue son of your old father, I see, and I will furnish you with as warm\nwinter quarters as you ever enjoyed when you was half-stewed with your\nold maiden aunt, at the top of fifteen pair of stairs in the High Street\nof Edinburgh, when serving your apprenticeship with Dick Mouleypouches.\u201d\n\nA cold sweat broke over the poor tailor, and he felt as if he could have\nsunk snugly into the earth, if it had only had the goodness to open at\nthat moment for his especial accommodation, when he saw the long bony\narm stretched out, with its sharp eagle claws, to clutch him: he made a\nsharp bolt back, and giving vent to his feelings in a loud and long\nhowl, which rung horribly in his ears long after opening his eyes, he\nfound himself sprawling in the middle of his wooden floor, with all the\nbed-clothes tumbled above him. It was the first breaking out of a fine\nmorning: the sun was rising, and all nature looked fresh and fair; but\npoor John was at the point of death with sheer bodily fear and\ntrembling, so that to get to bed again, and to sleep, would have been\nmartyrdom; therefore he huddled on his clothes, and walked out \u201cto snuff\nthe caller air,\u201d and muse over his wonderful dream. The more he thought\nof it, the more he saw the necessity of reforming his mode of life; and,\nbefore finishing his stroll, he was an altered man, and had made up his\nmind never more to cabbage an inch of cloth; and, by walking circumspect\nand just, he trusted that his past offences might be wiped out, and that\nthe wonderful web of many colours should no more be brought up as\nevidence against him. To make him the more secure in the event of\nforgetfulness in the hour of temptation, his foreman was let into the\ngreat secret, and had orders at all times to rub up his remembrance when\nthere was any thing good going, which he used to do by the laconic\nphrase of, \u201cMaster, mind the sheet!\u201d\n\nA year passed over, and the terror of the dream being yet fresh in his\nmemory, John\u2019s transactions were strictly honest. He could cut out with\nsomewhat more considerable ease, and had lost a good deal the knack of\ncutting out the sly piece at the corner. But, alas! for the stability of\nall human resolutions, our friend was sorely tempted, and how he stood\nwe shall soon see. He had got to hand a beautiful piece of red cloth,\nfor what purpose I know not, whether for the coat of a field officer, or\nthe back of a fox hunter, but a prime piece of cloth that was; he turned\nit over to this side, and back to that, viewed it in all lights and\nshades, rubbed it against the grain, and found it faultless. He had\nnever seen such a fine piece of cloth before\u2014scissors had never before\ncut such immaculate stuff. He fixed his eye wistfully on a tempting\ncorner, looked up, and his foreman John was staring firmly in his face:\nhe had read his thoughts.\n\n\u201cMaster, mind the sheet!\u201d solemnly ejaculated John.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m just swithering, John; I\u2019m just swithering: now when I mind, there\nwasna a piece of red cloth in all the sheet; and mair by token, there\nwas a bit gap at one of the corners. Now, I\u2019m just thinking, since it\nmaun be that all these bit odds and ends are to be evidence against me\nwhen I come to the lang count, it would be better to snick a bit aff the\ncorner here; and that you see, John, will fill all deficiencies, and mak\nthe sheet, since it maun appear against me, evidence, John, without a\nflaw!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n BLACK JOE O\u2019 THE BOW.\n\n BY JAMES SMITH.\n\n\nIn the days no sae very lang syne, when the auld West Bow o\u2019 Edinburgh\nwas in the deadthraw o\u2019 its glory, there lived an auld blackymore named\nJoe Johnson. He was weel kent through a\u2019 the toun for his great\ningenuity in makin\u2019 ships an\u2019 automaton figures\u2014something like the\n\u201cPunch and Judy\u201d o\u2019 present times, but mair exquisitely finished\nan\u2019\u2014what d\u2019ye ca\u2019 that fine word?\u2014_artistic_?\u2014that\u2019s it. Aweel, this\nman, commonly ca\u2019d Black Joe, lived up a lang stair in the Bow, on the\nricht-hand side gaun doun. He made his livin\u2019 in simmer by the bonnie\nbits o\u2019 ships he made, displaying them for sale at the front gate o\u2019\nHeriot\u2019s Wark, in Lauriston; an\u2019 whiles he took a change at the drum an\u2019\npan-pipes, wi\u2019 a wee doggie ca\u2019d Pincher, that stood on its hint-legs\nwhen Joe was playin\u2019, wi\u2019 a tin saucer in its mouth to haud the coppers.\nSometimes, when Joe was playin\u2019, and naething was comin\u2019 in, the dog wad\nbite somebody\u2019s leg by mistake to vary the entertainment, to Joe\u2019s\nunspeakable delight. But this was often followed by somebody roaring\noot\u2014\u201cHorselip! Horselip!\u201d an\u2019 then the drumstick flew through the crowd\nat somebody\u2019s head, an\u2019 Joe was generally marched to the office between\ntwa policemen. But for a\u2019 his fiery temper when roused, he had a kind,\ncanny way wi\u2019 him when civilly treated, an\u2019 wadna hae wranged a livin\u2019\ncratur.\n\nWhen the lang winter nichts set in, Joe had a show at the fit o\u2019 his\nstair; an\u2019 aften the Bow rang wi\u2019 his drum an\u2019 pan-pipes, as he stood at\nthe outside o\u2019 the show, wi\u2019 a lichtit paper lantern stuck up in front,\nwhereon was painted a rough sketch o\u2019 Billy Button on the road to\nBrentford, the Babes in the Wood, Tam o\u2019 Shanter on his mare Meg,\npursued by the witches, wi\u2019 Cutty Sark makin\u2019 a catch at Maggie\u2019s tail,\nor some ither scenic representation. Whiles, when Joe was burstin\u2019 his\nblack face in the middle o\u2019 a fine tune, some ragged imp wad roar\u2014\n\n Hey cocky dawdy, hey cocky dow\u2014\n Horselip, Horselip\u2019s comin doun the Bow,\n Wi\u2019 his drum an\u2019 his pipe, an\u2019 his pipe, pipe, pipe!\n\nDoun went the drum, an\u2019 aff ran Joe after the malicious urchin, the\ndoggie first and foremost in the chase. For whether the beast had been\ntrained, or acted through the force o\u2019 instinct, certain it is, that nae\nsooner was its maister ca\u2019d \u201cHorselip,\u201d than aff it sprang, an\u2019 fixed\nits teeth in the shins o\u2019 the first ane that cam in its way.\n\nThere was ae New Year\u2019s nicht that an unco mess took place wi\u2019 Joe\u2019s\nshow. There was a wee funny dancin\u2019 figure o\u2019 a man that the laddies aye\nca\u2019d \u201cTooral\u201d\u2014ane o\u2019 the best figures in the show. This figure was on\nthe stage singin\u2019 \u201cTooraladdy,\u201d an\u2019 he was at the last verse\u2014\n\n Tak the pan an\u2019 break his head\u2014\n Tooraladdy, tooraladdy;\n That\u2019s a\u2019 as fac\u2019 as death\u2014\n\nwhen a wild loon, that had been lookin\u2019 on wi\u2019 a greedy e\u2019e an\u2019 a watery\nmouth at the figures a\u2019 nicht, unable ony langer to resist temptation,\nmade a dart at \u201cTooral,\u201d and vanished wi\u2019 him oot o\u2019 the show. This\ncreated an unco commotion, for when the folk begoud to rise up in the\ngallery\u2014it was a\u2019 gallery thegither\u2014as Joe rushed out after the thief,\ncryin\u2019 \u201cPolish! polish! polish!\u2014catch a thief! catch a thief!\u201d the whole\nrickety concern cam doun wi\u2019 a great crash. But they didna fa\u2019 far; for\nit wasna muckle mair than five or six inches frae the ground\na\u2019thegither. But the thief was never gotten that nicht, tho\u2019 it\u2019s a\nconsolation to ken that he was banished shortly afterwards for stealin\u2019\na broon tammy an\u2019 a quarter o\u2019 saut butter frae a puir widdy woman, as\nshe was comin\u2019 out o\u2019 a provision shop in the Canongate.\n\nBut Joe was thrown into sic a state wi\u2019 rinnin\u2019 through the toun after\nthe thief, that next day he was delirious wi\u2019 a ragin\u2019 fever. My mither\nlived but an\u2019 ben wi\u2019 Joe; an\u2019 it was while gaun in noo an\u2019 then to see\nhow the puir body was doing, that a strange interest in Joe\u2019s history\nwas awakened in her breast. For he had cam oot wi\u2019 some very strange\nexpressions when lyin\u2019 in the delirious state. Ance or twice he cried,\n\u201cMe nebber shoot massa\u2014me nebber shoot massa. Major murder him broder\u2014me\nsee \u2019im do it. Got pistol yet\u2014me tell truth\u2014me no tell lie;\u201d an\u2019 sae he\nwad gang ravin\u2019 on at this gait for hours. When at last the fever had\nabated, an\u2019 Joe was able to come ben an\u2019 sit doun by my mither\u2019s\nfireside, she asked him, in her ain canny way, if he wadna like to gang\nback again to his native country. But the black fell a tremblin\u2019, an\u2019\nshook his head, sayin\u2019 \u201cNebber\u2014nebber\u2014nebber more!\u201d This roused my\nmither\u2019s curiosity to the highest pitch, for she was convinced noo, mair\nthan ever, that some dark history was locked up in the African\u2019s breast.\nAe day, a while after this, Joe cam ben an\u2019 sat doun by the fireside, as\nusual; for though the day was scorching hot, being in the heat o\u2019\nsimmer, the cratur was aye shiverin\u2019 and cowerin\u2019 wi\u2019 the cauld. Takin\noot his cutty pipe, as usual, he began to fill\u2019t, sayin\u2019\u2014\u201cMissy, me no\nlib long; me no strength\u2014me weak as water\u2014me no happy\u2014wish \u2019im was\ndead.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat way that?\u201d asked my mither; \u201cby my faith, ye\u2019ll live mony a lang\nday yet. Deein\u2019! deil the fear o\u2019 ye!\u201d\n\nBut Joe aye shook his head.\n\n\u201cJoe,\u201d says my mither, takin\u2019 his puir wasted hand in her ain, \u201cthere\u2019s\nsomething mair than weakness the matter wi\u2019 ye. I ken that, whatever ye\nmay say; and the best thing for ye to do\u2019s to mak a clean breast o\u2019t.\nWhatever ye may say to me, I promise shall be as secret as the grave. Ye\nken me ower weel to doot that.\u201d\n\nJoe lookit earnestly in her face, an\u2019 syne at the door. My mither\ncannily closed the door, an\u2019 sat doun beside him. Then the nigger,\ncautioning her to mind her promise, telt her a story that sent her to\nher bed that nicht wi\u2019 a gey quaking heart. But as this story wadna be\nrichtly understood to gie\u2019t in the nigger\u2019s strange broken English, I\u2019ll\ntell\u2019t in my ain way.\n\nTen years before Joe cam to Edinburgh, baith him an\u2019 his wife were\nslaves on Zedekiah Gilroy\u2019s plantation in Jamaica. This Zedekiah Gilroy\nwas the second son o\u2019 Colonel Gilroy, o\u2019 Hawkesneb Hoose. I mind o\u2019 the\nplace mysel\u2019 as weel as if it were yesterday; for mony a time I\u2019ve\npassed it on the road to my aunty\u2019s at Cockleburgh. It\u2019s a gude fourteen\nhours\u2019 journey frae Edinburgh\u2014try\u2019t ony day ye like. Aweel, the eldest\nson o\u2019 this Colonel Gilroy had gotten a commission in the East India\nCompany, an\u2019 had risen to the rank o\u2019 major in ane o\u2019 the native\nregiments; but brocht himsel\u2019 into disgrace there by causing the death\no\u2019 ane o\u2019 his servants wi\u2019 his merciless cruelty, an\u2019 was obliged to\nsell oot, an\u2019 come hame in disgrace. He hadna been lang hame, when a\nletter cam frae his brither, requesting him to come oot an\u2019 look after\nhis estate, for he had been twice attacked by yellow fever, an\u2019 was\nutterly incompetent to look after\u2019t. His overseers, he said, were rivin\u2019\nhim oot o\u2019 hoose an\u2019 ha\u2019, an\u2019 a\u2019thing was gaun wrang thegither. His wife\nhad been struck doun by the same fell disease, an\u2019 a lowness o\u2019 spirits\nhad ta\u2019en possession o\u2019 him, that a\u2019 the luxuries o\u2019 high life an\u2019\nplenty o\u2019 siller couldna diminish. His only wish was to see his brither\noot beside him, an\u2019 tak for a while the oversicht o\u2019 his affairs, till\nhealth an\u2019 strength blessed him ance mair. Aweel, under a\u2019 thae\ncircumstances, the auld colonel advised his son to gang oot an\u2019 do his\nbest to help his brither in his sair extremity. Sae the major, wi\u2019 an\nunco show o\u2019 reluctance, at last consented, an\u2019 aff he gaed to Jamaica,\nto play the deevil there, as he had done before in the East Indies.\n\nMajor Gilroy wasna lang at Jamaica when an unco change for the waur took\nplace. There was naething but orderin\u2019, cursin\u2019, swearin\u2019, an\u2019 lashin\u2019\no\u2019 slaves frae mornin\u2019 till nicht. Joe\u2019s wife was amang the first that\nsuccumbed to the murderous whip, an\u2019 Joe himsel\u2019 cam in for mair than\nhis share. Rumours soon began to spread that the maister himsel\u2019 was\ntyrannised ower by his brither. He was ane o\u2019 the very kindest o\u2019\nmaisters to his slaves, until his brither cam like a frosty blicht, and\nfilled the whole estate wi\u2019 lamentation. Sae this state o\u2019 things gaed\non for nearly six months, when ae day Joe, exasperated at the inhuman\ntreatment he was receivin\u2019 at the major\u2019s instigation, took leg-bail to\nthe sea-shore, an\u2019 hid himsel\u2019 amang the cliffs. There he lurked, day\nafter day, crawlin\u2019 oot at nicht to gather shell-fish an\u2019 dulse frae the\nrocks, an\u2019 castin\u2019 his e\u2019e ower the wide watery waste for the welcome\nsicht o\u2019 a sail to bear him frae the accursed spot. Mair than ance he\nhad heard the shouts o\u2019 the manhunters on his track, intermingling wi\u2019\nthe terrible bay o\u2019 the bluidhound. But a\u2019 their vigilance was eluded by\nthe impregnable nature o\u2019 his position, high up amang the rocks.\n\nOn the morning o\u2019 the thirteenth day after his escape, he cautiously\nemerged frae his high den, an\u2019 looked around him as usual. The air was\nintensely hot, an\u2019 dark-red masses o\u2019 cloud were fast drivin\u2019 through a\nblack, lowering sky, the certain presage o\u2019 a fearfu\u2019 storm. The sea lay\ncalm and still, for there wasna a breath o\u2019 wind stirring, an\u2019 flocks o\u2019\nsea-birds were filling the sultry air wi\u2019 their harsh, discordant cries.\nSuddenly a flash o\u2019 forked lichtnin\u2019 illumined the black, murky sky, an\u2019\na loud clap o\u2019 thunder reverberated amang the mountains. Then the\nlichtnin\u2019 an\u2019 thunder became incessant, the sea lashed itsel\u2019 into foam\nan\u2019 fury, an\u2019 the rain poured doun in torrents. As the slave surveyed\nthe elements thus ragin\u2019 in a\u2019 their terrific grandeur, the distant\nsound o\u2019 carriage-wheels caught his ear. Nearer an\u2019 nearer they cam,\ntill he recognised a gig driven by the major comin\u2019 on at a rattlin\u2019\npace. His brither sat beside him, propped up wi\u2019 shawls and cushions,\nan\u2019 appeared to be at that moment in an attitude o\u2019 earnest entreaty;\nwhile every noo and then the faint sound o\u2019 voices in noisy altercation\nwas borne on the gale that noo roared ower land an\u2019 sea, though what\nthey said it was utterly impossible to distinguish. The slave looked on,\nfirst in astonishment, an\u2019 syne in horror; for, instead o\u2019 turnin\u2019 the\nhorse\u2019s head hamewards as the storm cam on, the major persisted in\ndrivin\u2019 richt on through the sands as the spring-tide was fast cornin\u2019\nin, in spite o\u2019 the agonised entreaties o\u2019 his brither to turn. At last\nthe gig was stopped, as the horse, plunging and restive, went up to the\nmiddle in water. Then a deadly struggle took place that lasted scarcely\na minute, when the report o\u2019 a pistol reverberated amid the thunder, an\u2019\nthe next instant the body o\u2019 the invalid was hurled into the roaring\nsurge. Then, indeed, the horse\u2019s head was turned hameward, an\u2019 aff went\nthe gig in richt earnest, but no before a wild yell o\u2019 execration frae\nthe cliff warned the murderer that the deed had been witnessed by mair\nthan the e\u2019e o\u2019 God abune. Scarcely had the sound o\u2019 the wheels died\naway, when the slave descended the lofty precipitous rocks wi\u2019 the\nagility o\u2019 a wild cat, an\u2019 plunged into the sea to save, if it were yet\npossible, his puir maister. But the dark purple streaks on the surface\no\u2019 the water where the deed was accomplished telt, ower fearfully, that\nthe sharks were already thrang at their horrid wark, an\u2019 that a\u2019 hope o\u2019\nsaving him, if he werena clean deid after the pistol-shot was fired, was\nfor ever gane. Therefore he reluctantly swam back to the shore, wi\u2019\nbarely enough o\u2019 time to save himsel\u2019. Before scaling the cliff, he\nlifted the pistol that the murderer, in the hurry an\u2019 confusion o\u2019 the\nmoment, had left behind him on the beach. This incident filled the slave\nwi\u2019 fresh alarm, for it was certain the major wad come back for\u2019t before\nlang. Sae a\u2019 that nicht he wearied sair for the mornin\u2019 to come in.\nSlowly at last the storm subsided, as the first pale streaks o\u2019 dawn\nwere visible in the horizon; an\u2019 as the daylicht lengthened mair an\u2019\nmair, he saw a dark speck floating on the waves, that on a nearer\napproach proved to be a boat that had burst frae its moorings frae some\nship in the distant harbour. Fervently thanking God for this\nprovidential means o\u2019 deliverance, he descended frae his friendly\nshelter for the last time, an\u2019 boldly struck out for the boat, which he\nreached in safety. Seizing the oars, he steered oot to the open sea, wi\u2019\na fervent prayer that the dark drizzly fog that enveloped the ocean wad\ncontinue to shield him, for a time, frae his merciless enemy, till some\nfriendly ship wad tak him up. It was high time; for he hadna gi\u2019en\nhalf-a-dozen strokes, when the sound o\u2019 angry voices, among which was\nthe major\u2019s, was borne on the breeze, an\u2019 again the deep-toned bay o\u2019\nthe bluidhound nerved his arms wi\u2019 a\u2019 the energy o\u2019 desperation. Farther\nan\u2019 farther oot he gaed, battling wi\u2019 the heavily swelling rollers that\nthreatened every moment to engulph the boat he steered sae bravely. For\nmony a lang and weary hour he struggled wi\u2019 the giant waves, enveloped\nin fog, till the darkness o\u2019 nicht had nearly set in; an\u2019 he was fast\ngi\u2019en up a\u2019 hopes o\u2019 succour, when the tout o\u2019 a horn near at hand\nwarned him that a ship was bearing doun upon him. He had barely time to\nsteer oot o\u2019 her way, when he was hailed by the captain, an\u2019 asked where\nhe cam frae. Joe made answer that he was the sole survivor o\u2019 the\n_Nancy_, bound for England, that had sprung a leak, an\u2019 foundered in\nlast nicht\u2019s gale. At that moment a terrible wave capsized the boat, and\nJoe was struggling in the water. But a rope was flung oot to him, an\u2019 he\nspeedily drew himsel\u2019 on board. This circumstance o\u2019 the boat\u2019s being\nswamped was a mercy for Joe; for had the name o\u2019 the ship she belanged\nto met the captain\u2019s e\u2019e, the lee wad hae been fand oot, an\u2019 it micht\nhae fared waur wi\u2019 him. But the captain treated Joe wi\u2019 great kindness,\nand telt him he micht work his passage to Leith, which was the port o\u2019\ntheir destination. The vessel was a Leith trader named the _William and\nMary_, an\u2019 was on her passage hame frae the Island o\u2019 Cuba.\n\nHere, let it be remembered, Joe wasna to be blamed a\u2019thegither for the\ndoonricht lee he telt the captain. He was a rinaway slave in the first\nplace, an\u2019 had the captain kent the truth, it\u2019s mair than likely he wad\nhae delivered him up at the first port he touched at on the voyage hame.\nIn the second place, there was nae ither witness o\u2019 the fearfu\u2019 crime\nbinna himsel\u2019; an\u2019 he had the tact to see that evidence resting on the\nsole testimony o\u2019 a rinaway slave, mair especially when that slave micht\nbe reasonably suspected o\u2019 vindictive feelings against the murderer, wad\nbe treated wi\u2019 scorn an\u2019 indignation, an\u2019 even add to the horrors o\u2019 his\nain death. Therefore Joe kept his ain coonsel, and when the vessel\narrived at Leith, he wandered up to Edinburgh, and resided for mony a\nlang year in the West Bow, makin\u2019 his livin\u2019 in the manner already\nrelated, and wi\u2019 the secret carefully locked up in his breast until now.\n\n\u201cAweel, Joe,\u201d said my mither, when she had heard him oot, \u201cthat\u2019s an\nunco story, man. But are ye aware that the auld colonel\u2019s aye livin\u2019\nyet, an\u2019 that it wad be a duty to let him ken the truth?\u201d Here Joe\nlookit in her face sae pitifu\u2019 an\u2019 imploring like, that she didna find\nit in her heart to press the question ony mair at that time. But when\nthe body gaed awa\u2019 ben, my mither sat thinkin\u2019 and thinkin\u2019 till the day\nwas far spent; an\u2019 for mony a lang day after that she hadna muckle peace\no\u2019 mind.\n\nAe mornin\u2019 she put on her bannit and shawl, and said she wadna be hame\ntill late. Although I was a bit lassie at the time, I jaloused where she\nwas gaun, but I never let on. It wasna till late, late at nicht that she\ncam hame, an\u2019 then she telt me she had been at Hawkesneb Hoose on a\npretence to see if an auld servant she had kent mony a year sin\u2019 was aye\nbidin\u2019 there. As she rang the gate-bell, she said a fearfu\u2019 sense o\u2019\nshame an\u2019 disgrace comin\u2019 ower an auld man made her swither; but there\nwas the lodgekeeper\u2019s wife comin\u2019 to the gate, an\u2019 it was ower late noo\nto gang back. She then inquired for ane Jess Tamson, that had been a\nservant up at the big hoose three years sin\u2019; but the woman said she\ndidna ken o\u2019 onybody o\u2019 that name servin\u2019 there noo. My mither said that\nwas an unco pity, as she had cam a lang way to see her, an\u2019 her feet\nwere sair blistered wi\u2019 the roads. The woman then opened the gate, an\u2019\nasked my mither into the lodge, an\u2019 offered her a cup o\u2019 tea, for which\nmy mither was very thankfu\u2019. Then, when the twa fell on the crack, my\nmither said the laird wad be gey far doon the brae noo, for he was an\nauld man in Jess\u2019s time. My mither came oot wi\u2019 this in her ain pawky\nway, to hear for certain whether the colonel were dead or livin\u2019.\n\n\u201cThe auld colonel\u2019s dead an\u2019 gane a year sin\u2019,\u201d said the woman, \u201cbut his\nson the major\u2019s expected hame in a month; an\u2019 I\u2019m sure there has been\nsic a scrubbin\u2019 an\u2019 cleanin\u2019 an\u2019 hammerin\u2019, that what wi\u2019 masons,\njoiners, plasterers, painters, and glaziers, there hasna been muckle\nrest for the servants this last fortnicht.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 is the major married?\u201d asked my mither.\n\n\u201cMarried! no as yet,\u201d said the woman. \u201cThey say he\u2019s turned unco silent\nand cantankerous since his brither\u2019s death, sees naebody, an\u2019 never\ngangs to sleep without wax candles burnin\u2019 a\u2019 nicht by his bedside.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe major never gangs to sleep without wax candles burnin\u2019 a\u2019 nicht by\nhis bedside!\u201d said my mither, slowly comin\u2019 ower the words after her.\n\u201cDeary me, that\u2019s strange!\u201d tryin\u2019 sair to keep in her breath. \u201cWhat\nkind o\u2019 death was\u2019t his brither dee\u2019d o\u2019, hae ye heard?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat kind o\u2019 death was\u2019t? It was murder, dounricht murder!\u201d said the\nwoman; \u201can\u2019 done too by ane o\u2019 his ain slaves through revenge. But it\nwas a grand day for the major when his brither dee\u2019d; for he wasna a\nmonth gane when the plantation was selt aff, an\u2019 the major left Jamaica\nwi\u2019 mony a braw thousand pound in his pouch.\u201d\n\nMy mither then asked if the major cam hame at that time. The woman said,\n\u201cNo, he had gane to Italy, and aye kept sendin\u2019 letters to his faither\nevery noo and then, makin\u2019 apologies about his health being in a\ndelicate state, and declaring his resolution to abide by the advice o\u2019\nhis doctors to remain in a warmer climate, in spite o\u2019 the auld laird\u2019s\nanxious entreaties for him to come hame. I often used to wonder at the\nmajor\u2019s continued absence; an\u2019 it lookit strange that he didna come to\nlay his faither\u2019s head in the grave, though he\u2019s comin\u2019 hame noo. As for\nthe slave that did the deed, they raised a hue an\u2019 cry after him for a\nwhile; but the murderer was never gotten, an\u2019 it\u2019s not likely he ever\nwill be noo. It seems the major had been gi\u2019en his brither an airing in\na gig, when they were attacked by the slave frae behind, wha fired a\npistol at his brither oot o\u2019 revenge, and then fled, wounding him\nmortally. The major pursued, but when he had gane a lang distance and\nfand he couldna mak up to him, he cam back to the spot where the murder\nhad been committed, expecting to see the body; but, astonishing to\nrelate, the body had disappeared. And the man that did the deed, as I\nsaid before, was never gotten; nor is it very likely he ever will be,\nafter sic a lang lapse o\u2019 time. It seems he fled awa to the mountains\namong the Maroons, as they ca\u2019 them.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s hard, hard to say,\u201d said my mither; \u201cbut God has his ain ways o\u2019\nworkin\u2019, lass, an\u2019 maybe the deed\u2019ll be brocht to licht in a way that\nyou an\u2019 me little dream o\u2019.\u201d Then she rose up, an\u2019 spoke o\u2019 gaun hame;\nbut the woman wadna hear o\u2019t, sayin\u2019 the nicht was ower far gane, an\u2019\nshe wad mak her very welcome to a bed beside the bairns. At that moment\nthe gudeman himsel\u2019 cam in, an\u2019 seeing her anxiety to gang awa, he said\nthe mail-coach wad be gaun by in half an hour, an\u2019 he had nae doot the\nguard wad gie her a lift into the toun. Sae she waited till the coach\ncam by, an\u2019 fortunately got a ride in.\n\nAweel, when my mither had composed hersel\u2019 a bit, after she had telt\nthis, she filled her cutty-pipe, an\u2019 begoud to blaw. \u201cLassie,\u201d says she\nto me, after a wee, \u201cfetch doun yer faither\u2019s Bible frae the shelf.\u201d It\naye got the name o\u2019 my faither\u2019s Bible, though he had been deid an\u2019 gane\nmony a year. Sae I gied her the Bible; an\u2019 then I heard her slowly\nreadin\u2019 ower thae verses frae the Book o\u2019 Proverbs\u2014\u201cBe not afraid of\nsudden fear, neither of the desolation of the wicked when it cometh; for\nthe Lord shall be thy confidence, and shall keep thy foot from being\ntaken.\u201d This she read ower twa-three times to hersel\u2019, an\u2019 syne put a\nmark at the place, and gaed awa to her bed. And lang after that, as the\npuir body lay half doverin\u2019, I heard her comin\u2019 ower and ower thae\nbonnie verses, till she was fast asleep. The first thing she did, when\nthe mornin\u2019 cam in, was to tell Joe o\u2019 her journey an\u2019 its result. The\npuir African lifted up his hands in astonishment when she telt him the\nmurder had been laid to his charge. But she took doun the Bible again,\nan\u2019 read ower the verses that had sae powerfully arrested her attention\nthe nicht before; and as she read them, a gleam o\u2019 triumphant exultation\nshone in the e\u2019e o\u2019 the puir nigger\u2014a look o\u2019 conscious innocence, that\ndispelled every vestige o\u2019 doot in my mither\u2019s mind, if she ever had\nony, an\u2019 made her sympathise a\u2019 the mair wi\u2019 the lingerin\u2019 agony he had\nendured since the murder was committed. He noo declared his readiness to\nlodge an accusation against Major Gilroy; for the fear o\u2019 his word being\nmisdooted vanished as if by magic frae his mind, mair especially when my\nmither led him to understand that, being in a free country, nae\nslave-owner could touch him, and that his word would be ta\u2019en wi\u2019 the\nbest white man among them a\u2019. Hooever, my mither advised him no to be\nrash, but to bide a wee till the major\u2019s arrival, as an accusation\npreferred against him in his absence micht be construed into an evidence\no\u2019 guilt on the part o\u2019 the accuser; for the wily, lang-headit bodies o\u2019\nlawyers were fit for onything, an\u2019 siller could do an awfu\u2019 lot, an\u2019 mak\nblack look white ony day. Besides, Great Britain was at this time deeply\nengaged in the Slave Trade, and micht be ower glad to tak the major\u2019s\npart. Sae Joe took her advice, an\u2019 prayed that Job wad teach him\npatience.\n\nThree weeks had passed away, when Joe, unable ony langer to control the\nwild tumult that reigned in his breast, gaed awa oot to Hawkesneb Hoose,\ncarryin\u2019 his drum an\u2019 pan-pipes wi\u2019 him as usual. It had been a drizzly\nsma\u2019 rain a\u2019 day; an\u2019 when he reached his journey\u2019s end, as nicht set\nin, he was wet through an\u2019 through. The place was a\u2019 in darkness, and as\nhe stood at the gate, an\u2019 looked up the lang dusky avenue, he half\nresolved to gang back, an\u2019 trust to time an\u2019 the retributive justice o\u2019\nHeaven to prove his innocence. But an impulse he couldna resist chained\nhim to the spot, an\u2019 he rang the gate-bell. Nae answer was returned; a\nsecond time\u2019 he rang, but still wi\u2019 the same result. Then he pushed the\ngate forward, and to his surprise it swung heavily back on its hinges.\nWi\u2019 an unsteady, tremblin\u2019 step, he advanced up the dark avenue till he\nreached the mansion. The hoose seemed silent an\u2019 deserted, binna a sma\u2019\nlicht that twinkled in ane o\u2019 the lower windows, an\u2019 as he drew nearer,\nthe sound o\u2019 voices reached his ear. Then the resolve to gang back again\ntook possession o\u2019 him; but the strange impulse to advance gained the\nmastery, an\u2019 he lifted the kitchen knocker. A lass wasna lang in makin\u2019\nher appearance at the door wi\u2019 a lichtit candle in her hand; an\u2019 nae\nsooner did she see the black man stannin\u2019 oot in the dark than she gied\na roar as if Joe had been the very deevil himsel\u2019. This brocht ben a\u2019\nthe rest o\u2019 the servants; an\u2019 a bonnie hurly-burly was set up as this\nane an\u2019 the ither ane wondered hoo he had got in.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s your negligence, Willie Johnston,\u201d said an auld leddy dressed in\nblack, that appeared to be the hoosekeeper; \u201cI\u2019m sure ye needna hae been\nsae thochtless as that, particularly at a time when the major\u2019s lookit\nfor every minute.\u201d\n\nThis was addressed to the keeper o\u2019 the lodge, that had come up to the\nbig hoose wi\u2019 his wife at the hoosekeeper\u2019s invitation, to while awa the\nnicht wi\u2019 a cup o\u2019 tea an\u2019 a dram. Willie Johnston fell a swearin\u2019, an\u2019\nwas aboot to lay violent hands on Joe, when the butler, a wee fat birsy\nbody, but no bad-hearted, ordered him to desist; and seeing the nicht\nwas sae cauld an\u2019 wat, he brocht Joe into the kitchen, and thinkin\u2019 him\na cadger, he set doun baith bread, meat, an\u2019 beer before him, tellin\u2019\nhim to look alive, for it wadna do to stay lang there. The hoosekeeper\ndidna offer ony objection to this, as mony a ane wad hae dune; but to\ntell the truth, it seems that the twa were unco gracious, for when the\ntane took whisky, the tither took yill\u2014sae that settles that. When Joe\nhad sat for a while preein\u2019 the mercies set before him, ane o\u2019 them\u2014the\nlaundry-maid\u2014gi\u2019en a wistfu\u2019 look at Joe\u2019s drum an\u2019 pan-pipes, said she\nhadna haen a dance since gude kens the time, an\u2019 the cook, an\u2019 the\nkitchen-maid, an\u2019 a young crater o\u2019 a flunkey, expressed themsel\u2019s in a\nsimilar manner.\n\n\u201cA dance!\u201d cried the hoosekeeper, makin\u2019 a pretence o\u2019 being angry. \u201cA\nbonnie daft-like thing it wad be to welcome hame the laird wi\u2019 a drum\nan\u2019 pan-pipes, as if he were the keeper o\u2019 a wild-beast show. A fiddle\nmichtna be sae bad.\u201d\n\nJoe saw what was wanted. It was only a quiet invitation to play for\nnaething; sae he took a lang heavy pull at the beer-jug, an\u2019 syne struck\nup a lilt that set them a\u2019 up on their feet thegither. An\u2019 sae on he\nplayed, tune after tune, until a breathin\u2019 time was ca\u2019ed; an\u2019 the\nwhisky an\u2019 beer in plenty were again gaun round, when the gate-bell was\nrung wi\u2019 great violence.\n\n\u201cFlee for yer life to the gate, Willie Johnston,\u201d cried the hoosekeeper,\n\u201can\u2019 stop that skirlin\u2019. I\u2019m sure I never expected him the nicht noo,\nwhen it\u2019s sae late. What\u2019s to be dune? Haste ye, Sally, to the major\u2019s\nroom, an\u2019 on wi\u2019 a fire like winkin\u2019!\u201d and in an instant a\u2019 was\nconfusion, an\u2019 every ane stannin\u2019 in each ither\u2019s road.\n\nThe soond o\u2019 carriage wheels was heard comin\u2019 up the avenue, and the\nlood gruff voice o\u2019 Major Gilroy cursing the carelessness o\u2019 the\nlodge-keeper startled every ane there, but nane mair sae than Joe; for\nthat voice brocht back the past in a\u2019 its terrible reality, an\u2019 he kent\nthe crisis was comin\u2019 wi\u2019 a crash either for him or his auld relentless\noppressor. But him and his pan-pipes were then as completely forgotten\nby the servants as if they had never been there. But as quietness was at\nlast restored, an\u2019 the major had shut himsel\u2019 up in his room, wi\u2019 a\nstern injunction to the butler that he wasna to be disturbed wi\u2019 supper\nor onything else that nicht, an\u2019 threatenin\u2019 instant dismissal to the\nfirst that gied him ony cause o\u2019 annoyance, Joe asked the hoosekeeper,\nwi\u2019 a palpitatin\u2019 heart, if he micht gang noo.\n\n\u201cNo, for a thoosand pound I wadna open that door,\u201d said the hoosekeeper;\n\u201cye had better bide awhile yet till he\u2019s asleep. I never saw sic a\nsavage-lookin\u2019 man in my life, as he cam in at the front door. He\u2019s\ncompletely changed since I mind o\u2019 him, when he wasna muckle mair than a\nladdie. An\u2019 sic a restless, suspicious e\u2019e as he\u2019s got! I dinna like\nit\u2014I positively dinna like it. But I\u2019ll never pit up wi\u2019 sic a man\u2014I\u2019ll\ntak to drink, as sure\u2019s I\u2019m a livin\u2019 woman. An\u2019 what the deil brocht\n_you_ here?\u2014makin\u2019 things fifty times waur! Ye\u2019ll never get oot o\u2019 here\nthis nicht\u2014I\u2019m certain o\u2019 that. An\u2019 yet there\u2019s that brute,\u201d pointing to\nPincher, that a\u2019 this time had been keepin\u2019 quiet under the table,\nthrang worryin\u2019 at a big bane\u2014\u201cwhat\u2019s to be dune if it barks?\u201d\n\nBut Joe gied her to understand there was nae fear o\u2019 that, for he had\nhim ower weel trained to mak ony disturbance; but oh! he was\nanxious\u2014anxious to be off. The woman, hooever, remained inexorable.\nThere was therefore nae help for\u2019t but to sit doun on a chair by the\nkitchen fireside, an\u2019 be slippit oot cannily in the mornin\u2019 before the\nmajor was up. Sae they a\u2019 gaed awa to their beds, an\u2019 Joe was left alane\nin the kitchen, wi\u2019 Pincher snockerin\u2019 at his side. But Joe couldna\nclose an e\u2019e, wi\u2019 the intensity o\u2019 his thocht; for here, at last, had\nthe providence o\u2019 God brocht the murderer and his accuser beneath the\nsame roof. Joe lay doverin\u2019 an\u2019 waitin\u2019 wearily for the mornin\u2019 comin\u2019\nin. The weather had cleared up, an\u2019 the moon was streamin\u2019 in through\nthe kitchen windows. The fire had gane oot, an\u2019 the air felt cauld an\u2019\nchill; an\u2019 gradually a feeling o\u2019 horror took possession o\u2019 Joe that he\ncouldna shake off. At last Pincher gaed a low growl, as if he had heard\nsomebody comin\u2019. Joe could hear naething at first, but by degrees he\nbecame sensible that a step was advancin\u2019, saft, an\u2019 almost noiseless,\ndoun the kitchen stair; an\u2019 slowly the door opened as a figure dressed\nin a lang dressin\u2019-goun, an\u2019 a lichtit wax candle in its hand, entered\nthe kitchen. Speechless and unable to move, Joe saw his mortal enemy,\nthe major, starin\u2019 him in the face; but as he silently returned the\ngaze, he became sensible that it was void o\u2019 consciousness. The major\nwas walkin\u2019 in his sleep, that was evident, for he kept movin\u2019 up an\u2019\ndoun the kitchen, mutterin\u2019 to himsel\u2019. He laid doun the candle on the\nfloor in ane o\u2019 his rounds, an\u2019 said in a tone sae distinct that Joe\ncould hear every word\u2014\n\n\u201cWill the sea give up its dead?\u2014No, no. Why does his face always turn up\namid the roaring waves, as if to taunt me with the crime, and drag me to\neternal perdition? Pshaw! it\u2019s but a fancy after all. But the slave who\neluded my vengeance\u2014curses on him!\u2014where is _he_? Wandering over the\nface of the earth, to confront me at last, perhaps, and accuse me as my\nbrother\u2019s murderer. But will they believe _him_? They will not\u2014nay, they\ndare not\u2014they dare not. Yet oh! the black countenance of that infernal\nfiend dogs me wherever I go, and will not give me peace\u2014peace\u2014peace!\u201d\n\nThen he took up the candle an\u2019 made for the door, drew back, an\u2019 again\ncam into the kitchen; then left the kitchen a second time, an\u2019 opened\nthe door. The sudden rush o\u2019 the nicht air put oot the candle, an\u2019 he\nagain entered the kitchen. At that moment he stumbled ower a chair, an\u2019\nPincher gaed a loud bark, as the major started to his feet, restored to\nconsciousness. And as the moon\u2019s rays revealed every surrounding object\nwi\u2019 a ghastly distinctness, the first sicht that met his e\u2019e was Joe\u2014Joe\nstannin\u2019 before him, rigid and motionless\u2014an auld rusty pistol in his\nricht hand presented at him, an\u2019 a wild glare o\u2019 rage an\u2019 defiance\nflashin\u2019 in his unearthly-lookin\u2019 e\u2019en. The suddenness o\u2019 the appearance\no\u2019 this apparition\u2014for apparition he thocht Joe to be\u2014completely\nparalysed him for the moment. His knees gaed knock, knockin\u2019 thegither,\nas Joe cried\u2014\n\n\u201cMurderer! murderer! murderer! Me tell truth\u2014me no tell lie. You dam\nrascal\u2014you villain\u2014me hear to speak truth, and truth me speak spite of\neberyting. Ha! what you say now?\u201d\n\nAs Joe said this, he advanced nearer an\u2019 nearer, till the pistol touched\nthe major\u2019s breast. But there he stood, powerless to resist; for his\nbelief still was that Joe was a phantom, till the growlin\u2019 o\u2019 the doggie\nbrocht him to himsel\u2019 mair than onything else; and, fired by the energy\no\u2019 desperation, he made a snatch at the pistol. But the nigger was ower\nquick for him; for he sprang past the major, and oot at the kitchen door\nthat the major had providentially opened in his sleep, darted doun the\navenue and oot at the gate, syne awa at full speed on his lang journey\nhame, which he reached by nine o\u2019clock in the mornin\u2019, mair deid than\nalive. He cam into my mither\u2019s just as she sat doun to her tea, an\u2019 gaed\nher the history o\u2019 his last nicht\u2019s adventure, as already related. My\nmither\u2019s advice to him was to gang directly to the authorities, an\u2019\nlodge an accusation. Joe did sae, and the result was that Captain S\u2014\u2014,\naccompanied by half a dozen constables, immediately took the coach for\nHawkesneb Hoose, which they reached about seven o\u2019clock.\n\nWhen they arrived there, the butler, hoosekeeper, an\u2019 a\u2019 the lave o\u2019\nthem cam out, wonderin\u2019 at seein\u2019 the police authorities, accompanied by\nthe black man. But when Captain S\u2014\u2014 asked, in a stern manner, if he\ncould see the major, an\u2019 telling the men to watch the hoose, baith back\nand front, their surprise was turned into consternation. The major wasna\nup yet, the butler said; and his orders the nicht before were that\nnaebody was to disturb him unless his bell rang. And it was neither his\nbusiness nor onybody else\u2019s to intrude where they werena wanted. On\nhearing this, the captain peremptorily demanded to see his maister,\notherwise it wad be necessary to force an entrance into his room. At\nthis the hoosekeeper and butler baith gaed up, an\u2019 cried the major\u2019s\nname; but nae answer cam. Then they tried to open the door, but the door\nwas evidently locked frae the inside, for it wadna open. When the\ncaptain heard this, he gaed up himsel\u2019, an\u2019 burst open the door. On\nentering the room, he lookit round, but could see naething. The bed lay\nuntouched; there had been naebody there, that was evident. But there was\na sma\u2019 dressing-room that opened frae the bedroom, and on lookin\u2019 there\nhe saw the major lyin\u2019 in a doubled-up position on the carpet, wi\u2019 his\nhands clenched, an\u2019 his e\u2019en starin\u2019 wide open. An empty phial lay\nbeside him, that telt, ower surely, what he had been after. The captain\nplaced his hand on his face, but it was quite cauld; an\u2019 there wasna the\nleast doot that he had been dead for a lang time. When the captain cam\ndoun and communicated the news, there was sair wonder an\u2019 astonishment,\nbut no muckle grief, \u2019od knows. The major had been a perfect stranger to\nthem a\u2019, except the auld hoosekeeper; an\u2019 to do the body justice, she\nshed a tear or twa; but it\u2019s my belief a third never made its\nappearance, for a\u2019 she tried.\n\nNaething farther could be done in the matter. The major had anticipated\nthe demands o\u2019 justice by takin\u2019 justice on himsel\u2019, an\u2019 the wuddy had\nbeen cheated o\u2019 a victim, an\u2019 a multitude o\u2019 morbid sightseers rightly\nungratified. But oh, the joy o\u2019 Joe\u2019s heart when he cam into my mither\u2019s\nnext mornin\u2019! for it seems they had remained in the hoose a\u2019 that nicht,\ntill the coach cam by on the Edinburgh journey. The fear that had hung\nower him like a nichtmare was dispelled for ever, an\u2019 his innocence\ntriumphantly established beyond the least shadow o\u2019 a doot. Kindly my\nmither shook him by the hand, as she said\u2014\u201cThe hand o\u2019 God\u2019s been in\u2019t,\nJoe, my man; an\u2019 praise be to his name for sendin\u2019 a bonnie glint o\u2019\nsunshine oot o\u2019 the lang dreary darkness that\u2019s encompassed ye. An\u2019\nnever forget the verses that gaed ye sic blessed consolation;\u201d an\u2019\nsaftly an\u2019 solemnly she cam ower them again\u2014\u201cBe not afraid of sudden\nfear, neither of the desolation of the wicked when it cometh; for the\nLord shall be thy confidence, an\u2019 shall keep thy foot from being taken.\u201d\nAn\u2019 Joe looked happy an\u2019 contented, an\u2019 never forgot my mither\u2019s\nkindness.\n\nJoe gaed aboot the streets o\u2019 Edinburgh mony a lang day after this. He\nnever taen up the show again, that I mind o\u2019; but mony a bonnily riggit\nship he selt at Heriot\u2019s Wark, and on the Earthen Mound, amang the\npanoramas and the wild-beast shows, and doun at the stairs at bonnie\nauld Shakespeare Square, that\u2019s noo awa; an\u2019 mony a time hae I heard his\ndrum an\u2019 pan-pipes when I was baith a young quean an\u2019 a married wife. He\ndee\u2019d a short time before the richt-hand side o\u2019 the West Bow was taen\ndoun, an\u2019 there\u2019s no a single vestige noo to be seen o\u2019 the auld land\nwhere the show used to be, wi\u2019 the lichtit paper-lantern at the door,\nan\u2019 the pan-pipes playin\u2019 \u201cTooraladdy,\u201d that cheered sae mony young\nhearts in the days that are noo past an\u2019 gane.\u2014_From \u201cPeggy Pinkerton\u2019s\nRecollections.\u201d_\n\n\n\n\n THE FIGHT FOR THE STANDARD.\n\n BY JAMES PATERSON.\n\n\nLieutenant Charles Ewart, better known as \u201cSergeant Ewart of the Greys,\u201d\nwas born in Kilmarnock about the year 1767, and enlisted in that\nregiment in 1789. He served under the Duke of York in the Low Country\nCampaigns of 1793\u20134, and shared in all the victories and defeats which\nthe allied arms experienced. The disasters encountered by the British\narose in a great measure from the duplicity of the Dutch, as well as\nfrom the military incapacity of the Royal general. At the battle, if we\nmistake not, of Fleurus, in the Netherlands, where the Republican\nforces, after a protracted contest, were the victors, Ewart had the\nmisfortune to be taken prisoner. Towards the close of the action, the\nGreys were so thoroughly surrounded by the enemy that escape was\nconsidered next to impossible. As the only means of preventing their\nentire capture, they were ordered to disperse in small parties of twos\nand threes, each to exert himself as he best might in finding his way to\nthe allied army, which had undertaken a retrograde movement. It was\nevening as Ewart and his companions endeavoured to thread their way\namidst the smoke and spreading darkness by which they were enveloped.\nThey had not proceeded far, when, perceiving a body of French cavalry at\na short distance, they were compelled to seek safety in an opposite\ndirection. Though hotly pursued, they put spurs to their horses, and\nsoon distanced their enemies. At length they found themselves in the\nvicinity of a wood, and, ignorant of the direction in which they were\nproceeding, they determined on taking advantage of its shelter for the\nnight. Tying their jaded horses to a tree, they lay down beside them.\nTired out with the day\u2019s fatigue, they fell soundly asleep; nor did they\nawaken until rudely stirred from their slumber in the morning by a large\nbody of French infantry who had taken possession of the wood. Resistance\nbeing out of the question, they instantly surrendered; but nothing could\nsave them from the abuse and insult of the soldiers, by whom they were\nplundered of everything valuable. Fortunately, not above two hours\nafterwards, the advance corps of the French were beaten back by a number\nof Austrian troops, who in turn took the captors captive, and Ewart and\nhis comrades were restored to their regiment, not, however, without\nhaving obtained permission of the Austrian officer in charge of the\nprisoners to take from the Frenchmen the property of which they had been\nplundered, and which they did with something of _interest_, by way of\nrepaying the usage they had experienced.\n\nIn the retreat of the British through Holland after the disastrous\nbattle of Nimguen, though conducted by Sir Ralph Abercrombie with great\nskill and success, considering the desperate circumstances in which they\nwere placed, the army suffered the utmost privations. The winter was\nunprecedentedly severe, and the loss of the stores and baggage added\ngreatly to their sufferings. Hundreds perished from excessive cold,\nhunger, and fatigue. Many affecting anecdotes are told of the\nvicissitudes endured. While on the march one day, near a place, the name\nof which we forget, the faint wailings of a child were heard not far\nfrom the roadside. Ewart dismounted, and proceeding to the spot, found a\nwoman and child lying amongst the snow. The mother was dead, but the\ninfant, still in life, was in the act of sucking the breast of its\nlifeless parent. \u201cAlbeit unused to the melting mood,\u201d Ewart felt\novercome by the spectacle. There was no time, however, for\nsentimentalism; but lifting the child in his arms, and wrapping his\ncloak around it, he remounted with his tender charge. On reaching the\nencampment for the evening, he applied to the colonel, who generously\noffered to defray the expenses of a nurse; but so entirely were the\nwomen of the army absorbed with their own misfortunes, that not one of\nthem could be found to take care of the little orphan. Ewart was at\nlength fortunate in discovering the father of the child, a sergeant of\nthe 60th regiment, who was so much affected that he could scarcely be\nrestrained from retracing his steps in the vain hope of finding his\npartner still in life. Three years after the return of the army to\nBritain, and while the Greys were stationed in the south of England,\nEwart was one evening called to the head inn of the town. The soldier to\nwhom he was introduced grasped him warmly by the hand, as he inquired\nwhether he knew him. Ewart replied in the negative. A short explanation\nsufficed. The stranger was the father of the child whom he had saved,\ncome to tender his thanks in a more substantial manner than was in his\npower on the retreat in Holland. He had since that period been raised to\nthe rank of sergeant-major, and the little orphan was then a thriving\nboy at home with his grandmother. He insisted on presenting Ewart with a\nsum of money, but the offer was firmly rejected. He pressed him,\nhowever, to accept a silver watch as a memento of his gratitude.\n\nWith the exception of a small portion of the regiment which took part in\nthe Peninsular War, the Scots Greys were not again called abroad till\n1815. During the intervening period, no opportunity of distinguishing\nthemselves occurred. Ewart, who had borne himself with uniform\npropriety, and gained the esteem of his superior officers by his\nsoldierly conduct, was early advanced as a sergeant, while his skill in\nthe sword exercise procured him further emolument by being appointed\nmaster-of-fence to the regiment. The unlooked-for escape of Napoleon\nfrom Elba gave a new impulse to the military ardour of this country. The\nGreys, as well as the household troops, were called to arms, and in the\nshort but important campaign in Belgium, covered themselves with glory\non the plains of Waterloo. The splendid charge of General Ponsonby\u2019s\ncavalry brigade\u2014composed of the First Royals, Greys, and\nInniskillings\u2014is matter of history. It was in one of those dashing\naffairs on the 18th, when covering the Highland brigade against a dense\nmass of Invincibles, that the two eagles were captured by the Greys and\nRoyals. As the cavalry passed through the open columns of the\nHighlanders, the cry of \u201cScotland for ever!\u201d created an enthusiasm which\nnothing could withstand, and the French infantry were scattered before\nthem. Upwards of two thousand prisoners were taken in this single onset.\nSergeant Ewart was engaged hand to hand with an officer, whom he was\nabout to cut down, when a young ensign of the Greys interceded in his\nbehalf, and desired that he might be passed to the rear. He had scarcely\ncomplied with the request, when, on hearing the report of a pistol, he\nturned and beheld the ensign falling from his saddle, and the French\nofficer in the act of replacing the weapon with which he had savagely\ntaken the life of his preserver. Enraged at the ingratitude of the\nFrenchman, Ewart immediately turned upon him, and, deaf to his\nsupplications, cut him down to the brisket. This was the work only of a\nmoment, for the conflict still raged, the French infantry having been\nsupported by a numerous array of cuirassiers and lancers. Dashing\nforward, he now came within reach of the standard-bearer of one of the\nInvincible regiments to which they were opposed. A short conflict\nensued, when the French officer fell beneath Ewart\u2019s sword, and the\nstaff of the eagle stuck fast in the ground, which was soft, so that he\nwas enabled to lay hold of it without further trouble. Had the standard\nfallen, he could not have recovered it in the _mel\u00e9e_. Wheeling round,\nEwart was in the act of making off with his prize, when a lancer,\nsingling him out, galloped forward and hurled his spear at his breast.\nWith all his reputed quickness in defence, he had just strength enough\nto ward off the blow, so that the lance merely grazed his side; then\nraising himself in his stirrups, he brought his antagonist to the ground\nwith one cut of his sword. In riding away with the valuable trophy,\nEwart experienced another narrow escape\u2014a wounded Frenchman, whom he had\nsupposed to be dead, having raised himself on his elbow, and fired at\nhim as he passed. The ball fortunately missed him, and he escaped to the\nrear, when he was ordered to proceed with the standard to Brussels.\n\nThe prowess of Ewart was greatly applauded, not less in Belgium and\nFrance than in Britain, and he subsequently, through the influence of\nthe late Sir John Sinclair, obtained a commission in a veteran battalion\nas a reward for his services. When in Edinburgh in 1816, he was invited\nto a Waterloo dinner at Leith, where Sir Walter Scott proposed his\nhealth in an eloquent and highly complimentary speech. Little accustomed\nto civilian society, Lieutenant Ewart felt diffident to reply; and, in a\nnote to the chairman, begged that he might be excused, adding, with the\nbluntness of a soldier, that \u201che would rather fight the battle of\nWaterloo over again, than face so large an assemblage.\u201d The company,\nhowever, would not be denied the gratification of a full-length view of\nhis person, and he was under the necessity of shaking off his diffidence\nby acknowledging the toast in a brief reply, which he made amidst the\nrapturous cheers of his entertainers. He was also publicly entertained\nat dinner in Ayr and Kilmarnock, and was presented with the freedom of\nIrvine.\n\n\n\n\n CATCHING A TARTAR.\n\n BY D. M. MOIR.\n\n\nFrom the first moment I clapped eye on the caricature thing of a coat\nthat Tammie Bodkin had, in my absence, shaped out for Cursecowl the\nbutcher, I foresaw, in my own mind, that a catastrophe was brewing for\nus; and never did soldier gird himself to fight the French, or sailor\nprepare for a sea-storm, with greater alacrity, than I did to cope with\nthe bull-dog anger, and buffet back the uproarious vengeance of our\nheathenish customer.\n\nAt first I thought of letting the thing take its natural course, and of\nthreaping down Cursecowl\u2019s throat that he must have been feloniously\nkeeping in his breath when Tammie took his measure; and, moreover, that\nas it was the fashion to be straight-laced, Tammie had done his utmost\ntrying to make him look like his betters; till, my conscience checking\nme for such a nefarious intention, I endeavoured, as became me in the\nrelations of man, merchant, and Christian, to solder the matter\npeaceably, and show him, if there was a fault committed, that there was\nno evil intention on my side of the house. To this end I despatched the\nbit servant wench, on the Friday afternoon, to deliver the coat, which\nwas neatly tied up in brown paper, and directed, \u201cMr Cursecowl, with\ncare,\u201d and to buy a sheep\u2019s-head; bidding her, by way of being civil,\ngive my kind compliments, and inquire how Mr and Mrs Cursecowl, and the\nfive little Miss Cursecowls, were keeping their healths, and trusting to\nhis honour in sending me a good article. But have a moment\u2019s patience.\n\nBeing busy at the time turning a pair of kuttikins for old Mr\nMooleypouch the mealmonger, when the lassie came back I had no mind of\nasking a sight of the sheep\u2019s-head, as I aye like the little blackfaced\nin preference to the white, fat, fozy Cheviot breed; but most\nprovidentially I catched a gliskie of the wench passing the shop window,\non the road over to Jamie Coom the smith\u2019s, to get it singed, having\nbeen dispatched there by her mistress. Running round the counter like\nlightning, I opened the sneck, and halooed to her to wheel to the right\nabout, having, somehow or other, a superstitious longing to look at the\narticle. As I was saying, there was a providence in this, which, at the\ntime, mortal man could never have thought of.\n\nJames Batter had popped in with a newspaper in his hand, to read me a\ncurious account of a mermaid that was seen singing a Gaelic song, and\ncombing its hair with a tortoise-shell comb, someway terrible far north\nabout Shetland, by a respectable minister of the district, riding home\nin the gloaming after a Presbytery dinner. So, as he was just taking off\nhis spectacles cannily, and saying to me\u2014\u201cAnd was not that droll?\u201d\u2014the\nlassie spread down her towel on the counter, when, lo, and behold! such\nan abominable spectacle! James Batter observing me run back, and turn\nwhite, put on his glasses again, cannily taking them out of his\nwell-worn shagreen case, and, giving a stare down at the towel, almost\ntouched the beast\u2019s nose with his own.\n\n\u201cAnd what, in the name of goodness, is the matter?\u201d quo\u2019 James Batter;\n\u201cye seem in a wonderful quandary.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe matter!\u201d answered I, in astonishment, looking to see if the man had\nlost his sight or his senses; \u201cthe matter! who ever saw a sheep\u2019shead\nwith straight horns, and a visnomy all colours of the rainbow\u2014red, blue,\norange, green, yellow, white, and black?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Deed it is,\u201d said James, after a nearer inspection; \u201cit must be a\nlowsynaturay. I\u2019m sure I have read most of Buffon\u2019s books, and I have\nnever heard tell of the like. It\u2019s gey and queerish.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Od, James,\u201d answered I, \u201cye take everything very canny; you\u2019re a\nphilosopher, to be sure; but I daresay if the moon was to fall from the\nlift, and knock down the old kirk, ye would say no more than \u2018it\u2019s gey\nand queerish.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cQueerish, man! Do ye not see that?\u201d added I, shoving down his head\nmostly on the top of it. \u201cDo ye not see that? awful, most awful!\nextonishing!! Do ye not see that long beard? Who, in the name of\ngoodness, ever was an eyewitness to a sheep\u2019s-head, in a Christian land,\nwith a beard like an unshaven Jew, crying \u2018owl clowes,\u2019 with a green bag\nover his left shoulder?\u201d\n\n\u201cDog on it,\u201d said James, giving a fidge with his hainches; \u201cdog on it,\nas I am a living sinner, that is the head of a Willie-goat.\u201d\n\n\u201cWillie or Nannie,\u201d answered I, \u201cit\u2019s not meat for me; and never shall\nan ounce of it cross the craig of my family\u2014that is as sure as ever\nJames Batter drave a shuttle. Give counsel in need, James: what is to be\ndone?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat needs consideration,\u201d quo\u2019 James, giving a bit hoast. \u201cUnless he\nmakes ample apology, and explains the mistake in a feasible way, it is\nmy humble opinion that he ought to be summoned before his betters. That\nis the legal way to make him smart for his sins.\u201d\n\nAt last a thought struck me, and I saw farther through my difficulties\nthan ever mortal man did through a millstone; but, like a politician, I\nminted not the matter to James. Keeping my tongue cannily within my\nteeth, I then laid the head, wrapped up in the bit towel, in a corner\nbehind the counter; and turning my face round again to James, I put my\nhands into my breeches-pockets, as if nothing in the world had happened,\nand ventured back to the story of the mermaid. I asked him how she\nlooked\u2014what kind of dress she wore\u2014if she swam with her corsets\u2014what was\nthe colour of her hair\u2014where she would buy the tortoise-shell comb\u2014and\nso on; when just as he was clearing his pipe to reply, who should burst\nopen the shop-door like a clap of thunder, with burning cat\u2019s een, and a\nface as red as a soldier\u2019s jacket, but Cursecowl himself, with the new\nkilling-coat in his hand, which, giving a tremendous curse (the words of\nwhich are not essentially necessary for me to repeat, being an elder of\nour kirk), he made play flee at me with such a birr, that it twisted\nround my neck, and mostly blinding me, made me doze like a tottum. At\nthe same time, to clear his way, and the better to enable him to take a\ngood mark, he gave James Batter a shove, that made him stoiter against\nthe wall, and snacked the good new farthing tobacco-pipe, that James was\ntaking his first whiff out of; crying at the same blessed moment\u2014\n\n\u201cHold out o\u2019 my road, ye long, withered wabster. Ye\u2019re a pair of\nhavering idiots; but I\u2019ll have pennyworths out of both your skins, as\nI\u2019m a sinner!\u201d\n\nWhat was to be done? There was no time for speaking; for Cursecowl,\nfoaming like a mad dog with passion, seized hold of the ell-wand, which\nhe flourished round his head like a Highlander\u2019s broadsword, and\nstamping about with his stockings drawn up his thighs, threatened every\nmoment to commit bloody murder.\n\nIf James Batter never saw service before, he learned a little of it that\nday, being in a pickle of bodily terror not to be imagined by living\nman; but his presence of mind did not forsake him, and he cowered for\nsafety and succour into a far corner, holding out a web of buckram\nbefore him, me crying all the time\u2014\u201cSend for the town-officer! Will ye\nnot send for the town-officer?\u201d\n\nYou may talk of your General Moores and your Lord Wellingtons as ye\nlike; but never, since I was born, did I ever see or hear tell of\nanything braver than the way Tammy Bodkin behaved, in saving both our\nprecious lives, at that blessed nick of time, from touch-and-go\njeopardy; for, when Cursecowl was rampauging about, cursing and swearing\nlike a Russian bear, hurling out volleys of oaths that would have\nfrighted John Knox, forbye the like of us, Tammie stole in behind him\nlike a wild cat, followed by Joseph Breekey, Walter Cuff, and Jack\nThorl, the three apprentices, on their stocking-soles; and having strong\nand dumpy arms, pinned back his elbows like a flash of lightning, giving\nthe other callants time to jump on his back, and hold him like a vice;\nwhile, having got time to draw my breath, and screw up my pluck, I ran\nforward like a lion, and houghed the whole concern\u2014Tammie Bodkin, the\nthree faithful apprentices, Cursecowl, and all, coming to the ground\nlike a battered castle.\n\nIt was now James Batter\u2019s time to come up in line; and though a douce\nman (being savage for the insulting way that Cursecowl had dared to use\nhim), he dropped down like mad, with his knees on Cursecowl\u2019s breast,\nwho was yelling, roaring, and grinding his buck-teeth like a mad bull,\nkicking right and spurring left with fire and fury; and, taking his\nKilmarnock off his head, thrust it, like a battering-ram, into\nCursecowl\u2019s mouth, to hinder him from alarming the neighbourhood, and\nbringing the whole world about our ears.\n\nSuch a stramash of tumbling, roaring, tearing, swearing, kicking,\npushing, cuffing, rugging, and riving about the floor!! I thought they\nwould not have left one another with a shirt on: it seemed a combat even\nto the death. Cursecowl\u2019s breath was choked up within him, like wind in\nan empty bladder; and when I got a gliskie of his face, from beneath\nJames\u2019s cowl, it was growing as black as the crown of my hat. It feared\nme much that murder would be the upshot, the webs being all heeled over,\nboth of broad cloth, buckram, cassimir, and Welsh flannel; and the paper\nshapings and worsted runds coiled about their throats and bodies like\nfiery serpents. At long and last, I thought it became me, being the head\nof the house, to sound a parley, and bid them give the savage a mouthful\nof fresh air, to see if he had anything to say in his defence.\n\nCursecowl, by this time, had forcible assurance of our ability to\noverpower him, and finding he had by far the worst of it, was obliged to\ngrow tamer, using the first breath he got to cry out\u2014\n\n\u201cA barley, ye thieves! a barley! I tell you, give me wind. There\u2019s not a\nman in nine of ye!\u201d\n\nFinding our own strength, we saw, by this time, that we were masters of\nthe field; nevertheless we took care to make good terms when they were\nin our power, nor would we allow Cursecowl to sit upright till after he\nhad said, three times over, on his honour as a gentleman, that he would\nbehave as became one.\n\nAfter giving his breeches-knees a skuff with his loof, to dad off the\nstoure, he came, right foot foremost, to the counter-side, while the\nladdies were dighting their brows, and stowing away the webs upon their\nends round about, saying,\u2014\n\n\u201cMaister Wauch, how have ye the conscience to send hame such a piece o\u2019\nwark as that coat to ony decent man? Do ye dare to imagine that I am a\nJerusalem spider, that I could be crammed, neck and heels, into such a\nthing as that? Fie, shame\u2014it would not button on yourself, man,\nscarecrow-looking mortal though ye be!\u201d\n\nJames Batter\u2019s blood was now up, and boiling like an old Roman\u2019s; so he\nwas determined to show Cursecowl that I had a friend in court, able and\nwilling to keep him at stave\u2019s end.\n\n\u201cKeep a calm sough,\u201d said James Batter, interfering; \u201cand not miscall\nthe head of the house in his own shop; or, to say nothing of present\nconsequences, by way of showing ye the road to the door, perhaps Maister\nSneckdrawer, the penny-writer, \u2019ll give ye a caption-paper with a broad\nmargin, to claw your elbow with at your leisure, my good fellow.\u201d\n\n\u201cPugh, pugh!\u201d cried Cursecowl, snapping his finger and thumb at James\u2019s\nbeak; \u201cI do not value your threatening an ill halfpenny. Come away out\nyour ways to the crown of the causey, and I\u2019ll box any three of ye, over\nthe bannys, for half-a-mutchkin. But, \u2019odsake, Batter, my man, nobody\u2019s\nspeaking to you,\u201d added Cursecowl, giving a hack now and then, and a bit\nspit down on the floor; \u201cgo hame, man, and get your cowl washed; I\ndaresay you have pushioned me, so I have no more to say to the like of\nyou. But now, Maister Wauch, just speaking hooly and fairly, do you not\nthink black burning shame of yourself, for putting such an article into\nany decent Christian man\u2019s hand, like mine?\u201d\n\n\u201cWait a wee\u2014wait a wee, friend, and I\u2019ll give ye a lock salt to your\nbroth,\u201d answered I, in a calm and cool way; for, being a confidential\nelder of Maister Wiggie\u2019s, I kept myself free from the sin of getting\ninto a passion, or fighting, except in self-defence, which is forbidden\nneither by law nor gospel; and, stooping down, I took up the towel from\nthe corner, and, spreading it upon the counter, bade him look, and see\nif he knew an auld acquaintance!\n\nCursecowl, to be such a dragoon, had some rational points in his\ncharacter; so, seeing that he lent ear to me with a smirk on his rough\nred face, I went on:\n\n\u201cTake my advice as a friend, and make the best of your way home,\nkilling-coat and all; for the most perfect will sometimes fall into an\ninnocent mistake, and, at any rate, it cannot be helped now. But if ye\nshow any symptom of obstripulosity, I\u2019ll find myself under the necessity\nof publishing you abroad to the world for what you are, and show about\nthat head in the towel for a wonder to broad Scotland, in a manner that\nwill make customers flee from your booth, as if it was infected with the\nseven plagues of Egypt.\u201d\n\nAt sight of the goat\u2019s head, Cursecowl clapped his hand on his thigh two\nor three times, and could scarcely muster good manners enough to keep\nhimself from bursting out a-laughing.\n\n\u201cYe seem to have found a fiddle, friend,\u201d said I; \u201cbut give me leave to\ntell you, that ye\u2019ll may be find it liker a hanging-match than a musical\nmatter. Are you not aware that I could hand you over to the sheriff, on\ntwo special indictments? In the first place, for an action of assault\nand batterification, in cuffing me, an elder of our kirk, with a sticked\nkilling-coat, in my own shop; and, in the second place, as a swindler,\nimposing on his Majesty\u2019s loyal subjects, taking the coin of the realm\non false pretences, and palming off goat\u2019s flesh upon Christians, as if\nthey were perfect Pagans.\u201d\n\nHeathen though Cursecowl was, this oration alarmed him in a jiffie, soon\nshowing him, in a couple of hurries, that it was necessary for him to be\nour humble servant; so he said, still keeping the smirk on his face\u2014\n\n\u201cKeh, keh, it\u2019s not worth making a noise about after all. Gie me the\njacket, Mansie, my man, and it\u2019ll maybe serve my nephew, young Killim,\nwho is as lingit in the waist as a wasp. Let us take a shake of your paw\nover the counter, and be friends. Bye-ganes should be bye-ganes.\u201d\n\nNever let it be said that Mansie Wauch, though one of the king\u2019s\nvolunteers, ever thrust aside the olive branch of peace; so, ill-used\nthough I had been, to say nothing of James Batter, who had got his pipe\nsmashed to crunches, and one of the eyes of his spectacles knocked out,\nI gave him my fist frankly.\n\nJames Batter\u2019s birse had been so fiercely put up, and no wonder, that it\nwas not so easily sleeked down; so, for a while, he looked unco glum,\ntill Cursecowl insisted that our meeting should not be a dry one; nor\nwould he hear a single word on me and James Batter not accepting his\ntreat of a mutchkin of Kilbagie.\n\nI did not think James would have been so doure and refractory, funking\nand flinging like old Jeroboam; but at last, with the persuasion of the\ntreat, he came to, and, sleeking down his front hair, we all three took\na step down to the far end of the close, at the back street, where Widow\nThamson kept the sign of \u2018The Tankard and the Tappit Hen;\u2019 Cursecowl,\nwhen we got ourselves seated, ordering in the spirits with a loud rap on\nthe table with his knuckles, and a whistle on the landlady through his\nforeteeth, that made the roof ring. A bottle of beer was also brought;\nso, after drinking one another\u2019s healths round, with a tasting out of\nthe dram glass, Cursecowl swashed the rest of the raw creature into the\ntankard, saying\u2014\n\n\u201cNow take your will o\u2019t; there\u2019s drink fit for a king; that\u2019s real\n\u2018Pap-in.\u2019\u201d\n\nHe was an awful body, Cursecowl, and had a power of queer stories,\nwhich, weel-a-wat, did not lose in the telling. James Batter, beginning\nto brighten up, hodged and leuch like a nine-year-old; and I freely\nconfess, for another, that I was so diverted, that, I daresay, had it\nnot been for his fearsome oaths, which made our very hair stand on end,\nand were enough to open the stone-wall, we would have both sate from\nthat time to this.\n\nWe got the whole story of the Willie-goat, out and out, it seeming to be\nwith Cursecowl a prime matter of diversion, especially that part of it\nrelating to the head, by which he had won a crown-piece from Deacon\nPaunch, who wagered that the wife and me would eat it, without ever\nfinding out our mistake. But, aha, lad!\n\nThe long and the short of the matter was this. The Willie-goat had, for\neighteen years, belonged to a dragoon marching regiment, and, in its\nbetter days, had seen a power of service abroad; till, being now old and\ninfirm, it had fallen off one of the baggage-carts, and got its leg\nbroken on the road to Piershill, where it was sold to Cursecowl, by a\ncorporal, for half-a-crown and a dram. The four quarters he had managed\nto sell for mutton, like lightning, this one buying a jigget, that one a\nback ribs, and so on. However, he had to weather a gey brisk gale in\nmaking his point good. One woman remarked that it had an unearthly, rank\nsmell; to which he said, \u201cNo, no\u2014ye do not ken your blessings, friend;\nthat\u2019s the smell of venison, for the beast was brought up along with the\ndeers in the Duke\u2019s parks.\u201d And to another wife, that, after\nsmell-smelling at it, thought it was a wee humphed, he replied, \u201cFaith,\nthat\u2019s all the thanks folks get for letting their sheep crop heather\namong the Cheviot hills,\u201d and such-like lies. But as for the head, that\nhad been the doure business. Six times had it been sold and away, and\nsix times had it been brought back again. One bairn said that her\n\u201cmother didna like a sheep\u2019s-head with horns like these,\u201d and wanted it\nchanged for another one. A second one said, that \u201cit had tup\u2019s een, and\nher father liked wether mutton.\u201d A third customer found mortal fault\nwith the colours, which, she said, \u201cwere not canny, or in the course of\nnature.\u201d What the fourth one said, and the fifth one took leave to\nobserve, I have stupidly forgotten, though, I am sure, I heard both; but\nI mind one remarked, quite off-hand, as she sought back her money, that\n\u201cunless sheep could do without beards, like their neighbours, she would\nkeep the pot boiling with a piece beef, in the meantime.\u201d After all\nthis\u2014would any mortal man believe it?\u2014Deacon Paunch, the greasy Daniel\nLambert that he is, had taken the wager, as I before took opportunity to\nremark, that our family would swallow the bait! But, aha, he was off his\neggs there!\n\nJames and me were so tickled with Cursecowl\u2019s wild, outrageous,\noff-hand, humoursome way of telling his crack, that, though sore with\nneighering, none of the two of us ever thought of rising; Cursecowl\nchapping in first one stoup, and then another, and birling the tankard\nround the table, as if we had been drinking dub-water. I daresay I would\nnever have got away, had I not slipped out behind Lucky Thamson\u2019s\nback\u2014for she was a broad fat body, with a round-eared mutch, and a\nfull-plaited check apron\u2014when she was drawing the sixth bottle of small\nbeer, with her corkscrew between her knees; Cursecowl lecturing away, at\nthe dividual moment, like a Glasgow professor, to James Batter, whose\neen were gathering straws, on a pliskie he had once, in the course of\ntrade, played on a conceited body of a French sick-nurse, by selling her\na lump of fat pork to make beef-tea of to her mistress, who was dwining\nin the blue Beelzebubs.\n\nOhone, and woe\u2019s me, for old Father Adam and the fall of man! Poor,\nsober, good, honest James Batter was not, by a thousand miles, a match\nfor such company. Everything, however, has its moral, and the truth will\nout. When Nanse and me were sitting at our breakfast next morning, we\nheard from Benjie, who had been early up fishing for eels at the\nwater-side, that the whole town talk was concerning the misfortunate\nJames Batter, who had been carried home, totally incapable, far in the\nnight, by Cursecowl and an Irish labourer\u2014that sleeped in Widow\nThamson\u2019s garret\u2014on a hand-barrow, borrowed from Maister Wiggie\u2019s\nservant-lass, Jenny Jessamine.\u2014_Mansie Wauch._\n\n\n _Commercial Printing Company, Edinburgh._\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n TRANSCRIBER\u2019S NOTES\n\n\n 1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in\n spelling.\n 2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.\n 3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.\n 4. Enclosed blackletter font in =equals=.","title":"The book of Scottish story : $b historical, humorous, legendary, and imaginative, selected from the works of standard Scottish authors","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":480684}