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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Redgauntlet, by Sir Walter Scott
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Redgauntlet
+
+Author: Sir Walter Scott
+
+Posting Date: December 31, 2008 [EBook #2516]
+Release Date: February, 2000, 2016
+Last Updated: August 31
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK REDGAUNTLET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer
+
+
+
+
+
+REDGAUNTLET
+
+by Sir Walter Scott
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+     Introduction
+     Text
+         Letters I - XIII
+         Chapters I - XXIII
+         Conclusion
+     Notes
+     Glossary
+
+
+Original Transcriber’s Note: Footnotes in the printed book have been
+inserted in the etext in square brackets (“[]”) close to the place where
+they were referenced by a suffix in the original text. Text in italics
+has been written in capital letters. There are some numbered notes at
+the end of the text that are referred to by their numbers with brief
+notes, also in square brackets, embedded in the text.
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+The Jacobite enthusiasm of the eighteenth century, particularly during
+the rebellion of 1745, afforded a theme, perhaps the finest that could
+be selected for fictitious composition, founded upon real or probable
+incident. This civil war and its remarkable events were remembered by
+the existing generation without any degree of the bitterness of spirit
+which seldom fails to attend internal dissension. The Highlanders, who
+formed the principal strength of Charles Edward’s army, were an ancient
+and high-spirited race, peculiar in their habits of war and of peace,
+brave to romance, and exhibiting a character turning upon points more
+adapted to poetry than to the prose of real life. Their prince, young,
+valiant, patient of fatigue, and despising danger, heading his army
+on foot in the most toilsome marches, and defeating a regular force
+in three battles--all these were circumstances fascinating to the
+imagination, and might well be supposed to seduce young and enthusiastic
+minds to the cause in which they were found united, although wisdom and
+reason frowned upon the enterprise.
+
+The adventurous prince, as is well known, proved to be one of
+those personages who distinguish themselves during some single and
+extraordinarily brilliant period of their lives, like the course of a
+shooting-star, at which men wonder, as well on account of the
+briefness, as the brilliancy of its splendour. A long tract of darkness
+overshadowed the subsequent life of a man who, in his youth, showed
+himself so capable of great undertakings; and, without the painful task
+of tracing his course farther, we may say the latter pursuits and habits
+of this unhappy prince are those painfully evincing a broken heart,
+which seeks refuge from its own thoughts in sordid enjoyments.
+
+Still, however, it was long ere Charles Edward appeared to be, perhaps
+it was long ere he altogether became, so much degraded from his original
+self; as he enjoyed for a time the lustre attending the progress and
+termination of his enterprise. Those who thought they discerned in his
+subsequent conduct an insensibility to the distresses of his followers,
+coupled with that egotistical attention to his own interests which has
+been often attributed to the Stuart family, and which is the natural
+effect of the principles of divine right in which they were brought up,
+were now generally considered as dissatisfied and splenetic persons,
+who, displeased with the issue of their adventure and finding themselves
+involved in the ruins of a falling cause, indulged themselves in
+undeserved reproaches against their leader. Indeed, such censures were
+by no means frequent among those of his followers who, if what was
+alleged had been just, had the best right to complain. Far the greater
+number of those unfortunate gentlemen suffered with the most dignified
+patience, and were either too proud to take notice of ill-treatment an
+the part of their prince, or so prudent as to be aware their complaints
+would meet with little sympathy from the world. It may be added, that
+the greater part of the banished Jacobites, and those of high rank and
+consequence, were not much within reach of the influence of the prince’s
+character and conduct, whether well regulated or otherwise.
+
+In the meantime that great Jacobite conspiracy, of which the
+insurrection of 1745-6 was but a small part precipitated into action on
+the failure of a far more general scheme, was resumed and again put into
+motion by the Jacobites of England, whose force had never been broken,
+as they had prudently avoided bringing it into the field. The surprising
+effect which had been produced by small means, in 1745-6, animated their
+hopes for more important successes, when the whole nonjuring interest
+of Britain, identified as it then was with great part of the landed
+gentlemen, should come forward to finish what had been gallantly
+attempted by a few Highland chiefs.
+
+It is probable, indeed, that the Jacobites of the day were incapable of
+considering that the very small scale on which the effort was made, was
+in one great measure the cause of its unexpected success. The remarkable
+speed with which the insurgents marched, the singularly good discipline
+which they preserved, the union and unanimity which for some time
+animated their councils, were all in a considerable degree produced
+by the smallness of their numbers. Notwithstanding the discomfiture
+of Charles Edward, the nonjurors of the period long continued to nurse
+unlawful schemes, and to drink treasonable toasts, until age stole upon
+them. Another generation arose, who did not share the sentiments which
+they cherished; and at length the sparkles of disaffection, which had
+long smouldered, but had never been heated enough to burst into actual
+flame, became entirely extinguished. But in proportion as the political
+enthusiasm died gradually away among men of ordinary temperament, it
+influenced those of warm imaginations and weak understandings, and hence
+wild schemes were formed, as desperate as they were adventurous.
+
+Thus a young Scottishman of rank is said to have stooped so low as to
+plot the surprisal of St. James’s Palace, and the assassination of the
+royal family. While these ill-digested and desperate conspiracies were
+agitated among the few Jacobites who still adhered with more obstinacy
+to their purpose, there is no question but that other plots might have
+been brought to an open explosion, had it not suited the policy of Sir
+Robert Walpole rather to prevent or disable the conspirators in their
+projects, than to promulgate the tale of danger, which might thus have
+been believed to be more widely diffused than was really the case.
+
+In one instance alone this very prudential and humane line of conduct
+was departed from, and the event seemed to confirm the policy of the
+general course. Doctor Archibald Cameron, brother of the celebrated
+Donald Cameron of Lochiel, attainted for the rebellion of 1745, was
+found by a party of soldiers lurking with a comrade in the wilds of Loch
+Katrine five or six years after the battle of Culloden, and was there
+seized. There were circumstances in his case, so far as was made known
+to the public, which attracted much compassion, and gave to the judicial
+proceedings against him an appearance of cold-blooded revenge on the
+part of government; and the following argument of a zealous Jacobite in
+his favour, was received as conclusive by Dr. Johnson and other persons
+who might pretend to impartiality. Dr. Cameron had never borne arms,
+although engaged in the Rebellion, but used his medical skill for the
+service, indifferently, of the wounded of both parties. His return to
+Scotland was ascribed exclusively to family affairs. His behaviour at
+the bar was decent, firm, and respectful. His wife threw herself, on
+three different occasions, before George II and the members of his
+family, was rudely repulsed from their presence, and at length placed,
+it was said, in the same prison with her husband, and confined with
+unmanly severity.
+
+Dr. Cameron was finally executed with all the severities of the law of
+treason; and his death remains in popular estimation a dark blot upon
+the memory of George II, being almost publicly imputed to a mean and
+personal hatred of Donald Cameron of Lochiel, the sufferer’s heroic
+brother.
+
+Yet the fact was that whether the execution of Archibald Cameron was
+political or otherwise, it might certainly have been justified, had
+the king’s ministers so pleased, upon reasons of a public nature. The
+unfortunate sufferer had not come to the Highlands solely upon his
+private affairs, as was the general belief; but it was not judged
+prudent by the English ministry to let it be generally known that
+he came to inquire about a considerable sum of money which had been
+remitted from France to the friends of the exiled family. He had also a
+commission to hold intercourse with the well-known M’Pherson of Cluny,
+chief of the clan Vourich, whom the Chevalier had left behind at his
+departure from Scotland in 1746, and who remained during ten years of
+proscription and danger, skulking from place to place in the Highlands,
+and maintaining an uninterrupted correspondence between Charles and his
+friends. That Dr. Cameron should have held a commission to assist this
+chief in raking together the dispersed embers of disaffection, is in
+itself sufficiently natural, and, considering his political principles,
+in no respect dishonourable to his memory. But neither ought it to be
+imputed to George II that he suffered the laws to be enforced against
+a person taken in the act of breaking them. When he lost his hazardous
+game, Dr. Cameron only paid the forfeit which he must have calculated
+upon. The ministers, however, thought it proper to leave Dr. Cameron’s
+new schemes in concealment, lest, by divulging them, they had indicated
+the channel of communication which, it is now well known, they possessed
+to all the plots of Charles Edward. But it was equally ill advised and
+ungenerous to sacrifice the character of the king to the policy of the
+administration. Both points might have been gained by sparing the
+life of Dr. Cameron after conviction, and limiting his punishment to
+perpetual exile.
+
+These repeated and successive Jacobite plots rose and burst like bubbles
+on a fountain; and one of them, at least, the Chevalier judged of
+importance enough to induce him to risk himself within the dangerous
+precincts of the British capital. This appears from Dr. King’s ANECDOTES
+OF HIS OWN TIMES.
+
+‘September, 1750.--I received a note from my Lady Primrose, who desired
+to see me immediately. As soon as I waited on her, she led me into her
+dressing-room, and presented me to--’ [the Chevalier, doubtless]. ‘If
+I was surprised to find him there, I was still more astonished when he
+acquainted me with the motives which had induced him to hazard a journey
+to England at this juncture. The impatience of his friends who were in
+exile had formed a scheme which was impracticable; but although it had
+been as feasible as they had represented it to him, yet no preparation
+had been made, nor was anything ready to carry it into execution. He was
+soon convinced that he had been deceived; and, therefore, after a stay
+in London of five days only, he returned to the place from whence he
+came.’ Dr. King was in 1750 a keen Jacobite, as may be inferred from the
+visit made by him to the prince under such circumstances, and from his
+being one of that unfortunate person’s chosen correspondents. He, as
+well as other men of sense and observation, began to despair of
+making their fortune in the party which they had chosen. It was indeed
+sufficiently dangerous; for, during the short visit just described,
+one of Dr. King’s servants remarked the stranger’s likeness to Prince
+Charles, whom he recognized from the common busts.
+
+The occasion taken for breaking up the Stuart interest we shall tell in
+Dr. King’s own words:--‘When he (Charles Edward) was in Scotland, he had
+a mistress whose name was Walkinshaw, and whose sister was at that time,
+and is still, housekeeper at Leicester House. Some years after he was
+released from his prison, and conducted out of France, he sent for
+this girl, who soon acquired such a dominion over him, that she was
+acquainted with all his schemes, and trusted with his most secret
+correspondence. As soon as this was known in England, all those persons
+of distinction who were attached to him were greatly alarmed: they
+imagined that this wench had been placed in his family by the English
+ministers; and, considering her sister’s situation, they seemed to have
+some ground for their suspicion; wherefore, they dispatched a gentleman
+to Paris, where the prince then was, who had instructions to insist that
+Mrs. Walkinshaw should be removed to a convent for a certain term; but
+her gallant absolutely refused to comply with this demand; and although
+Mr. M’Namara, the gentleman who was sent to him, who has a natural
+eloquence and an excellent understanding, urged the most cogent reasons,
+and used all the arts of persuasion, to induce him to part with his
+mistress, and even proceeded so far as to assure him, according to his
+instructions, that an immediate interruption of all correspondence with
+his most powerful friends in England, and, in short, that the ruin of
+his interest, which was now daily increasing, would be the infallible
+consequence of his refusal; yet he continued inflexible, and all
+M’Namara’s entreaties and remonstrances were ineffectual. M’Namara
+stayed in Paris some days beyond the time prescribed him, endeavouring
+to reason the prince into a better temper; but finding him obstinately
+persevere in his first answer, he took his leave with concern and
+indignation, saying, as he passed out, “What has your family done, sir,
+thus to draw down the vengeance of Heaven on every branch of it, through
+so many ages?” It is worthy of remark, that in all the conferences which
+M’Namara had with the prince on this occasion, the latter declared that
+it was not a violent passion, or indeed any particular regard, which
+attached him to Mrs. Walkinshaw and that he could see her removed from
+him without any concern; but he would not receive directions, in respect
+to his private conduct, from any man alive. When M’Namara returned
+to London, and reported the prince’s answer to the gentlemen who had
+employed him, they were astonished and confounded. However, they soon
+resolved on the measures which they were to pursue for the future, and
+determined no longer to serve a man who could not be persuaded to serve
+himself, and chose rather to endanger the lives of his best and most
+faithful friends, than part with an harlot, whom, as he often declared,
+he neither loved nor esteemed.’
+
+From this anecdote, the general truth of which is indubitable, the
+principal fault of Charles Edward’s temper is sufficiently obvious. It
+was a high sense of his own importance, and an obstinate adherence to
+what he had once determined on--qualities which, if he had succeeded in
+his bold attempt, gave the nation little room to hope that he would have
+been found free from the love of prerogative and desire of arbitrary
+power, which characterized his unhappy grandfather. He gave a notable
+instance how far this was the leading feature of his character, when,
+for no reasonable cause that can be assigned, he placed his own single
+will in opposition to the necessities of France, which, in order to
+purchase a peace become necessary to the kingdom, was reduced to gratify
+Britain by prohibiting the residence of Charles within any part of the
+French dominions. It was in vain that France endeavoured to lessen the
+disgrace of this step by making the most flattering offers, in hopes
+to induce the prince of himself to anticipate this disagreeable
+alternative, which, if seriously enforced, as it was likely to be, he
+had no means whatever of resisting, by leaving the kingdom as of his
+own free will. Inspired, however, by the spirit of hereditary obstinacy,
+Charles preferred a useless resistance to a dignified submission, and,
+by a series of idle bravadoes, laid the French court under the necessity
+of arresting their late ally, and sending him to close confinement
+in the Bastille, from which he was afterwards sent out of the French
+dominions, much in the manner in which a convict is transported to the
+place of his destination.
+
+In addition to these repeated instances of a rash and inflexible temper,
+Dr. King also adds faults alleged to belong to the prince’s character,
+of a kind less consonant with his noble birth and high pretensions.
+He is said by this author to have been avaricious, or parsimonious at
+least, to such a degree of meanness, as to fail, even when he had
+ample means, in relieving the sufferers who had lost their fortune, and
+sacrificed all in his ill-fated attempt. [The approach is thus expressed
+by Dr. King, who brings the charge:--‘But the most odious part of his
+character is his love of money, a vice which I do not remember to have
+been imputed by our historians to any of his ancestors, and is the
+certain index of a base and little mind. I know it may be urged in his
+vindication, that a prince in exile ought to be an economist. And so
+he ought; but, nevertheless, his purse should be always open as long as
+there is anything in it, to relieve the necessities of his friends and
+adherents. King Charles II, during his banishment, would have shared the
+last pistole in his pocket with his little family. But I have known this
+gentleman, with two thousand louis-d’ors in his strong-box, pretend he
+was in great distress, and borrow money from a lady in Paris who was not
+in affluent circumstances. His most faithful servants, who had closely
+attended him in all his difficulties, were ill rewarded.’--King’s
+MEMOIRS.] We must receive, however, with some degree of jealousy what
+is said by Dr. King on this subject, recollecting that he had left at
+least, if he did not desert, the standard of the unfortunate prince, and
+was not therefore a person who was likely to form the fairest estimate
+of his virtues and faults. We must also remember that if the exiled
+prince gave little, he had but little to give, especially considering
+how late he nourished the scheme of another expedition to Scotland, for
+which he was long endeavouring to hoard money.
+
+The case, also, of Charles Edward must be allowed to have been a
+difficult one. He had to satisfy numerous persons, who, having lost
+their all in his cause, had, with that all, seen the extinction of hopes
+which they accounted nearly as good as certainties; some of these were
+perhaps clamorous in their applications, and certainly ill pleased with
+their want of success. Other parts of the Chevalier’s conduct may have
+afforded grounds for charging him with coldness to the sufferings of his
+devoted followers. One of these was a sentiment which has nothing in it
+that is generous, but it was certainly a principle in which the young
+prince was trained, and which may be too probably denominated peculiar
+to his family, educated in all the high notions of passive obedience
+and non-resistance. If the unhappy prince gave implicit faith to the
+professions of statesmen holding such notions, which is implied by his
+whole conduct.
+
+
+
+
+
+REDGAUNTLET
+
+
+
+
+LETTER I
+
+DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+DUMFRIES.
+
+CUR ME EXANIMAS QUERELIS TUIS? In plain English, Why do you deafen me
+with your croaking? The disconsolate tone in which you bade me farewell
+at Noble House, [The first stage on the road from Edinburgh to Dumfries
+via Moffat.] and mounted your miserable hack to return to your law
+drudgery, still sounds in my ears. It seemed to say, ‘Happy dog! you can
+ramble at pleasure over hill and dale, pursue every object of curiosity
+that presents itself, and relinquish the chase when it loses interest;
+while I, your senior and your better, must, in this brilliant season,
+return to my narrow chamber and my musty books.’
+
+Such was the import of the reflections with which you saddened our
+parting bottle of claret, and thus I must needs interpret the terms of
+your melancholy adieu.
+
+And why should this be so, Alan? Why the deuce should you not be sitting
+precisely opposite to me at this moment, in the same comfortable George
+Inn; thy heels on the fender, and thy juridical brow expanding its
+plications as a pun rose in your fancy? Above all, why, when I fill this
+very glass of wine, cannot I push the bottle to you, and say, ‘Fairford,
+you are chased!’ Why, I say, should not all this be, except because Alan
+Fairford has not the same true sense of friendship as Darsie Latimer,
+and will not regard our purses as common, as well as our sentiments?
+
+I am alone in the world; my only guardian writes to me of a large
+fortune which will be mine when I reach the age of twenty-five complete;
+my present income is, thou knowest, more than sufficient for all
+my wants; and yet thou--traitor as thou art to the cause of
+friendship--dost deprive me of the pleasure of thy society, and
+submittest, besides, to self-denial on thine own part, rather than my
+wanderings should cost me a few guineas more! Is this regard for
+my purse, or for thine own pride? Is it not equally absurd and
+unreasonable, whichever source it springs from? For myself, I tell thee,
+I have, and shall have, more than enough for both. This same methodical
+Samuel Griffiths, of Ironmonger Lane, Guildhall, London, whose letter
+arrives as duly as quarter-day, has sent me, as I told thee, double
+allowance for this my twenty-first birthday, and an assurance, in his
+brief fashion, that it will be again doubled for the succeeding years,
+until I enter into possession of my own property. Still I am to refrain
+from visiting England until my twenty-fifth year expires; and it is
+recommended that I shall forbear all inquiries concerning my family, and
+so forth, for the present.
+
+Were it not that I recollect my poor mother in her deep widow’s weeds,
+with a countenance that never smiled but when she looked on me--and
+then, in such wan and woful sort, as the sun when he glances through an
+April cloud,--were it not, I say, that her mild and matron-like form
+and countenance forbid such a suspicion, I might think myself the son of
+some Indian director, or rich citizen, who had more wealth than grace,
+and a handful of hypocrisy to boot, and who was breeding up privately,
+and obscurely enriching, one of whose existence he had some reason to be
+ashamed. But, as I said before, I think on my mother, and am convinced
+as much as of the existence of my own soul, that no touch of shame could
+arise from aught in which she was implicated. Meantime, I am wealthy,
+and I am alone, and why does my friend scruple to share my wealth?
+
+Are you not my only friend? and have you not acquired a right to share
+my wealth? Answer me that, Alan Fairford. When I was brought from the
+solitude of my mother’s dwelling into the tumult of the Gaits’ Class at
+the High School--when I was mocked for my English accent--salted with
+snow as a Southern--rolled in the gutter for a Saxon pock-pudding,--who,
+with stout arguments and stouter blows, stood forth my defender?--why,
+Alan Fairford. Who beat me soundly when I brought the arrogance of an
+only son, and of course a spoiled urchin, to the forms of the little
+republic?--why, Alan. And who taught me to smoke a cobbler, pin a losen,
+head a bicker, and hold the bannets?--[Break a window, head a skirmish
+with stones, and hold the bonnet, or handkerchief, which used to divide
+High School boys when fighting.] Alan, once more. If I became the pride
+of the Yards, and the dread of the hucksters in the High School Wynd,
+it was under thy patronage; and, but for thee, I had been contented with
+humbly passing through the Cowgate Port, without climbing over the
+top of it, and had never seen the KITTLE NINE-STEPS nearer than from
+Bareford’s Parks. [A pass on the very brink of the Castle rock to the
+north, by which it is just possible for a goat, or a High School boy,
+to turn the corner of the building where it rises from the edge of the
+precipice. This was so favourite a feat with the ‘hell and neck boys’
+of the higher classes, that at one time sentinels were posted to prevent
+its repetition. One of the nine-steps was rendered more secure because
+the climber could take hold of the root of a nettle, so precarious were
+the means of passing this celebrated spot. The manning the Cowgate Port,
+especially in snowball time, was also a choice amusement, as it offered
+an inaccessible station for the boys who used these missiles to the
+annoyance of the passengers. The gateway is now demolished; and probably
+most of its garrison lie as low as the fortress. To recollect that
+the author himself, however naturally disqualified, was one of those
+juvenile dreadnoughts, is a sad reflection to one who cannot now step
+over a brook without assistance.]
+
+You taught me to keep my fingers off the weak, and to clench my fist
+against the strong--to carry no tales out of school--to stand forth like
+a true man--obey the stern order of a PANDE MANUM, and endure my pawmies
+without wincing, like one that is determined not to be the better for
+them. In a word, before I knew thee, I knew nothing.
+
+At college it was the same. When I was incorrigibly idle, your example
+and encouragement roused me to mental exertion, and showed me the way
+to intellectual enjoyment. You made me an historian, a metaphysician
+(INVITA MINERVA)--nay, by Heaven! you had almost made an advocate of me,
+as well as of yourself. Yes, rather than part with you, Alan, I attended
+a weary season at the Scotch Law Class; a wearier at the Civil; and with
+what excellent advantage, my notebook, filled with caricatures of the
+professors and my fellow students, is it not yet extant to testify?
+
+   Thus far have I held on with thee untired;
+
+and, to say truth, purely and solely that I might travel the same road
+with thee. But it will not do, Alan. By my faith, man, I could as soon
+think of being one of those ingenious traders who cheat little Master
+Jackies on the outside of the partition with tops, balls, bats, and
+battledores, as a member of the long-robed fraternity within, who impose
+on grown country gentlemen with bouncing brocards of law. [The Hall of
+the Parliament House of Edinburgh was, in former days, divided into two
+unequal portions by a partition, the inner side of which was consecrated
+to the use of the Courts of Justice and the gentlemen of the law; while
+the outer division was occupied by the stalls of stationers, toymen, and
+the like, as in a modern bazaar. From the old play of THE PLAIN DEALER,
+it seems such was formerly the case with Westminster Hall. Minos has now
+purified his courts in both cities from all traffic but his own.]
+Now, don’t you read this to your worthy father, Alan--he loves me well
+enough, I know, of a Saturday night; but he thinks me but idle company
+for any other day of the week. And here, I suspect, lies your real
+objection to taking a ramble with me through the southern counties in
+this delicious weather. I know the good gentleman has hard thoughts
+of me for being so unsettled as to leave Edinburgh before the Session
+rises; perhaps, too, he quarrels a little--I will not say with my want
+of ancestry, but with my want of connexions. He reckons me a lone thing
+in this world, Alan, and so, in good truth, I am; and it seems a reason
+to him why you should not attach yourself to me, that I can claim no
+interest in the general herd.
+
+Do not suppose I forget what I owe him, for permitting me to shelter for
+four years under his roof: My obligations to him are not the less, but
+the greater, if he never heartily loved me. He is angry, too, that I
+will not, or cannot, be a lawyer, and, with reference to you, considers
+my disinclination that way as PESSIMI EXEMPLI, as he might say.
+
+But he need not be afraid that a lad of your steadiness will be
+influenced by such a reed shaken by the winds as I am. You will go on
+doubting with Dirleton, and resolving those doubts with Stewart,
+[‘Sir John Nisbett of Dirleton’s DOUBTS AND QUESTIONS UPON THE LAW,
+ESPECIALLLY OF SCOTLAND;’ and ‘Sir James Stewart’s DIRLETON’S DOUBTS AND
+QUESTIONS ON THE LAW OF SCOTLAND RESOLVED AND ANSWERED,’ are works
+of authority in Scottish jurisprudence. As is generally the case, the
+doubts are held more in respect than the solution.] until the cramp
+speech [Till of late years, every advocate who catered at the Scottish
+bar made a Latin address to the Court, faculty, and audience, in set
+terms, and said a few words upon a text of the civil law, to show his
+Latinity and jurisprudence. He also wore his hat for a minute, in order
+to vindicate his right of being covered before the Court, which is said
+to have originated from the celebrated lawyer, Sir Thomas Hope, having
+two sons on the bench while he himself remained at the bar. Of late this
+ceremony has been dispensed with, as occupying the time of the Court
+unnecessarily. The entrant lawyer merely takes the oaths to government,
+and swears to maintain the rules and privileges of his order.] has
+been spoken more SOLITO from the corner of the bench, and with covered
+head--until you have sworn to defend the liberties and privileges of the
+College of Justice--until the black gown is hung on your shoulders, and
+you are free as any of the Faculty to sue or defend. Then will I step
+forth, Alan, and in a character which even your father will allow may be
+more useful to you than had I shared this splendid termination of your
+legal studies. In a word, if I cannot be a counsel, I am determined to
+be a CLIENT, a sort of person without whom a lawsuit would be as dull
+as a supposed case. Yes, I am determined to give you your first fee. One
+can easily, I am assured, get into a lawsuit--it is only the getting out
+which is sometimes found troublesome;--and, with your kind father for
+an agent, and you for my counsel learned in the law, and the worshipful
+Master Samuel Griffiths to back me, a few sessions shall not tire my
+patience. In short, I will make my way into court, even if it should
+cost me the committing a DELICT, or at least a QUASI DELICT.--You see
+all is not lost of what Erskine wrote, and Wallace taught.
+
+Thus far I have fooled it off well enough; and yet, Alan, all is not
+at ease within me. I am affected with a sense of loneliness, the more
+depressing, that it seems to me to be a solitude peculiarly my own. In a
+country where all the world have a circle of consanguinity, extending to
+sixth cousins at least, I am a solitary individual, having only one kind
+heart to throb in unison with my own. If I were condemned to labour
+for my bread, methinks I should less regard this peculiar species of
+deprivation, The necessary communication of master and servant would be
+at least a tie which would attach me to the rest of my kind--as it is,
+my very independence seems to enhance the peculiarity of my situation.
+I am in the world as a stranger in the crowded coffeehouse, where he
+enters, calls for what refreshment he wants, pays his bill, and is
+forgotten so soon as the waiter’s mouth has pronounced his ‘Thank ye,
+sir.’
+
+I know your good father would term this SINNING MY MERCIES, [A
+peculiar Scottish phrase expressive of ingratitude for the favours of
+Providence.] and ask how I should feel if, instead of being able to
+throw down my reckoning, I were obliged to deprecate the resentment of
+the landlord for consuming that which I could not pay for. I cannot tell
+how it is; but, though this very reasonable reflection comes across me,
+and though I do confess that four hundred a year in possession, eight
+hundred in near prospect, and the L--d knows how many hundreds more in
+the distance, are very pretty and comfortable things, yet I would freely
+give one half of them to call your father father, though he should
+scold me for my idleness every hour of the day, and to call you brother,
+though a brother whose merits would throw my own so completely into the
+shade.
+
+The faint, yet not improbable, belief has often come across me, that
+your father knows something more about my birth and condition than he
+is willing to communicate; it is so unlikely that I should be left in
+Edinburgh at six years old, without any other recommendation than
+the regular payment of my board to old M--, [Probably Mathieson,
+the predecessor of Dr. Adams, to whose memory the author and his
+contemporaries owe a deep debt of gratitude.] of the High School.
+Before that time, as I have often told you, I have but a recollection
+of unbounded indulgence on my mother’s part, and the most tyrannical
+exertion of caprice on my own. I remember still how bitterly she
+sighed, how vainly she strove to soothe me, while, in the full energy
+of despotism, I roared like ten bull-calves, for something which it was
+impossible to procure for me. She is dead, that kind, that ill-rewarded
+mother! I remember the long faces--the darkened rooms--the black
+hangings--the mysterious impression made upon my mind by the hearse and
+mourning coaches, and the difficulty which I had to reconcile all this
+to the disappearance of my mother. I do not think I had before this
+event formed, any idea, of death, or that I had even heard of that final
+consummation of all that lives. The first acquaintance which I formed
+with it deprived me of my only relation.
+
+A clergyman of venerable appearance, our only visitor, was my guide
+and companion in a journey of considerable length; and in the charge of
+another elderly man, substituted in his place, I know not how or why, I
+completed my journey to Scotland--and this is all I recollect.
+
+I repeat the little history now, as I have a hundred times before,
+merely because I would wring some sense out of it. Turn, then, thy
+sharp, wire-drawing, lawyer-like ingenuity to the same task--make up my
+history as though thou wert shaping the blundering allegations of some
+blue-bonneted, hard-headed client, into a condescendence of facts
+and circumstances, and thou shalt be, not my Apollo--QUID TIBI CUM
+LYRA?--but my Lord Stair, [Celebrated as a Scottish lawyer.] Meanwhile,
+I have written myself out of my melancholy and blue devils, merely by
+prosing about them; so I will now converse half an hour with Roan Robin
+in his stall--the rascal knows me already, and snickers whenever I cross
+the threshold of the stable.
+
+The black which you bestrode yesterday morning promises to be an
+admirable roadster, and ambled as easily with Sam and the portmanteau,
+as with you and your load of law-learning. Sam promises to be steady,
+and has hitherto been so. No long trial, you will say. He lays the
+blame of former inaccuracies on evil company--the people who were at the
+livery-stable were too seductive, I suppose--he denies he ever did the
+horse injustice--would rather have wanted his own dinner, he says.
+In this I believe him, as Roan Robin’s ribs and coat show no marks of
+contradiction. However, as he will meet with no saints in the inns we
+frequent, and as oats are sometimes as speedily converted into ale
+as John Barleycorn himself, I shall keep a look-out after Master Sam.
+Stupid fellow! had he not abused my good nature, I might have chatted
+to him to keep my tongue in exercise; whereas now I must keep him at a
+distance.
+
+Do you remember what Mr. Fairford said to me on this subject--it did not
+become my father’s son to speak in that manner to Sam’s father’s son?
+I asked you what your father could possibly know of mine; and you
+answered, ‘As much, you supposed, as he knew of Sam’s--it was a
+proverbial expression.’ This did not quite satisfy me; though I am sure
+I cannot tell why it should not. But I am returning to a fruitless
+and exhausted subject. Do not be afraid that I shall come back on
+this well-trodden yet pathless field of conjecture. I know nothing so
+useless, so utterly feeble and contemptible, as the groaning forth one’s
+lamentations into the ears of our friends.
+
+I would fain promise you that my letters shall be as entertaining as
+I am determined they shall be regular and well filled. We have an
+advantage over the dear friends of old, every pair of them.
+Neither David and Jonathan, nor Orestes and Pylades, nor Damon and
+Pythias--although, in the latter case particularly, a letter by post
+would have been very acceptable--ever corresponded together; for they
+probably could not write, and certainly had neither post nor franks to
+speed their effusions to each other; whereas yours, which you had from
+the old peer, being handled gently, and opened with precaution, may be
+returned to me again, and serve to make us free of his Majesty’s post
+office, during the whole time of my proposed tour. [It is well known
+and remembered, that when Members of Parliament enjoyed the unlimited
+privilege of franking by the mere writing the name on the cover, it was
+extended to the most extraordinary occasions. One noble lord, to express
+his regard for a particular regiment, franked a letter for every rank
+and file. It was customary also to save the covers and return them,
+in order that the correspondence might be carried on as long as the
+envelopes could hold together.] Mercy upon us, Alan! what letters I
+shall have to send to you, with an account of all that I can collect, of
+pleasant or rare, in this wild-goose jaunt of mine! All I stipulate is
+that you do not communicate them to the SCOTS MAGAZINE; for though you
+used, in a left-handed way, to compliment me on my attainments in the
+lighter branches of literature, at the expense of my deficiency in the
+weightier matters of the law, I am not yet audacious enough to enter the
+portal which the learned Ruddiman so kindly opened for the acolytes of
+the Muses.--VALE SIS MEMOR MEI. D. L.
+
+PS. Direct to the Post Office here. I shall leave orders to forward your
+letters wherever I may travel.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER II
+
+ALAN FAIRFORD TO DARSIE LATIMER
+
+NEGATUR, my dear Darsie--you have logic and law enough to understand the
+word of denial. I deny your conclusion. The premises I admit, namely,
+that when I mounted on that infernal hack, I might utter what seemed
+a sigh, although I deemed it lost amid the puffs and groans of the
+broken-winded brute, matchless in the complication of her complaints by
+any save she, the poor man’s mare, renowned in song, that died
+
+  A mile aboon Dundee.
+
+ [Alluding, as all Scotsmen know, to the humorous old song:--
+
+ ‘The auld man’s mare’s dead,
+  The puir man’s mare’s dead,
+  The auld man’s mare’s dead,
+  A mile aboon Dundee.’]
+
+But credit me, Darsie, the sigh which escaped me, concerned thee more
+than myself, and regarded neither the superior mettle of your cavalry,
+nor your greater command of the means of travelling. I could certainly
+have cheerfully ridden with you for a few days; and assure yourself I
+would not have hesitated to tax your better filled purse for our joint
+expenses. But you know my father considers every moment taken from the
+law as a step down hill; and I owe much to his anxiety on my account,
+although its effects are sometimes troublesome. For example:
+
+I found, on my arrival at the shop in Brown’s Square, that the old
+gentleman had returned that very evening, impatient, it seems, of
+remaining a night out of the guardianship of the domestic Lares. Having
+this information from James, whose brow wore rather an anxious look on
+the occasion, I dispatched a Highland chairman to the livery stable with
+my Bucephalus, and slunk, with as little noise as might be, into my own
+den, where I began to mumble certain half-gnawed and not half-digested
+doctrines of our municipal code. I was not long seated, when my father’s
+visage was thrust, in a peering sort of way, through the half-opened
+door; and withdrawn, on seeing my occupation, with a half-articulated
+HUMPH! which seemed to convey a doubt of the seriousness of my
+application. If it were so, I cannot condemn him; for recollection of
+thee occupied me so entirely during an hour’s reading, that although
+Stair lay before me, and notwithstanding that I turned over three or
+four pages, the sense of his lordship’s clear and perspicuous style
+so far escaped me, that I had the mortification to find my labour was
+utterly in vain.
+
+Ere I had brought up my lee-way, James appeared with his summons to our
+frugal supper--radishes, cheese, and a bottle of the old ale-only two
+plates though--and no chair set for Mr. Darsie, by the attentive James
+Wilkinson. Said James, with his long face, lank hair, and very long
+pig-tail in its leathern strap, was placed, as usual, at the back of
+my father’s chair, upright as a wooden sentinel at the door of a
+puppet-show. ‘You may go down, James,’ said my father; and exit
+Wilkinson.--What is to come next? thought I; for the weather is not
+clear on the paternal brow.
+
+My boots encountered his first glance of displeasure, and he asked me,
+with a sneer, which way I had been riding. He expected me to answer,
+‘Nowhere,’ and would then have been at me with his usual sarcasm,
+touching the humour of walking in shoes at twenty shillings a pair. But
+I answered with composure, that I had ridden out to dinner as far as
+Noble House. He started (you know his way) as if I had said that I
+had dined at Jericho; and as I did not choose to seem to observe his
+surprise, but continued munching my radishes in tranquillity, he broke
+forth in ire.
+
+‘To Noble House, sir! and what had you to do at Noble House, sir? Do
+you remember you are studying law, sir?--that your Scots law trials are
+coming on, sir?--that every moment of your time just now is worth hours
+at another time?--and have you leisure to go to Noble House, sir?--and
+to throw your books behind you for so many hours?--Had it been a turn in
+the meadows, or even a game at golf--but Noble House, sir!’
+
+‘I went so far with Darsie Latimer, sir, to see him begin his journey.’
+
+‘Darsie Latimer?’ he replied in a softened tone--‘Humph!--Well, I do not
+blame you for being kind to Darsie Latimer; but it would have done as
+much good if you had walked with him as far as the toll-bar, and then
+made your farewells--it would have saved horse-hire--and your reckoning,
+too, at dinner.’
+
+‘Latimer paid that, sir,’ I replied, thinking to soften the matter; but
+I had much better have left it unspoken.
+
+‘The reckoning, sir!’ replied my father. ‘And did you sponge upon any
+man for a reckoning? Sir, no man should enter the door of a public-house
+without paying his lawing.’
+
+‘I admit the general rule, sir,’ I replied; ‘but this was a parting-cup
+between Darsie and me; and I should conceive it fell under the exception
+of DOCH AN DORROCH.’
+
+‘You think yourself a wit,’ said my father, with as near an approach to
+a smile as ever he permits to gild the solemnity of his features; ‘but
+I reckon you did not eat your dinner standing, like the Jews at their
+Passover? and it was decided in a case before the town-bailies of
+Cupar-Angus, when Luckie Simpson’s cow had drunk up Luckie Jamieson’s
+browst of ale while it stood in the door to cool, that there was no
+damage to pay, because the crummie drank without sitting down; such
+being the very circumstance constituting DOCH AN DORROCH, which is a
+standing drink, for which no reckoning is paid. Ha, sir! what says your
+advocateship (FIERI) to that? EXEPTIO FIRMAT REGULAM--But come, fill
+your glass, Alan; I am not sorry ye have shown this attention to Darsie
+Latimer, who is a good lad, as times go; and having now lived under my
+roof since he left the school, why, there is really no great matter in
+coming under this small obligation to him.’
+
+As I saw my father’s scruples were much softened by the consciousness of
+his superiority in the legal argument, I took care to accept my pardon
+as a matter of grace, rather than of justice; and only replied, we
+should feel ourselves duller of an evening, now that you were absent. I
+will give you my father’s exact words in reply, Darsie. You know him so
+well, that they will not offend you; and you are also aware, that there
+mingles with the good man’s preciseness and formality, a fund of shrewd
+observation and practical good sense.
+
+‘It is very true,’ he said; ‘Darsie was a pleasant companion-but over
+waggish, over waggish, Alan, and somewhat scatter-brained.--By the way,
+Wilkinson must get our ale bottled in English pints now, for a quart
+bottle is too much, night after night, for you and me, without his
+assistance.--But Darsie, as I was saying, is an arch lad, and somewhat
+light in the upper story--I wish him well through the world; but he has
+little solidity, Alan, little solidity.’
+
+I scorn to desert an absent friend, Darsie, so I said for you a little
+more than my conscience warranted: but your defection from your legal
+studies had driven you far to leeward in my father’s good opinion.
+
+‘Unstable as water, he shall not excel,’ said my father; ‘or, as the
+Septuagint hath it, EFUSA EST SICUT AQUA--NON CRESCAT. He goeth to
+dancing-houses, and readeth novels--SAT EST.’
+
+I endeavoured to parry these texts by observing, that the dancing-houses
+amounted only to one night at La Pique’s ball--the novels (so far as
+matter of notoriety, Darsie) to an odd volume of TOM JONES.
+
+‘But he danced from night to morning,’ replied my father, ‘and he read
+the idle trash, which the author should have been scourged for, at least
+twenty times over. It was never out of his hand.’
+
+I then hinted, that in all probability your fortune was now so easy as
+to dispense with your prosecuting the law any further than you had done;
+and therefore you might think you had some title to amuse yourself. This
+was the least palatable argument of all.
+
+‘If he cannot amuse himself with the law,’ said my father, snappishly
+‘it is the worse for him. If he needs not law to teach him to make a
+fortune, I am sure he needs it to teach him how to keep one; and it
+would better become him to be learning this, than to be scouring the
+country like a land-louper, going he knows not where, to see he knows
+not what, and giving treats at Noble House to fools like himself’ (an
+angry glance at poor me), ‘Noble House, indeed!’ he repeated, with
+elevated voice and sneering tone, as if there were something offensive
+to him in the name, though I will venture to say that any place in which
+you had been extravagant enough to spend five shillings, would have
+stood as deep in his reprobation.
+
+Mindful of your idea, that my father knows more of your real situation
+than he thinks proper to mention, I thought I would hazard a fishing
+observation. ‘I did not see,’ I said, ‘how the Scottish law would be
+useful to a young gentleman whose fortune would seem to be vested in
+England.’--I really thought my father would have beat me.
+
+‘D’ye mean to come round me, sir, PER AMBAGES, as Counsellor Pest says?
+What is it to you where Darsie Latimer’s fortune is vested, or whether
+he hath any fortune, aye or no? And what ill would the Scottish law do
+to him, though he had as much of it as either Stair or Bankton, sir? Is
+not the foundation of our municipal law the ancient code of the Roman
+Empire, devised at a time when it was so much renowned for its civil
+polity, sir, and wisdom? Go to your bed, sir, after your expedition to
+Noble House, and see that your lamp be burning and your book before you
+ere the sun peeps. ARS LONGA, VITA BREVIS--were it not a sin to call the
+divine science of the law by the inferior name of art.’
+
+So my lamp did burn, dear Darsie, the next morning, though the owner
+took the risk of a domiciliary visitation, and lay snug in bed, trusting
+its glimmer might, without further inquiry, be received as sufficient
+evidence of his vigilance. And now, upon this the third morning after
+your departure, things are but little better; for though the lamp burns
+in my den, and VOET ON THE PANDECTS hath his wisdom spread open before
+me, yet as I only use him as a reading-desk on which to scribble this
+sheet of nonsense to Darsie Latimer, it is probable the vicinity will be
+of little furtherance to my studies.
+
+And now, methinks, I hear thee call me an affected hypocritical varlet,
+who, living under such a system of distrust and restraint as my father
+chooses to govern by, nevertheless pretends not to envy you your freedom
+and independence.
+
+Latimer, I will tell you no lies. I wish my father would allow me a
+little more exercise of my free will, were it but that I might feel the
+pleasure of doing what would please him of my own accord. A little more
+spare time, and a little more money to enjoy it, would, besides, neither
+misbecome my age nor my condition; and it is, I own, provoking to see so
+many in the same situation winging the air at freedom, while I sit here,
+caged up like a cobbler’s linnet, to chant the same unvaried lesson
+from sunrise to sunset, not to mention the listening to so many lectures
+against idleness, as if I enjoyed or was making use of the means of
+amusement! But then I cannot at heart blame either the motive or the
+object of this severity. For the motive, it is and can only be my
+father’s anxious, devoted, and unremitting affection and zeal for my
+improvement, with a laudable sense of the honour of the profession to
+which he has trained me.
+
+As we have no near relations, the tie betwixt us is of even unusual
+closeness, though in itself one of the strongest which nature can form.
+I am, and have all along been, the exclusive object of my father’s
+anxious hopes, and his still more anxious and engrossing fears; so what
+title have I to complain, although now and then these fears and hopes
+lead him to take a troublesome and incessant charge of all my motions?
+Besides, I ought to recollect, and, Darsie, I do recollect, that my
+father upon various occasions, has shown that he can be indulgent as
+well as strict. The leaving his old apartments in the Luckenbooths was
+to him like divorcing the soul from the body; yet Dr. R---- did but
+hint that the better air of this new district was more favourable to
+my health, as I was then suffering under the penalties of too rapid a
+growth, when he exchanged his old and beloved quarters, adjacent to the
+very Heart of Midlothian, for one of those new tenements (entire within
+themselves) which modern taste has so lately introduced. Instance also
+the inestimable favour which he conferred on me by receiving you into
+his house, when you had only the unpleasant alternative of remaining,
+though a grown-up lad, in the society of mere boys. [The diminutive and
+obscure place called Brown’s Square, was hailed about the time of its
+erection as an extremely elegant improvement upon the style of designing
+and erecting Edinburgh residences. Each house was, in the phrase used
+by appraisers, ‘finished within itself,’ or, in the still newer
+phraseology, ‘self-contained.’ It was built about the year 1763-4; and
+the old part of the city being near and accessible, this square soon
+received many inhabitants, who ventured to remove to so moderate a
+distance from the High Street.] This was a thing so contrary to all my
+father’s ideas of seclusion, of economy, and of the safety to my morals
+and industry, which he wished to attain, by preserving me from the
+society of other young people, that, upon my word, I am always rather
+astonished how I should have had the impudence to make the request, than
+that he should have complied with it.
+
+Then for the object of his solicitude--Do not laugh, or hold up your
+hands, my good Darsie; but upon my word I like the profession to which
+I am in the course of being educated, and am serious in prosecuting the
+preliminary studies. The law is my vocation--in an especial, and, I
+may say, in an hereditary way, my vocation; for although I have not the
+honour to belong to any of the great families who form in Scotland, as
+in France, the noblesse of the robe, and with us, at least, carry their
+heads as high, or rather higher, than the noblesse of the sword,--for
+the former consist more frequently of the ‘first-born of Egypt,’--yet
+my grandfather, who, I dare say, was a most excellent person, had the
+honour to sign a bitter protest against the Union, in the respectable
+character of town-clerk to the ancient Borough of Birlthegroat; and
+there is some reason--shall I say to hope, or to suspect?--that he may
+have been a natural son of a first cousin of the then Fairford of that
+Ilk, who had been long numbered among the minor barons. Now my father
+mounted a step higher on the ladder of legal promotion, being, as you
+know as well as I do, an eminent and respected Writer to his Majesty’s
+Signet; and I myself am destined to mount a round higher still, and wear
+the honoured robe which is sometimes supposed, like Charity, to cover
+a multitude of sins. I have, therefore, no choice but to climb upwards;
+since we have mounted thus high, or else to fall down at the imminent
+risk of my neck. So that I reconcile myself to my destiny; and while
+you, are looking from mountain peaks, at distant lakes and firths, I am,
+DE APICIBUS JURIS, consoling myself with visions of crimson and scarlet
+gowns--with the appendages of handsome cowls, well lined with salary.
+
+You smile, Darsie, MORE TUO, and seem to say it is little worth while to
+cozen one’s self with such vulgar dreams; yours being, on the contrary,
+of a high and heroic character, bearing the same resemblance to mine,
+that a bench, covered with purple cloth and plentifully loaded with
+session papers, does to some Gothic throne, rough with barbaric pearl
+and gold. But what would you have?--SUA QUEMQUE TRAHIT VOLUPTAS. And my
+visions of preferment, though they may be as unsubstantial at present,
+are nevertheless more capable of being realized, than your aspirations
+after the Lord knows what. What says my father’s proverb? ‘Look to a
+gown of gold, and you will at least get a sleeve of it.’ Such is my
+pursuit; but what dost thou look to? The chance that the mystery, as
+you call it, which at present overclouds your birth and connexions, will
+clear up into something inexpressibly and inconceivably brilliant;
+and this without any effort or exertion of your own, but purely by the
+goodwill of Fortune. I know the pride and naughtiness of thy heart, and
+sincerely do I wish that thou hadst more beatings to thank me for, than
+those which thou dost acknowledge so gratefully. Then had I thumped
+these Quixotical expectations out of thee, and thou hadst not, as
+now, conceived thyself to be the hero of some romantic history, and
+converted, in thy vain imaginations, honest Griffiths, citizen and
+broker, who never bestows more than the needful upon his quarterly
+epistles, into some wise Alexander or sage Alquife, the mystical and
+magical protector of thy peerless destiny. But I know not how it was,
+thy skull got harder, I think, and my knuckles became softer; not to
+mention that at length thou didst begin to show about thee a spark of
+something dangerous, which I was bound to respect at least, if I did not
+fear it.
+
+And while I speak of this, it is not much amiss to advise thee to
+correct a little this cock-a-hoop courage of thine. I fear much that,
+like a hot-mettled horse, it will carry the owner into some scrape, out
+of which he will find it difficult to extricate himself, especially if
+the daring spirit which bore thee thither should chance to fail thee
+at a pinch. Remember, Darsie, thou art not naturally courageous; on
+the contrary, we have long since agreed that, quiet as I am, I have the
+advantage in this important particular. My courage consists, I think,
+in strength of nerves and constitutional indifference to danger; which,
+though it never pushes me on adventure, secures me in full use of
+my recollection, and tolerably complete self-possession, when danger
+actually arrives. Now, thine seems more what may be called intellectual
+courage; highness of spirit, and desire of distinction; impulses which
+render thee alive to the love of fame, and deaf to the apprehension of
+danger, until it forces itself suddenly upon thee. I own that, whether
+it is from my having caught my father’s apprehensions, or that I have
+reason to entertain doubts of my own, I often think that this wildfire
+chase of romantic situation and adventure may lead thee into some
+mischief; and then what would become of Alan Fairford? They might make
+whom they pleased Lord Advocate or Solicitor-General, I should never
+have the heart to strive for it. All my exertions are intended to
+Vindicate myself one day in your eyes; and I think I should not care
+a farthing for the embroidered silk gown, more than for an old woman’s
+apron, unless I had hopes that thou shouldst be walking the boards to
+admire, and perhaps to envy me.
+
+That this may be the case, I prithee--beware! See not a Dulcinea, in
+every slipshod girl, who, with blue eyes, fair hair, a tattered plaid,
+and a willow-wand in her grip, drives out the village cows to the
+loaning. Do not think you will meet a gallant Valentine in every English
+rider, or an Orson in every Highland drover. View things as they are,
+and not as they may be magnified through thy teeming fancy. I have seen
+thee look at an old gravel pit, till thou madest out capes, and bays,
+and inlets, crags and precipices, and the whole stupendous scenery of
+the Isle of Feroe, in what was, to all ordinary eyes, a mere horse-pond.
+Besides, did I not once find thee gazing with respect at a lizard, in
+the attitude of one who looks upon a crocodile? Now this is, doubtless,
+so far a harmless exercise of your imagination; for the puddle cannot
+drown you, nor the Lilliputian alligator eat you up. But it is different
+in society, where you cannot mistake the character of those you converse
+with, or suffer your fancy to exaggerate their qualities, good or bad,
+without exposing yourself not only to ridicule, but to great and serious
+inconveniences. Keep guard, therefore, on your imagination, my dear
+Darsie; and let your old friend assure you, it is the point of your
+character most pregnant with peril to its good and generous owner.
+Adieu! let not the franks of the worthy peer remain unemployed; above
+all, SIS MEMOR MEI. A. F.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER III
+
+DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+SHEPHERD’S BUSH.
+
+I have received thine absurd and most conceited epistle. It is well
+for thee that, Lovelace and Belford-like, we came under a convention
+to pardon every species of liberty which we may take with each other;
+since, upon my word, there are some reflections in your last which would
+otherwise have obliged me to return forthwith to Edinburgh, merely to
+show you I was not what you took me for.
+
+Why, what a pair of prigs hast thou made of us! I plunging into scrapes,
+without having courage to get out of them--thy sagacious self, afraid
+to put one foot before the other, lest it should run away from its
+companion; and so standing still like a post, out of mere faintness
+and coldness of heart, while all the world were driving full speed past
+thee. Thou a portrait-painter! I tell thee, Alan, I have seen a better
+seated on the fourth round of a ladder, and painting a bare-breeched
+Highlander, holding a pint-stoup as big as himself, and a booted
+Lowlander, in a bobwig, supporting a glass of like dimensions; the whole
+being designed to represent the sign of the Salutation.
+
+How hadst thou the heart to represent thine own individual self, with
+all thy motions, like those of a great Dutch doll, depending on the
+pressure of certain springs, as duty, reflection, and the like; without
+the impulse of which, thou wouldst doubtless have me believe thou
+wouldst not budge an inch! But have I not seen Gravity out of his bed at
+midnight? and must I, in plain terms, remind thee of certain mad pranks?
+Thou hadst ever, with the gravest sentiments in thy mouth and the most
+starched reserve in thy manner, a kind of lumbering proclivity towards
+mischief, although with more inclination to set it a-going than address
+to carry it through; and I cannot but chuckle internally, when I think
+of having seen my most venerable monitor, the future president of some
+high Scottish court, puffing, blowing, and floundering, like a clumsy
+cart-horse in a bog where his efforts to extricate himself only plunged
+him deeper at every awkward struggle, till some one--I myself, for
+example--took compassion on the moaning monster, and dragged him out by
+mane and tail.
+
+As for me, my portrait is, if possible, even more scandalously
+caricatured, I fail or quail in spirit at the upcome! Where canst thou
+show me the least symptom of the recreant temper, with which thou hast
+invested me (as I trust) merely to set off the solid and impassible
+dignity of thine own stupid indifference? If you ever saw me tremble, be
+assured that my flesh, like that of the old Spanish general, only quaked
+at the dangers into which my spirit was about to lead it. Seriously,
+Alan, this imputed poverty of spirit is a shabby charge to bring against
+your friend. I have examined myself as closely as I can, being, in very
+truth, a little hurt at your having such hard thoughts of me, and on
+my life I can see no reason for them. I allow you have, perhaps, some
+advantage of me in the steadiness and indifference of your temper; but I
+should despise myself, if I were conscious of the deficiency in courage
+which you seem willing enough to impute to me. However, I suppose, this
+ungracious hint proceeds from sincere anxiety for my safety; and so
+viewing it, I swallow it as I would do medicine from a friendly doctor,
+although I believed in my heart he had mistaken my complaint.
+
+This offensive insinuation disposed of, I thank thee, Alan, for the rest
+of thy epistle. I thought I heard your good father pronouncing the word
+Noble House, with a mixture of contempt and displeasure, as if the very
+name of the poor little hamlet were odious to him, or as if you had
+selected, out of all Scotland, the very place at which you had no call
+to dine. But if he had had any particular aversion to that blameless
+village and very sorry inn, is it not his own fault that I did not
+accept the invitation of the Laird of Glengallacher, to shoot a buck
+in what he emphatically calls ‘his country’? Truth is, I had a strong
+desire to have complied with his lairdship’s invitation. To shoot a
+buck! Think how magnificent an idea to one who never shot anything but
+hedge-sparrows, and that with a horse-pistol purchased at a broker’s
+stand in the Cowgate! You, who stand upon your courage, may remember
+that I took the risk of firing the said pistol for the first time, while
+you stood at twenty yards’ distance; and that, when you were persuaded
+it would go off without bursting, forgetting all law but that of the
+biggest and strongest, you possessed yourself of it exclusively for the
+rest of the holidays. Such a day’s sport was no complete introduction to
+the noble art of deer-stalking, as it is practised in the Highlands; but
+I should not have scrupled to accept honest Glengallacher’s invitation,
+at the risk of firing a rifle for the first time, had it not been for
+the outcry which your father made at my proposal, in the full ardour of
+his zeal for King George, the Hanover succession, and the Presbyterian
+faith. I wish I had stood out, since I have gained so little upon
+his good opinion by submission. All his impressions concerning the
+Highlanders are taken from the recollections of the Forty-five, when he
+retreated from the West Port with his brother volunteers, each to
+the fortalice of his own separate dwelling, so soon as they heard the
+Adventurer was arrived with his clans as near them as Kirkliston. The
+flight of Falkirk--PARMA NON BENE SELECTA--in which I think your sire
+had his share with the undaunted western regiment, does not seem to have
+improved his taste for the company of the Highlanders; (quaere,
+Alan, dost thou derive the courage thou makest such boast of from an
+hereditary source?) and stories of Rob Roy Macgregor, and Sergeant Alan
+Mhor Cameron, have served to paint them in still more sable colours to
+his imagination. [Of Rob Roy we have had more than enough. Alan Cameron,
+commonly called Sergeant Mhor, a freebooter of the same period, was
+equally remarkable for strength, courage, and generosity.]
+
+Now, from all I can understand, these ideas, as applied to the present
+state of the country, are absolutely chimerical. The Pretender is
+no more remembered in the Highlands than if the poor gentleman were
+gathered to his hundred and eight fathers, whose portraits adorn the
+ancient walls of Holyrood; the broadswords have passed into other hands;
+the targets are used to cover the butter churns; and the race has sunk,
+or is fast sinking, from ruffling bullies into tame cheaters. Indeed, it
+was partly my conviction that there is little to be seen in the north,
+which, arriving at your father’s conclusions, though from different
+premisses, inclined my course in this direction, where perhaps I shall
+see as little.
+
+One thing, however, I HAVE seen; and it was with pleasure the more
+indescribable, that I was debarred from treading the land which my eyes
+were permitted to gaze upon, like those of the dying prophet from top
+of Mount Pisgah,--I have seen, in a word, the fruitful shores of merry
+England; merry England! of which I boast myself a native, and on which
+I gaze, even while raging floods and unstable quicksands divide us, with
+the filial affection of a dutiful son.
+
+Thou canst not have forgotten, Alan--for when didst thou ever forget
+what was interesting to thy friend?--that the same letter from my friend
+Griffiths, which doubled my income, and placed my motions at my own
+free disposal, contained a prohibitory clause, by which, reason none
+assigned, I was prohibited, as I respected my present safety and
+future fortunes, from visiting England; every other part of the British
+dominions, and a tour, if I pleased, on the Continent, being left to my
+own choice.--Where is the tale, Alan, of a covered dish in the midst
+of a royal banquet, upon which the eyes of every guest were immediately
+fixed, neglecting all the dainties with which the table was loaded? This
+cause of banishment from England--from my native country--from the land
+of the brave, and the wise, and the free--affects me more than I am
+rejoiced by the freedom and independence assigned to me in all other
+respects. Thus, in seeking this extreme boundary of the country which
+I am forbidden to tread, I resemble the poor tethered horse, which, you
+may have observed, is always grazing on the very verge of the circle to
+which it is limited by its halter.
+
+Do not accuse me of romance for obeying this impulse towards the South;
+nor suppose that, to satisfy the imaginary longing of an idle curiosity,
+I am in any danger of risking the solid comforts of my present
+condition. Whoever has hitherto taken charge of my motions has shown me,
+by convincing proofs more weighty than the assurances which they have
+witheld, that my real advantage is their principal object. I should be,
+therefore, worse than a fool did I object to their authority, even when
+it seems somewhat capriciously exercised; for assuredly, at my age, I
+might--intrusted as I am with the care and management of myself in every
+other particular--expect that the cause of excluding me from England
+should be frankly and fairly stated for my own consideration and
+guidance. However, I will not grumble about the matter. I shall know the
+whole story one day, I suppose; and perhaps, as you sometimes surmise, I
+shall not find there is any mighty matter in it after all.
+
+Yet one cannot help wondering--but plague on it, if I wonder any
+longer, my letter will be as full of wonders as one of Katterfelto’s
+advertisements. I have a month’s mind, instead of this damnable
+iteration of guesses and forebodings, to give thee the history of a
+little adventure which befell me yesterday; though I am sure you will,
+as usual, turn the opposite side of the spyglass on my poor narrative,
+and reduce, MORE TUO, to the most petty trivialities, the circumstance
+to which thou accusest me of giving undue consequence. Hang thee, Alan,
+thou art as unfit a confidant for a youthful gallant with some spice
+of imagination, as the old taciturn secretary of Facardin of Trebizond.
+Nevertheless, we must each perform our separate destinies. I am doomed
+to see, act, and tell; thou, like a Dutchman enclosed in the same
+diligence with a Gascon, to hear, and shrug thy shoulders.
+
+Of Dumfries, the capital town of this county, I have but little to say,
+and will not abuse your patience by reminding you that it is built on
+the gallant river Nith, and that its churchyard, the highest place of
+the old town, commands an extensive and fine prospect. Neither will I
+take the traveller’s privilege of inflicting upon you the whole history
+of Bruce poniarding the Red Comyn in the Church of the Dominicans
+at this place, and becoming a king and patriot because he had been a
+church-breaker and a murderer. The present Dumfriezers remember and
+justify the deed, observing it was only a papist church--in evidence
+whereof, its walls have been so completely demolished that no vestiges
+of them remain. They are a sturdy set of true-blue Presbyterians, these
+burghers of Dumfries; men after your father’s own heart, zealous for the
+Protestant succession--the rather that many of the great families around
+are suspected to be of a different way of thinking, and shared, a great
+many of them, in the insurrection of the Fifteen, and some in the more
+recent business of the Forty-five. The town itself suffered in the
+latter era; for Lord Elcho, with a large party of the rebels, levied
+a severe contribution upon Dumfries, on account of the citizens having
+annoyed the rear of the Chevalier during his march into England.
+
+Many of these particulars I learned from Provost C--, who, happening to
+see me in the market-place, remembered that I was an intimate of your
+father’s, and very kindly asked me to dinner. Pray tell your father that
+the effects of his kindness to me follow me everywhere. I became tired,
+however, of this pretty town in the course of twenty-four hours, and
+crept along the coast eastwards, amusing myself with looking out for
+objects of antiquity, and sometimes making, or attempting to make, use
+of my new angling-rod. By the way, old Cotton’s instructions, by which
+I hoped to qualify myself for one of the gentle society of anglers, are
+not worth a farthing for this meridian. I learned this by mere accident,
+after I had waited four mortal hours. I shall never forget an impudent
+urchin, a cowherd, about twelve years old, without either brogue or
+bonnet, barelegged, and with a very indifferent pair of breeches--how
+the villain grinned in scorn at my landing-net, my plummet, and the
+gorgeous jury of flies which I had assembled to destroy all the fish
+in the river. I was induced at last to lend the rod to the sneering
+scoundrel, to see what he would make of it; and he had not only half
+filled my basket in an hour, but literally taught me to kill two trouts
+with my own hand. This, and Sam having found the hay and oats, not
+forgetting the ale, very good at this small inn, first made me take
+the fancy of resting here for a day or two; and I have got my grinning
+blackguard of a piscator leave to attend on me, by paying sixpence a day
+for a herd-boy in his stead.
+
+A notably clean Englishwoman keeps this small house, and my bedroom is
+sweetened with lavender, has a clean sash-window, and the walls are,
+moreover, adorned with ballads of Fair Rosamond and Cruel Barbara Allan.
+The woman’s accent, though uncouth enough, sounds yet kindly in my ear;
+for I have never yet forgotten the desolate effect produced on my
+infant organs, when I heard on all sides your slow and broad northern
+pronunciation, which was to me the tone of a foreign land. I am sensible
+I myself have since that time acquired Scotch in perfection, and many a
+Scotticism withal. Still the sound of the English accentuation comes to
+my ears as the tones of a friend; and even when heard from the mouth of
+some wandering beggar, it has seldom failed to charm forth my mite.
+You Scotch, who are so proud of your own nationality, must make due
+allowance for that of other folks.
+
+On the next morning I was about to set forth to the stream where I had
+commenced angler the night before, but was prevented by a heavy shower
+of rain from stirring abroad the whole forenoon; during all which time,
+I heard my varlet of a guide as loud with his blackguard jokes in the
+kitchen, as a footman in the shilling gallery; so little are modesty and
+innocence the inseparable companions of rusticity and seclusion.
+
+When after dinner the day cleared, and we at length sallied out to the
+river side, I found myself subjected to a new trick on the part of my
+accomplished preceptor. Apparently, he liked fishing himself better than
+the trouble of instructing an awkward novice such as I; and in hopes of
+exhausting my patience, and inducing me to resign the rod, as I had done
+the preceding day, my friend contrived to keep me thrashing the water
+more than an hour with a pointless hook. I detected this trick at last,
+by observing the rogue grinning with delight when he saw a large trout
+rise and dash harmless away from the angle. I gave him a sound cuff,
+Alan; but the next moment was sorry, and, to make amends, yielded
+possession of the fishing-rod for the rest of the evening, he
+undertaking to bring me home a dish of trouts for my supper, in
+atonement for his offences.
+
+Having thus got honourably rid of the trouble of amusing myself in a way
+I cared not for, I turned my steps towards the sea, or rather the Solway
+Firth which here separates the two sister kingdoms, and which lay at
+about a mile’s distance, by a pleasant walk over sandy knells, covered
+with short herbage, which you call Links, and we English, Downs.
+
+But the rest of my adventure would weary out my fingers, and must
+be deferred until to-morrow, when you shall hear from me, by way of
+continuation; and, in the meanwhile, to prevent over-hasty conclusions,
+I must just hint to you, we are but yet on the verge of the adventure
+which it is my purpose to communicate.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IV
+
+THE SAME TO THE SAME
+
+SHEPHERD’S BUSH.
+
+I mentioned in my last, that having abandoned my fishing-rod as an
+unprofitable implement, I crossed over the open downs which divided me
+from the margin of the Solway. When I reached the banks of the great
+estuary, which are here very bare and exposed, the waters had receded
+from the large and level space of sand, through which a stream,
+now feeble and fordable, found its way to the ocean. The whole was
+illuminated by the beams of the low and setting sun, who showed
+his ruddy front, like a warrior prepared for defence, over a huge
+battlemented and turreted wall of crimson and black clouds, which
+appeared like an immense Gothic fortress, into which the lord of day was
+descending. His setting rays glimmered bright upon the wet surface of
+the sands, and the numberless pools of water by which it was covered,
+where the inequality of the ground had occasioned their being left by
+the tide.
+
+The scene was animated by the exertions of a number of horsemen, who
+were actually employed in hunting salmon. Aye, Alan, lift up your
+hands and eyes as you will, I can give their mode of fishing no name so
+appropriate; for they chased the fish at full gallop, and struck them
+with their barbed spears, as you see hunters spearing boars in the old
+tapestry. The salmon, to be sure, take the thing more quietly than the
+boars; but they are so swift in their own element, that to pursue
+and strike them is the task of a good horseman, with a quick eye, a
+determined hand, and full command both of his horse and weapon. The
+shouts of the fellows as they galloped up and down in the animating
+exercise--their loud bursts of laughter when any of their number caught
+a fall--and still louder acclamations when any of the party made a
+capital stroke with his lance--gave so much animation to the whole
+scene, that I caught the enthusiasm of the sport, and ventured forward
+a considerable space on the sands. The feats of one horseman, in
+particular, called forth so repeatedly the clamorous applause of his
+companions, that the very banks rang again with their shouts. He was a
+tall man, well mounted on a strong black horse, which he caused to turn
+and wind like a bird in the air, carried a longer spear than the others,
+and wore a sort of fur cap or bonnet, with a short feather in it,
+which gave him on the whole rather a superior appearance to the other
+fishermen. He seemed to hold some sort of authority among them, and
+occasionally directed their motions both by voice and hand: at which
+times I thought his gestures were striking, and his voice uncommonly
+sonorous and commanding.
+
+The riders began to make for the shore, and the interest of the scene
+was almost over, while I lingered on the sands, with my looks turned to
+the shores of England, still gilded by the sun’s last rays, and, as it
+seemed, scarce distant a mile from me. The anxious thoughts which
+haunt me began to muster in my bosom, and my feet slowly and insensibly
+approached the river which divided me from the forbidden precincts,
+though without any formed intention, when my steps were arrested by
+the sound of a horse galloping; and as I turned, the rider (the same
+fisherman whom I had formerly distinguished) called out to me, in
+an abrupt manner, ‘Soho, brother! you are too late for Bowness
+to-night--the tide will make presently.’
+
+I turned my head and looked at him without answering; for, to my
+thinking, his sudden appearance (or rather, I should say, his unexpected
+approach) had, amidst the gathering shadows and lingering light,
+something in it which was wild and ominous.
+
+‘Are you deaf?’ he added--‘or are you mad?--or have you a mind for the
+next world?’
+
+‘I am a stranger,’ I answered,’ and had no other purpose than looking on
+at the fishing--I am about to return to the side I came from.’
+
+‘Best make haste then,’ said he. ‘He that dreams on the bed of the
+Solway, may wake in the next world. The sky threatens a blast that will
+bring in the waves three feet abreast.’
+
+So saying, he turned his horse and rode off, while I began to walk back
+towards the Scottish shore, a little alarmed at what I had heard;
+for the tide advances with such rapidity upon these fatal sands, that
+well-mounted horsemen lay aside hopes of safety, if they see its white
+surge advancing while they are yet at a distance from the bank.
+
+These recollections grew more agitating, and, instead of walking
+deliberately, I began a race as fast as I could, feeling, or thinking I
+felt, each pool of salt water through which I splashed, grow deeper and
+deeper. At length the surface of the sand did seem considerably more
+intersected with pools and channels full of water--either that the tide
+was really beginning to influence the bed of the estuary, or, as I must
+own is equally probable, that I had, in the hurry and confusion of my
+retreat, involved myself in difficulties which I had avoided in my more
+deliberate advance. Either way, it was rather an unpromising state of
+affairs, for the sands at the same time turned softer, and my footsteps,
+so soon as I had passed, were instantly filled with water. I began to
+have odd recollections concerning the snugness of your father’s parlour,
+and the secure footing afforded by the pavement of Brown’s Square and
+Scott’s Close, when my better genius, the tall fisherman, appeared once
+more close to my side, he and his sable horse looming gigantic in the
+now darkening twilight.
+
+‘Are you mad?’ he said, in the same deep tone which had before thrilled
+on my ear, ‘or are you weary of your life? You will be presently amongst
+the quicksands.’ I professed my ignorance of the way, to which he only
+replied, ‘There is no time for prating--get up behind me.’
+
+He probably expected me to spring from the ground with the activity
+which these Borderers have, by constant practice, acquired in everything
+relating to horsemanship; but as I stood irresolute, he extended his
+hand, and grasping mine, bid me place my foot on the toe of his boot,
+and thus raised me in a trice to the croupe of his horse. I was scarcely
+securely seated, ere he shook the reins of his horse, who instantly
+sprang forward; but annoyed, doubtless, by the unusual burden, treated
+us to two or three bounds, accompanied by as many flourishes of his hind
+heels. The rider sat like a tower, notwithstanding that the unexpected
+plunging of the animal threw me forward upon him. The horse was soon
+compelled to submit to the discipline of the spur and bridle, and went
+off at a steady hand gallop; thus shortening the devious, for it was
+by no means a direct path, by which the rider, avoiding the loose
+quicksands, made for the northern bank.
+
+My friend, perhaps I may call him my preserver,--for, to a stranger, my
+situation was fraught with real danger,--continued to press on at the
+same speedy pace, but in perfect silence, and I was under too much
+anxiety of mind to disturb him with any questions. At length we arrived
+at a part of the shore with which I was utterly unacquainted, when I
+alighted and began to return in the best fashion I could my thanks for
+the important service which he had just rendered me.
+
+The stranger only replied by an impatient ‘pshaw!’ and was about to ride
+off, and leave me to my own resources when I implored him to complete
+his work of kindness by directing me to Shepherd’s Bush, which was, as I
+informed him, my home for the present.
+
+‘To Shepherd’s Bush?’ he said; ‘it is but three miles but if you know
+not the land better than the sand, you may break your neck before you
+get there; for it is no road for a moping boy in a dark night; and,
+besides, there are the brook and the fens to cross.’
+
+I was a little dismayed at this communication of such difficulties as my
+habits had not called on me to contend with. Once more the idea of thy
+father’s fireside came across me; and I could have been well contented
+to have swapped the romance of my situation, together with the glorious
+independence of control which I possessed at the moment, for the
+comforts of that chimney-corner, though I were obliged to keep my eyes
+chained to Erskine’s LARGER INSTITUTES.
+
+I asked my new friend whether he could not direct me to any house of
+public entertainment for the night; and supposing it probable he was
+himself a poor man, I added, with the conscious dignity of a well-filled
+pocket-book, that I could make it worth any man’s while to oblige me.
+The fisherman making no answer, I turned away from him with as gallant
+an appearance of indifference as I could command, and began to take, as
+I thought, the path which he had pointed out to me.
+
+His deep voice immediately sounded after me to recall me. ‘Stay, young
+man, stay--you have mistaken the road already.--I wonder your friends
+sent out such an inconsiderate youth, without some one wiser than
+himself to take care of him.’
+
+‘Perhaps they might not have done so,’ said I, ‘if I had any friends who
+cared about the matter.’
+
+‘Well, sir,’ he said, ‘it is not my custom to open my house to
+strangers, but your pinch is like to be a smart one; for, besides the
+risk from bad roads, fords, and broken ground, and the night,
+which looks both black and gloomy, there is bad company on the road
+sometimes--at least it has a bad name, and some have come to harm; so
+that I think I must for once make my rule give way to your necessity,
+and give you a night’s lodging in my cottage.
+
+Why was it, Alan, that I could not help giving an involuntary shudder at
+receiving an invitation so seasonable in itself, and so suitable to my
+naturally inquisitive disposition? I easily suppressed this untimely
+sensation; and as I returned thanks, and expressed my hope that I should
+not disarrange, his family, I once more dropped a hint of my desire to
+make compensation for any trouble I might occasion. The man answered
+very coldly, ‘Your presence will no doubt give me trouble, sir, but it
+is of a kind which your purse, cannot compensate; in a word, although
+I am content to receive you as my guest, I am no publican to call a
+reckoning.’
+
+I begged his pardon, and, at his instance, once more seated myself
+behind hint upon the good horse, which went forth steady as before--the
+moon, whenever she could penetrate the clouds, throwing the huge shadow
+of the animal, with its double burden, on the wild and bare ground over
+which we passed.
+
+Thou mayst laugh till thou lettest the letter fall, if thou wilt, but
+it reminded me of the magician Atlantes on his hippogriff with a knight
+trussed up behind him, in the manner Ariosto has depicted that matter.
+Thou art I know, matter-of-fact enough to affect contempt of that
+fascinating and delicious poem; but think not that, to conform with
+thy bad taste, I shall forbear any suitable illustration which now or
+hereafter may occur to me.
+
+On we went, the sky blackening around us, and the wind beginning to pipe
+such a wild and melancholy tune as best suited the hollow sounds of the
+advancing tide, which I could hear at a distance, like the roar of some
+immense monster defrauded of its prey.
+
+At length, our course was crossed by a deep dell or dingle, such as they
+call in some parts of Scotland a den, and in others a cleuch or narrow
+glen. It seemed, by the broken glances which the moon continued to
+throw upon it, to be steep, precipitous, and full of trees, which are,
+generally speaking, rather scarce upon these shores. The descent by
+which we plunged into this dell was both steep and rugged, with two
+or three abrupt turnings; but neither danger nor darkness impeded the
+motion of the black horse, who seemed rather to slide upon his haunches,
+than to gallop down the pass, throwing me again on the shoulders of the
+athletic rider, who, sustaining no inconvenience by the circumstance,
+continued to press the horse forward with his heel, steadily supporting
+him at the same time by raising his bridle-hand, until we stood in
+safety at the bottom of the steep--not a little to my consolation, as,
+friend Alan, thou mayst easily conceive.
+
+A very short advance up the glen, the bottom of which we had attained by
+this ugly descent, brought us in front of two or three cottages, one
+of which another blink of moonshine enabled me to rate as rather better
+than those of the Scottish peasantry in this part of the world; for the
+sashes seemed glazed, and there were what are called storm-windows in
+the roof, giving symptoms of the magnificence of a second story. The
+scene around was very interesting; for the cottages, and the yards or
+crofts annexed to them, occupied a haugh, or helm, of two acres, which
+a brook of some consequence (to judge from its roar) had left upon one
+side of the little glen while finding its course close to the farther
+bank, and which appeared to be covered and darkened with trees, while
+the level space beneath enjoyed such stormy smiles as the moon had that
+night to bestow.
+
+I had little time for observation, for my companion’s loud whistle,
+seconded by an equally loud halloo, speedily brought to the door of
+the principal cottage a man and a woman, together with two large
+Newfoundland dogs, the deep baying of which I had for some time heard. A
+yelping terrier or two, which had joined the concert, were silent at
+the presence of my conductor, and began to whine, jump up, and fawn upon
+him. The female drew back when she beheld a stranger; the man, who had
+a lighted lantern, advanced, and, without any observation, received the
+horse from my host, and led him, doubtless, to stable, while I followed
+my conductor into the house. When we had passed the HALLAN, [The
+partition which divides a Scottish cottage.] we entered a well-sized
+apartment, with a clean brick floor, where a fire blazed (much to my
+contentment) in the ordinary projecting sort of a chimney, common in
+Scottish houses. There were stone seats within the chimney; and ordinary
+utensils, mixed with fishing-spears, nets, and similar implements of
+sport, were hung around the walls of the place. The female who had first
+appeared at the door, had now retreated into a side apartment. She was
+presently followed by my guide, after he had silently motioned me to a
+seat; and their place was supplied by an elderly woman, in a grey stuff
+gown, with a check apron and toy, obviously a menial, though neater in
+her dress than is usual in her apparent rank--an advantage which was
+counterbalanced by a very forbidding aspect. But the most singular part
+of her attire, in this very Protestant country, was a rosary, in which
+the smaller beads were black oak, and those indicating the PATER-NOSTER
+of silver, with a crucifix of the same metal.
+
+This person made preparations for supper, by spreading a clean though
+coarse cloth over a large oaken table, placing trenchers and salt upon
+it, and arranging the fire to receive a gridiron. I observed her motions
+in silence; for she took no sort of notice of me, and as her looks were
+singularly forbidding, I felt no disposition to commence conversation.
+
+When this duenna had made all preliminary arrangements, she took from
+the well-filled pouch of my conductor, which he had hung up by the
+door, one or two salmon, or GRILSES, as the smaller sort are termed, and
+selecting that which seemed best and in highest season, began to cut
+it into slices, and to prepare a GRILLADE; the savoury smell of which
+affected me so powerfully that I began sincerely to hope that no delay
+would intervene between the platter and the lip.
+
+As this thought came across me, the man who had conducted the horse to
+the stable entered the apartment, and discovered to me a countenance yet
+more uninviting than that of the old crone who was performing with such
+dexterity the office of cook to the party. He was perhaps sixty years
+old; yet his brow was not much furrowed, and his jet-black hair was only
+grizzled, not whitened, by the advance of age. All his motions spoke
+strength unabated; and, though rather undersized, he had very broad
+shoulders, was square-made, thin-flanked, and apparently combined in his
+frame muscular strength and activity; the last somewhat impaired perhaps
+by years, but the first remaining in full vigour. A hard and harsh
+countenance--eyes far sunk under projecting eyebrows, which were
+grizzled like his hair--a wide mouth, furnished from ear to ear with it
+range of unimpaired teeth, of uncommon whiteness, and a size and breadth
+which might have become the jaws of an ogre, completed this delightful
+portrait. He was clad like a fisherman, in jacket and trousers of the
+blue cloth commonly used by seamen, and had a Dutch case-knife, like
+that of a Hamburgh skipper, stuck into a broad buff belt, which seemed
+as if it might occasionally sustain weapons of a description still less
+equivocally calculated for violence.
+
+This man gave me an inquisitive, and, as I thought, a sinister look upon
+entering the apartment; but without any further notice of me, took up
+the office of arranging the table, which the old lady had abandoned for
+that of cooking the fish, and, with more address than I expected from
+a person of his coarse appearance, placed two chairs at the head of the
+table, and two stools below; accommodating each seat to a cover, beside
+which he placed an allowance of barley-bread, and a small jug, which he
+replenished with ale from a large black jack. Three of these jugs
+were of ordinary earthenware, but the fourth, which he placed by the
+right-hand cover at, the upper end of the table, was a flagon of
+silver, and displayed armorial bearings. Beside this flagon he placed a
+salt-cellar of silver, handsomely wrought, containing salt of exquisite
+whiteness, with pepper and other spices. A sliced lemon was also
+presented on a small silver salver. The two large water-dogs, who
+seemed perfectly to understand the nature of the preparations, seated
+themselves one on each side of the table, to be ready to receive their
+portion of the entertainment. I never saw finer animals, or which
+seemed to be more influenced by a sense of decorum, excepting that they
+slobbered a little as the rich scent from the chimney was wafted past
+their noses. The small dogs ensconced themselves beneath the table.
+
+I am aware that I am dwelling upon trivial and ordinary circumstances,
+and that perhaps I may weary out your patience in doing so. But conceive
+me alone in this strange place, which seemed, from the universal
+silence, to be the very temple of Harpocrates--remember that this is
+my first excursion from home--forget not that the manner in which I had
+been brought hither had the dignity of danger and something the air of
+an adventure, and that there was a mysterious incongruity in all I had
+hitherto witnessed; and you will not, I think, be surprised that these
+circumstances, though trifling, should force themselves on my notice at
+the time, and dwell in my memory afterwards.
+
+That a fisher, who pursued the sport perhaps for his amusement as well
+as profit, should be well mounted and better lodged than the lower class
+of peasantry, had in it nothing surprising; but there was something
+about all that I saw which seemed to intimate that I was rather in
+the abode of a decayed gentleman, who clung to a few of the forms and
+observances of former rank, than in that of a common peasant, raised
+above his fellows by comparative opulence.
+
+Besides the articles of plate which I have already noticed, the old man
+now lighted and placed on the table a silver lamp, or CRUISIE as the
+Scottish term it, filled with very pure oil, which in burning diffused
+an aromatic fragrance, and gave me a more perfect view of the cottage
+walls, which I had hitherto only seen dimly by the light of the fire.
+The BINK [The frame of wooden shelves placed in a Scottish kitchen for
+holding plates.] with its usual arrangement of pewter and earthenware,
+which was most strictly and critically clean, glanced back the flame of
+the lamp merrily from one side of the apartment. In a recess, formed
+by the small bow of a latticed window, was a large writing-desk of
+walnut-tree wood, curiously carved, above which arose shelves of the
+same, which supported a few books and papers. The opposite side of the
+recess contained (as far as I could discern, for it lay in shadow, and
+I could at any rate have seen it but imperfectly from the place where
+I was seated) one or two guns, together with swords, pistols, and
+other arms a collection which, in a poor cottage, and in a country so
+peaceful, appeared singular at least, if not even somewhat suspicious.
+
+All these observations, you may suppose, were made much sooner than I
+have recorded, or you (if you have not skipped) have been able to read
+them. They were already finished, and I was considering how I should
+open some communication with the mute inhabitants of the mansion, when
+my conductor re-entered from the side-door by which he had made his
+exit.
+
+He had now thrown off his rough riding-cap, and his coarse jockey-coat,
+And stood before me in a grey jerkin trimmed with black, which sat close
+to, and set off, his large and sinewy frame, and a pair of trousers of
+a lighter colour, cut as close to the body as they are used by
+Highlandmen. His whole dress was of finer cloth than that of the old
+man; and his linen, so minute was my observation, clean and unsullied.
+His shirt was without ruffles, and tied at the collar with a black
+ribbon, which showed his strong and muscular neck rising from it like
+that of an ancient Hercules. His head was small, with a large forehead,
+and well-formed ears. He wore neither peruke nor hair-powder; and his
+chestnut locks, curling close to his head like those of an antique
+statue, showed not the least touch of time, though the owner must have
+been at least fifty. His features were high and prominent in such a
+degree that one knew not whether to term them harsh or handsome. In
+either case, the sparkling grey eye, aquiline nose, and well-formed
+mouth, combined to render his physiognomy noble and expressive. An air
+of sadness, or severity, or of both, seemed to indicate a melancholy,
+and, at the same time, a haughty temper. I could not help running
+mentally over the ancient heroes, to whom I might assimilate the noble
+form and countenance before me. He was too young, and evinced too little
+resignation to his fate, to resemble Belisarius. Coriolanus, standing by
+the hearth of Tullus Aufidius, came nearer the mark; yet the gloomy and
+haughty look of the stranger had, perhaps, still more of Marius, seated
+among the ruins of Carthage.
+
+While I was lost in these imaginations, my host stood by the fire,
+gazing on me with the same attention which I paid to him, until,
+embarrassed by his look, I was about to break silence at all hazards.
+But the supper, now placed upon the table, reminded me, by its
+appearance, of those wants which I had almost forgotten while I was
+gazing on the fine form of my conductor. He spoke at length, and I
+almost started at the deep rich tone of his voice, though what he said
+was but to invite me to sit down to the table. He himself assumed the
+seat of honour, beside which the silver flagon was placed, and beckoned
+to me to sit down beside him.
+
+Thou knowest thy father’s strict and excellent domestic discipline has
+trained me to bear the invocation of a blessing before we break the
+daily bread, for which we are taught to pray--I paused a moment, and,
+without designing to do so, I suppose my manner made him sensible of
+what I expected. The two domestics or inferiors, as I should have before
+observed, were already seated at the bottom of the table, when my
+host shot a glance of a very peculiar expression towards the old man,
+observing, with something approaching to a sneer, ‘Cristal Nixon, say
+grace--the gentleman expects one.’
+
+‘The foul fiend shall be clerk, and say amen, when I turn chaplain,’
+growled out the party addressed, in tones which might have become the
+condition of a dying bear; ‘if the gentleman is a whig, he may please
+himself with his own mummery. My faith is neither in word nor writ, but
+in barley-bread and brown ale.’
+
+‘Mabel Moffat,’ said my guide, looking at the old woman, and raising his
+sonorous voice, probably because she was hard of hearing, ‘canst thou
+ask a blessing upon our victuals?’
+
+The old woman shook her head, kissed the cross which hung from her
+rosary, and was silent.
+
+‘Mabel will say grace for no heretic,’ said the master of the house,
+with the same latent sneer on his brow and in his accent.
+
+At the same moment, the side-door already mentioned opened, and the
+young woman (so she proved) whom I had first seen at the door of the
+cottage, advanced a little way into the room, then stopped bashfully, as
+if she had observed that I was looking at her, and asked the master of
+the house, ‘if he had called?’
+
+‘Not louder than to make old Mabel hear me,’ he replied; ‘and yet,’ be
+added, as she turned to retire, ‘it is a shame a stranger should see a
+house where not one of the family can or will say a grace--do thou be
+our chaplain.’
+
+The girl, who was really pretty, came forward with timid modesty, and,
+apparently unconscious that she was doing anything uncommon,
+pronounced the benediction in a silver-toned voice, and with affecting
+simplicity--her cheek colouring just so much as to show that on a less
+solemn occasion she would have felt more embarrassed.
+
+Now, if thou expectest a fine description of this young woman, Alan
+Fairford, in order to entitle thee to taunt me with having found a
+Dulcinea in the inhabitant of a fisherman’s cottage on the Solway Firth,
+thou shalt be disappointed; for, having said she seemed very pretty,
+and that she was a sweet and gentle-speaking creature, I have said all
+concerning her that I can tell thee. She vanished when the benediction
+was spoken.
+
+My host, with a muttered remark on the cold of our ride, and the keen
+air of the Solway Sands, to which he did not seem to wish an answer,
+loaded my plate from Mabel’s grillade, which, with a large wooden bowl
+of potatoes, formed our whole meal. A sprinkling from the lemon gave a
+much higher zest than the usual condiment of vinegar; and I promise
+you that whatever I might hitherto have felt, either of curiosity or
+suspicion, did not prevent me from making a most excellent supper,
+during which little passed betwixt me and my entertainer, unless that
+he did the usual honours of the table with courtesy, indeed, but
+without even the affectation of hearty hospitality, which those in his
+(apparent) condition generally affect on such occasions, even when they
+do not actually feel it. On the contrary, his manner seemed that of a
+polished landlord towards an unexpected and unwelcome guest, whom,
+for the sake of his own credit, he receives with civility, but without
+either goodwill or cheerfulness.
+
+If you ask how I learned all this, I cannot tell you; nor, were I to
+write down at length the insignificant intercourse which took place
+between us, would it perhaps serve to justify these observations. It is
+sufficient to say, that in helping his dogs, which he did from time
+to time with great liberality, he seemed to discharge a duty much more
+pleasing to himself, than when he paid the same attention to his guest.
+Upon the whole, the result on my mind was as I tell it you.
+
+When supper was over, a small case-bottle of brandy, in a curious frame
+of silver filigree, circulated to the guests. I had already taken a
+small glass of the liquor, and, when it had passed to Mabel and to
+Cristal and was again returned to the upper end of the table, I could
+not help taking the bottle in my hand, to look more at the armorial
+bearings which were chased with considerable taste on the silver
+framework. Encountering the eye of my entertainer, I instantly saw that
+my curiosity was highly distasteful; he frowned, bit his lip, and
+showed such uncontrollable signs of impatience, that, setting the bottle
+immediately down, I attempted some apology. To this he did not deign
+either to reply, or even to listen; and Cristal, at a signal from his
+master, removed the object of my curiosity, as well as the cup, upon
+which the same arms were engraved.
+
+Then ensued an awkward pause, which I endeavoured to break by observing,
+that ‘I feared my intrusion upon his hospitality had put his family to
+some inconvenience’.
+
+‘I hope you see no appearance of it, sir,’ he replied, with cold
+civility. ‘What inconvenience a family so retired as ours may suffer
+from receiving an unexpected guest is like to be trifling, in comparison
+of what the visitor himself sustains from want of his accustomed
+comforts. So far, therefore, as our connexion stands, our accounts stand
+clear.’
+
+Notwithstanding this discouraging reply, I blundered on, as is usual in
+such cases, wishing to appear civil, and being, perhaps, in reality the
+very reverse. ‘I was afraid,’ I said, that my presence had banished one
+of the family’ (looking at the side-door) ‘from his table.’
+
+‘If,’ he coldly replied, ‘I meant the young woman whom I had seen in the
+apartment, he bid me observe that there was room enough at the table
+for her to have seated herself, and meat enough, such as it was, for her
+supper. I might, therefore, be assured, if she had chosen it, she would
+have supped with us.’
+
+There was no dwelling on this or any other topic longer; for my
+entertainer, taking up the lamp, observed, that ‘my wet clothes might
+reconcile me for the night to their custom of keeping early hours; that
+he was under the necessity of going abroad by peep of day to-morrow
+morning, and would call me up at the same time, to point out the way by
+which I was to return to the Shepherd’s Bush.’
+
+This left no opening for further explanation; nor was there room for it
+on the usual terms of civility; for, as he neither asked my name, nor
+expressed the least interest concerning my condition, I--the obliged
+person--had no pretence to trouble him with such inquiries on my part.
+
+He took up the lamp, and led me through the side-door into a very small
+room, where a bed had been hastily arranged for my accommodation,
+and, putting down the lamp, directed me to leave my wet clothes on the
+outside of the door, that they might be exposed to the fire during the
+night. He then left me, having muttered something which was meant to
+pass for good night.
+
+I obeyed his directions with respect to my clothes, the rather that,
+in despite of the spirits which I had drunk, I felt my teeth begin
+to chatter, and received various hints from an aguish feeling, that
+a town-bred youth, like myself, could not at once rush into all the
+hardihood of country sports with impunity. But my bed, though coarse and
+hard, was dry and clean; and I soon was so little occupied with my heats
+and tremors, as to listen with interest to a heavy foot, which seemed to
+be that of my landlord, traversing the boards (there was no ceiling,
+as you may believe) which roofed my apartment. Light, glancing through
+these rude planks, became visible as soon as my lamp was extinguished;
+and as the noise of the slow, solemn, and regular step continued, and I
+could distinguish that the person turned and returned as he reached the
+end of the apartment, it seemed clear to me that the walker was engaged
+in no domestic occupation, but merely pacing to and fro for his own
+pleasure. ‘An odd amusement this,’ I thought, ‘for one who had been
+engaged at least a part of the preceding day in violent exercise, and
+who talked of rising by the peep of dawn on the ensuing morning.’
+
+Meantime I heard the storm, which had been brewing during the evening,
+begin to descend with a vengeance; sounds as of distant-thunder (the
+noise of the more distant waves, doubtless, on the shore) mingled
+with the roaring of the neighbouring torrent, and with the crashing,
+groaning, and even screaming of the trees in the glen whose boughs were
+tormented by the gale. Within the house, windows clattered, and doors
+clapped, and the walls, though sufficiently substantial for a building
+of the kind, seemed to me to totter in the tempest.
+
+But still the heavy steps perambulating the apartment over my head were
+distinctly heard amid the roar and fury of the elements. I thought more
+than once I even heard a groan; but I frankly own that, placed in this
+unusual situation, my fancy may have misled me. I was tempted several
+times to call aloud, and ask whether the turmoil around us did not
+threaten danger to the building which we inhabited; but when I thought
+of the secluded and unsocial master of the dwelling, who seemed to avoid
+human society, and to remain unperturbed amid the elemental war, it
+seemed that to speak to him at that moment would have been to address
+the spirit of the tempest himself, since no other being, I thought,
+could have remained calm and tranquil while winds and waters were thus
+raging around.
+
+In process of time, fatigue prevailed over anxiety and curiosity. The
+storm abated, or my senses became deadened to its terrors, and I fell
+asleep ere yet the mysterious paces of my host had ceased to shake the
+flooring over my head.
+
+It might have been expected that the novelty of my situation, although
+it did not prevent my slumbers, would have at least diminished their
+profoundness, and shortened their duration. It proved otherwise,
+however; for I never slept more soundly in my life, and only awoke when,
+at morning dawn, my landlord shook me by the shoulder, and dispelled
+some dream, of which, fortunately for you, I have no recollection,
+otherwise you would have been favoured with it, in hopes you might have
+proved a second Daniel upon the occasion.
+
+‘You sleep sound--’ said his full deep voice; ‘ere five years have
+rolled over your head, your slumbers will be lighter--unless ere then
+you are wrapped in the sleep which is never broken.’
+
+‘How!’ said I, starting up in the bed; ‘do you know anything of me--of
+my prospects--of my views in life?’
+
+‘Nothing,’ he answered, with a grim smile; ‘but it is evident you are
+entering upon the world young, inexperienced, and full of hopes, and I
+do but prophesy to you what I would to any one in your condition. But
+come; there lie your clothes--a brown crust and a draught of milk wait
+you, if you choose to break your fast; but you must make haste.’
+
+‘I must first,’ I said, ‘take the freedom to spend a few minutes alone,
+before beginning the ordinary works of the day.’
+
+‘Oh!--umph!--I cry your devotions pardon,’ he replied, and left the
+apartment.
+
+Alan, there is something terrible about this man.
+
+I joined him, as I had promised, in the kitchen where we had supped
+overnight, where I found the articles which he had offered me for
+breakfast, without butter or any other addition.
+
+He walked up and down while I partook of the bread and milk; and the
+slow measured weighty step seemed identified with those which I had
+heard last night. His pace, from its funereal slowness, seemed to keep
+time with some current of internal passion, dark, slow, and unchanged.
+‘We run and leap by the side of a lively and bubbling brook,’ thought I,
+internally, ‘as if we would run a race with it; but beside waters deep,
+slow, and lonely, our pace is sullen and silent as their course. What
+thoughts may be now corresponding with that furrowed brow, and bearing
+time with that heavy step?’
+
+‘If you have finished,’ said he, looking up to me with a glance of
+impatience, as he observed that I ate no longer, but remained with my
+eyes fixed upon him, ‘I wait to show you the way.’
+
+We went out together, no individual of the family having been visible
+excepting my landlord. I was disappointed of the opportunity which I
+watched for of giving some gratuity to the domestics, as they seemed to
+be. As for offering any recompense to the master of the household, it
+seemed to me impossible to have attempted it.
+
+What would I have given for a share of thy composure, who wouldst have
+thrust half a crown into a man’s hand whose necessities seemed to crave
+it, conscious that you did right in making the proffer, and not caring
+sixpence whether you hurt the feelings of him whom you meant to serve!
+I saw thee once give a penny to a man with a long beard, who, from the
+dignity of his exterior, might have represented Solon. I had not thy
+courage, and therefore I made no tender to my mysterious host, although,
+notwithstanding his display of silver utensils, all around the house
+bespoke narrow circumstances, if not actual poverty.
+
+We left the place together. But I hear thee murmur thy very new and
+appropriate ejaculation, OHE, JAM SATIS!--The rest for another time.
+Perhaps I may delay further communication till I learn how my favours
+are valued.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER V
+
+ALAN FAIRFORD TO DARSIE LATIMER
+
+I have thy two last epistles, my dear Darsie, and expecting the third,
+have been in no hurry to answer them. Do not think my silence ought to
+be ascribed to my failing to take interest in them, for, truly, they
+excel (though the task was difficult) thy usual excellings. Since
+the moon-calf who earliest discovered the Pandemonium of Milton in an
+expiring wood-fire--since the first ingenious urchin who blew bubbles
+out of soap and water, thou, my best of friends, hast the highest knack
+at making histories out of nothing. Wert thou to plant the bean in the
+nursery-tale, thou wouldst make out, so soon as it began to germinate,
+that the castle of the giant was about to elevate its battlements on the
+top of it. All that happens to thee gets a touch of the wonderful and
+the sublime from thy own rich imagination. Didst ever see what artists
+call a Claude Lorraine glass, which spreads its own particular hue over
+the whole landscape which you see through it?--thou beholdest ordinary
+events just through such a medium.
+
+I have looked carefully at the facts of thy last long letter, and they
+are just such as might have befallen any little truant of the High
+School, who had got down to Leith Sands, gone beyond the PRAWN-DUB, wet
+his hose and shoon, and, finally, had been carried home, in compassion,
+by some high-kilted fishwife, cursing all the while the trouble which
+the brat occasioned her.
+
+I admire the figure which thou must have made, clinging for dear life
+behind the old fellow’s back--thy jaws chattering with fear, thy muscles
+cramped with anxiety. Thy execrable supper of broiled salmon, which was
+enough to ensure the nightmare’s regular visits for a twelvemonth,
+may be termed a real affliction; but as for the storm of Thursday
+last (such, I observe, was the date), it roared, whistled, howled, and
+bellowed, as fearfully amongst the old chimney-heads in the Candlemaker
+Row, as it could on the Solway shore, for the very wind of it--TESTE ME
+PER TOTAM NOCTEM VIGILANTE. And then in the morning again, when--Lord
+help you--in your sentimental delicacy you bid the poor man adieu,
+without even tendering him half a crown for supper and lodging!
+
+You laugh at me for giving a penny (to be accurate, though, thou
+shouldst have said sixpence) to an old fellow, whom thou, in thy high
+flight, wouldst have sent home supperless, because he was like Solon or
+Belisarius. But you forget that the affront descended like a benediction
+into the pouch of the old gaberlunzie, who overflowed in blessings upon
+the generous donor--long ere he would have thanked thee, Darsie, for
+thy barren veneration of his beard and his bearing. Then you laugh at
+my good father’s retreat from Falkirk, just as if it were not time for a
+man to trudge when three or four mountain knaves, with naked claymores,
+and heels as light as their fingers, were scampering after him, crying
+FURINISH. You remember what he said himself when the Laird of Bucklivat
+told him that FURINISH signified ‘stay a while’. ‘What the devil,’
+he said, surprised out of his Presbyterian correctness by the
+unreasonableness of such a request under the circumstances, ‘would the
+scoundrels have had me stop to have my head cut off?’
+
+Imagine such a train at your own heels, Darsie, and ask yourself whether
+you would not exert your legs as fast as you did in flying from the
+Solway tide. And yet you impeach my father’s courage. I tell you he has
+courage enough to do what is right, and to spurn what is wrong--courage
+enough to defend a righteous cause with hand and purse, and to take
+the part of the poor man against his oppressor, without fear of the
+consequences to himself. This is civil courage, Darsie; and it is of
+little consequence to most men in this age and country whether they ever
+possess military courage or no.
+
+Do not think I am angry with you, though I thus attempt to rectify your
+opinions on my father’s account. I am well aware that, upon the whole,
+he is scarce regarded with more respect by me than by thee. And, while
+I am in a serious humour, which it is difficult to preserve with one who
+is perpetually tempting me to laugh at him, pray, dearest Darsie, let
+not thy ardour for adventure carry thee into more such scrapes as that
+of the Solway Sands. The rest of the story is a mere imagination; but
+that stormy evening might have proved, as the clown says to Lear, ‘a
+naughty night to swim in.’
+
+As for the rest, if you can work mysterious and romantic heroes out of
+old cross-grained fishermen, why, I for one will reap some amusement by
+the metamorphosis. Yet hold! even there, there is some need of caution.
+This same female chaplain--thou sayest so little of her, and so much of
+every one else, that it excites some doubt in my mind. VERY PRETTY she
+is, it seems--and that is all thy discretion informs me of. There are
+cases in which silence implies other things than consent. Wert thou
+ashamed or afraid, Darsie, to trust thyself with the praises of the very
+pretty grace-sayer?--As I live, thou blushest! Why, do I not know thee
+an inveterate squire of dames? and have I not been in thy confidence?
+An elegant elbow, displayed when the rest of the figure was muffled in a
+cardinal, or a neat well-turned ankle and instep, seen by chance as its
+owner tripped up the Old Assembly Close, [Of old this almost deserted
+alley formed the most common access betwixt the High Street and the
+southern suburbs.] turned thy brain for eight days. Thou wert once
+caught if I remember rightly, with a single glance of a single matchless
+eye, which, when the fair owner withdrew her veil, proved to be single
+in the literal sense of the word. And, besides, were you not another
+time enamoured of a voice--a mere voice, that mingled in the psalmody at
+the Old Greyfriars’ Church--until you discovered the proprietor of that
+dulcet organ to be Miss Dolly MacIzzard, who is both ‘back and breast’,
+as our saying goes?
+
+All these things considered, and contrasted with thy artful silence on
+the subject of this grace-saying Nereid of thine, I must beg thee to be
+more explicit upon that subject in thy next, unless thou wouldst have me
+form the conclusion that thou thinkest more of her than thou carest to
+talk of.
+
+You will not expect much news from this quarter, as you know the
+monotony of my life, and are aware it must at present be devoted to
+uninterrupted study. You have said a thousand times that I am only
+qualified to make my way by dint of plodding, and therefore plod I must.
+
+My father seems to be more impatient of your absence than he was after
+your first departure. He is sensible, I believe, that our solitary meals
+want the light which your gay humour was wont to throw over them, and
+feels melancholy as men do when the light of the sun is no longer upon
+the landscape. If it is thus with him, thou mayst imagine it is much
+more so with me, and canst conceive how heartily I wish that thy frolic
+were ended, and thou once more our inmate.----
+
+I resume my pen, after a few hours’ interval, to say that an incident
+has occurred on which you will yourself be building a hundred castles
+in the air, and which even I, jealous as I am of such baseless fabrics,
+cannot but own affords ground for singular conjecture.
+
+My father has of late taken me frequently along with him when he
+attends the courts, in his anxiety to see me properly initiated into the
+practical forms of business. I own I feel something on his account
+and my own from this over-anxiety, which, I dare say, renders us both
+ridiculous. But what signifies my repugnance? my father drags me up to
+his counsel learned in the law,--‘Are you quite ready to come on to-day,
+Mr. Crossbite?--This is my son, designed for the bar--I take the liberty
+to bring him with me to-day to the consultation, merely that he may see
+how these things are managed.’
+
+Mr. Crossbite smiles and bows; as a lawyer smiles on the solicitor who
+employs him, and I dare say, thrusts his tongue into his cheek, and
+whispers into the first great wig that passes him, ‘What the d--l does
+old Fairford mean by letting loose his whelp on me?’
+
+As I stood beside them, too much vexed at the childish part I was made
+to play to derive much information from the valuable arguments of Mr.
+Crossbite, I observed a rather elderly man, who stood with his eyes
+firmly bent on my father, as if he only waited an end of the business in
+which he was engaged, to address him. There was something, I thought, in
+the gentleman’s appearance which commanded attention. Yet his dress was
+not in the present taste, and though it had once been magnificent, was
+now antiquated and unfashionable. His coat was of branched velvet, with
+a satin lining, a waistcoat of violet-coloured silk, much embroidered;
+his breeches the same stuff as the coat. He wore square-toed shoes, with
+foretops, as they are called; and his silk stockings were rolled up over
+his knee, as you may have seen in pictures, and here and there on some
+of those originals who seem to pique themselves on dressing after the
+mode of Methuselah. A CHAPEAU BRAS and sword necessarily completed his
+equipment, which, though out of date, showed that it belonged to a man
+of distinction.
+
+The instant Mr. Crossbite had ended what he had to say, this gentleman
+walked up to my father, with, ‘Your servant, Mr. Fairford--it is long
+since you and I met.’
+
+My father, whose politeness, you know, is exact and formal, bowed, and
+hemmed, and was confused, and at length professed that the distance
+since they had met was so great, that though he remembered the face
+perfectly, the name, he was sorry to any, had--really--somehow--escaped
+his memory.
+
+‘Have you forgot Herries of Birrenswork?’ said the gentleman, and
+my father bowed even more profoundly than before; though I think his
+reception of his old friend seemed to lose some of the respectful
+civility which he bestowed on him while his name was yet unknown. It now
+seemed to be something like the lip-courtesy which the heart would have
+denied had ceremony permitted.
+
+My father, however, again bowed low, and hoped he saw him well.
+
+‘So well, my good Mr. Fairford, that I come hither determined to renew
+my acquaintance with one or two old friends, and with you in the first
+place. I halt at my old resting place--you must dine with me to-day,
+at Paterson’s, at the head of the Horse Wynd--it is near your new
+fashionable dwelling, and I have business with you.’
+
+My father excused himself respectfully, and not without
+embarrassment--‘he was particularly engaged at home.’
+
+‘Then I will dine with you, man,’ said Mr. Herries of Birrenswork; ‘the
+few minutes you can spare me after dinner will suffice for my business;
+and I will not prevent you a moment from minding your own--I am no
+bottle-man.’
+
+You have often remarked that my father, though a scrupulous ohserver of
+the rites of hospitality, seems to exercise them rather as a duty than
+as a pleasure; indeed, but for a conscientious wish to feed the hungry
+and receive the stranger, his doors would open to guests much seldomer
+than is the case. I never saw so strong an example of this peculiarity
+(which I should otherwise have said is caricatured in your description)
+as in his mode of homologating the self-given invitation of Mr. Herries.
+The embarsassed brow, and the attempt at a smile which accompanied
+his ‘We will expect the honour of seeing you in Brown Square at three
+o’clock,’ could not deceive any one, and did not impose upon the old
+laird. It was with a look of scorn that he replied, ‘I will relieve you
+then till that hour, Mr. Fairford;’ and his whole manner seemed to say,
+‘It is my pleasure to dine with you, and I care not whether I am welcome
+or no.’
+
+When he turned away, I asked my father who he was.
+
+‘An unfortunate gentleman,’ was the reply.
+
+‘He looks pretty well on his misfortunes,’ replied I. ‘I should not have
+suspected that so gay an outside was lacking a dinner.’
+
+‘Who told you that he does?’ replied my father; ‘he is OMNI SUSPICIONE
+MAJOR, so far as worldly circumstances are concerned. It is to be hoped
+he makes a good use of them; though, if he does, it will be for the
+first time in his life.’
+
+‘He has then been an irregular liver?’ insinuated I.
+
+My father replied by that famous brocard with which he silences all
+unacceptable queries turning in the slightest degree upon the failings
+of our neighbours,--‘If we mend our own faults, Alan, we shall all of us
+have enough to do, without sitting in judgement upon other folks.’
+
+Here I was again at fault; but rallying once more, I observed, he had
+the air of a man of high rank and family.
+
+‘He is well entitled,’ said my father, ‘representing Herries of
+Birrenswork; a branch of that great and once powerful family of Herries,
+the elder branch whereof merged in the house of Nithesdale at the
+death of Lord Robin the Philosopher, Anno Domini sixteen hundred and
+sixty-seven.’
+
+‘Has he still,’ said I, ‘his patrimonial estate of Birrenswork?’
+
+‘No,’ replied my father; ‘so far back as his father’s time, it was
+a mere designation--the property being forfeited by Herbert Herries
+following his kinsman the Earl of Derwentwater to the Preston affair in
+1715. But they keep up the designation, thinking, doubtless, that their
+claims may be revived in more favourable times for Jacobites and for
+popery; and folks who in no way partake of their fantastic capriccios
+do yet allow it to pass unchallenged, EX COMITATE, if not EX
+MISERICORDIA.--But were he the Pope and the Pretender both, we must get
+some dinner ready for him, since he has thought fit to offer himself. So
+hasten home, my lad, and tell Hannah, Cook Epps, and James Wilkinson, to
+do their best; and do thou look out a pint or two of Maxwell’s best--it
+is in the fifth bin--there are the keys of the wine-cellar. Do not leave
+them in the lock--you know poor James’s failing, though he is an honest
+creature under all other temptations--and I have but two bottles of the
+old brandy left--we must keep it for medicine, Alan.’
+
+Away went I--made my preparations--the hour of dinner came, and so did
+Mr. Herries of Birrenswork.
+
+If I had thy power of imagination and description, Darsie, I could make
+out a fine, dark, mysterious, Rembrandt-looking portrait of this same
+stranger, which should be as far superior to thy fisherman as a shirt
+of chain-mail is to a herring-net. I can assure you there is some matter
+for description about him; but knowing my own imperfections, I can only
+say, I thought him eminently disagreeable and ill-bred.--No, ILL-BRED
+is not the proper word on the contrary, he appeared to know the rules of
+good-breeding perfectly, and only to think that the rank of the company
+did not require that he should attend to them--a view of the matter
+infinitely more offensive than if his behaviour had been that of
+uneducated and proper rudeness. While my father said grace, the laird
+did all but whistle aloud; and when I, at my father’s desire, returned
+thanks, he used his toothpick, as if he had waited that moment for its
+exercise.
+
+So much for Kirk--with King, matters went even worse. My father, thou
+knowest, is particularly full of deference to his guests; and in the
+present care, he seemed more than usually desirous to escape every cause
+of dispute. He so far compromised his loyalty as to announce merely ‘The
+King’ as his first toast after dinner, instead of the emphatic ‘King
+George’, which is his usual formula. Our guest made a motion with his
+glass, so as to pass it over the water-decanter which stood beside him,
+and added, ‘Over the water.’
+
+My father coloured, but would not seem to hear this. Much more there
+was of careless and disrespectful in the stranger’s manner and tone of
+conversation; so that, though I know my father’s prejudices in favour
+of rank and birth, and though I am aware his otherwise masculine
+understanding has never entirely shaken off the slavish awe of the great
+which in his earlier days they had so many modes of commanding, still I
+could hardly excuse him for enduring so much insolence--such it seemed
+to be as this self-invited guest was disposed to offer to him at his own
+table.
+
+One can endure a traveller in the same carriage, if he treads upon your
+toes by accident, or even through negligence; but it is very different
+when, knowing that they are rather of a tender description, he continues
+to pound away at them with his hoofs. In my poor opinion--and I am a man
+of peace--you can, in that case, hardly avoid a declaration of war.
+
+I believe my father read my thoughts in my eye; for, pulling out his
+watch, he said; ‘Half-past four, Alan--you should be in your own room by
+this time--Birrenswork will excuse you.’
+
+Our visitor nodded carelessly, and I had no longer any pretence to
+remain. But as I left the room, I heard this magnate of Nithesdale
+distinctly mention the name of Latimer. I lingered; but at length a
+direct hint from my father obliged me to withdraw; and when, an hour
+afterwards, I was summoned to partake of a cup of tea, our guest had
+departed. He had business that evening in the High Street, and could not
+spare time even to drink tea. I could not help saying, I considered his
+departure as a relief from incivility. ‘What business has he to upbraid
+us,’ I said, ‘with the change of our dwelling from a more inconvenient
+to a better quarter of the town? What was it to him if we chose
+to imitate some of the conveniences or luxuries of an English
+dwelling-house, instead of living piled up above each other in flats?
+Have his patrician birth and aristocratic fortunes given him any right
+to censure those who dispose of the fruits of their own industry,
+according to their own pleasure?’
+
+My father took a long pinch of snuff, and replied, ‘Very well, Alan;
+very well indeed. I wish Mr. Crossbite or Counsellor Pest had heard
+you; they must have acknowledged that you have a talent for forensic
+elocution; and it may not be amiss to try a little declamation at
+home now and then, to gather audacity and keep yourself in breath. But
+touching the subject of this paraffle of words, it’s not worth a pinch
+of tobacco. D’ye think that I care for Mr. Herries of Birrenswork more
+than any other gentleman who comes here about business, although I do
+not care to go tilting at his throat, because he speaks like a grey
+goose, as he is? But to say no more about him, I want to have Darsie
+Latimer’s present direction; for it is possible I may have to write the
+lad a line with my own hand--and yet I do not well know--but give me the
+direction at all events.’
+
+I did so, and if you have heard from my father accordingly, you know
+more, probably, about the subject of this letter than I who write it.
+But if you have not, then shall I have discharged a friend’s duty, in
+letting you know that there certainly is something afloat between
+this disagreeable laird and my father, in which you are considerably
+interested.
+
+Adieu! and although I have given thee a subject for waking dreams,
+beware of building a castle too heavy for the foundation; which, in the
+present instance, is barely the word Latimer occurring in a conversation
+betwixt a gentleman of Dumfriesshire and a W.S. of Edinburgh--CAETERA
+PRORSUS IGNORO.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VI
+
+DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+(In continuation of Letters III and IV.)
+
+I told thee I walked out into the open air with my grave and stern
+landlord. I could now see more perfectly than on the preceding night the
+secluded glen in which stood the two or three cottages which appeared to
+be the abode of him and his family.
+
+It was so narrow, in proportion to its depth, that no ray of the morning
+sun was likely to reach it till it should rise high in the horizon.
+Looking up the dell, you saw a brawling brook issuing in foamy haste
+from a covert of underwood, like a race-horse impatient to arrive at the
+goal; and, if you gazed yet; more earnestly, you might observe part of
+a high waterfall glimmering through the foliage, and giving occasion,
+doubtless, to the precipitate speed of the brook. Lower down, the
+stream became more placid, and opened into a quiet piece of water which
+afforded a rude haven to two or three fishermen’s boats, then lying high
+and dry on the sand, the tide being out. Two or three miserable huts
+could be seen beside this little haven, inhabited probably by the owners
+of the boats, but inferior in every respect to the establishment of mine
+host, though that was miserable enough.
+
+I had but a minute or two to make these observations, yet during that
+space my companion showed symptoms of impatience, and more than once
+shouted, ‘Cristal--Cristal Nixon,’ until the old man of the preceding
+evening appeared at the door of one of the neighbouring cottages or
+outhouses, leading the strong black horse which I before commemorated,
+ready bridled and saddled. My conductor made Cristal a sign with his
+finger, and, turning from the cottage door, led the way up the steep
+path or ravine which connected the sequestered dell with the open
+country.
+
+Had I been perfectly aware of the character of the road down which I
+had been hurried with so much impetuosity on the preceding evening, I
+greatly question if I should have ventured the descent; for it deserved
+no better name than the channel of a torrent, now in a good measure
+filled with water, that dashed in foam and fury into the dell, being
+swelled with the rains of the preceding night. I ascended this ugly path
+with some difficulty although on foot, and felt dizzy when I observed,
+from such traces as the rains had not obliterated, that the horse seemed
+almost to have slid down it upon his haunches the evening before.
+
+My host threw himself on his horse’s back, without placing a foot in the
+stirrup--passed me in the perilous ascent, against which he pressed his
+steed as if the animal had had the footing of a wild cat. The water and
+mud splashed from his heels in his reckless course, and a few bounds
+placed him on the top of the bank, where I presently joined him, and
+found the horse and rider standing still as a statue; the former
+panting and expanding his broad nostrils to the morning wind, the latter
+motionless, with his eye fixed on the first beams of the rising sun,
+which already began to peer above the eastern horizon and gild the
+distant mountains of Cumberland and Liddesdale.
+
+He seemed in a reverie, from which he started at my approach, and,
+putting his horse in motion, led the way at a leisurely pace through a
+broken and sandy road, which traversed a waste, level, and uncultivated
+tract of downs, intermixed with morass, much like that in the
+neighbourhood of my quarters at Shepherd’s Bush. Indeed, the whole open
+ground of this district, where it approaches the sea, has, except in a
+few favoured spots, the same uniform and dreary character.
+
+Advancing about a hundred yards from the brink of the glen, we gained
+a still more extensive command of this desolate prospect, which seemed
+even more dreary, as contrasted with the opposite shores of Cumberland,
+crossed and intersected by ten thousand lines of trees growing in
+hedgerows, shaded with groves and woods of considerable extent, animated
+by hamlets and villas, from which thin clouds of smoke already gave sign
+of human life and human industry.
+
+My conductor had extended his arm, and was pointing the road to
+Shepherd’s Bush, when the step of a horse was heard approaching us. He
+looked sharply round, and having observed who was approaching, proceeded
+in his instructions to me, planting himself at the same time in the very
+middle of the path, which, at the place where we halted, had a slough on
+the one side and a sandbank on the other.
+
+I observed that the rider who approached us slackened his horse’s pace
+from a slow trot to a walk, as if desirous to suffer us to proceed, or
+at least to avoid passing us at a spot where the difficulty of doing so
+must have brought us very close to each other. You know my old failing,
+Alan, and that I am always willing to attend to anything in preference
+to the individual who has for the time possession of the conversation.
+
+Agreeably to this amiable propensity, I was internally speculating
+concerning the cause of the rider keeping aloof from us, when my
+companion, elevating his deep voice so suddenly and so sternly as at
+once to recall my wandering thoughts, exclaimed, ‘In the name of the
+devil, young man, do you think that others have no better use for their
+time than you have, that you oblige me to repeat the same thing to you
+three times over? Do you see, I say, yonder thing at a mile’s distance,
+that looks like a finger-post, or rather like a gallows? I would it
+had a dreaming fool hanging upon it, as an example to all meditative
+moon-calves!--Yon gibbet-looking pole will guide you to the bridge,
+where you must pass the large brook; then proceed straight forwards,
+till several roads divide at a cairn. Plague on thee, thou art wandering
+again!
+
+It is indeed quite true that at this moment the horseman approached us,
+and my attention was again called to him as I made way to let him pass.
+His whole exterior at once showed that he belonged to the Society of
+Friends, or, as the world and the world’s law calls them, Quakers.
+A strong and useful iron-grey galloway showed, by its sleek and
+good condition, that the merciful man was merciful to his beast. His
+accoutrements were in the usual unostentatious but clean and servicable
+order which characterizes these sectaries. His long surtout of dark-grey
+superfine cloth descended down to the middle of his leg, and was
+buttoned up to his chin, to defend him against the morning air. As
+usual, his ample beaver hung down without button or loop, and shaded a
+comely and placid countenance, the gravity of which appeared to contain
+some seasoning of humour, and had nothing in common with the pinched
+puritanical air affected by devotees in general. The brow was open and
+free from wrinkles, whether of age or hypocrisy. The eye was clear,
+calm, and considerate, yet appeared to be disturbed by apprehension,
+not to say fear, as, pronouncing the usual salutation of, ‘I wish thee a
+good morrow, friend,’ he indicated, by turning his palfrey close to
+one side of the path, a wish to glide past us with as little trouble as
+possible--just as a traveller would choose to pass a mastiff of whose
+peaceable intentions he is by no means confident.
+
+But my friend, not meaning, perhaps, that he should get off so easily,
+put his horse quite across the path, so that, without plunging into the
+slough, or scrambling up the bank, the Quaker could not have passed
+him. Neither of these was an experiment without hazard greater than the
+passenger seemed willing to incur. He halted, therefore, as if waiting
+till my companion should make way for him; and, as they sat fronting
+each other, I could not help thinking that they might have formed no bad
+emblem of Peace and War; for although my conductor was unarmed, yet the
+whole of his manner, his stern look, and his upright seat on horseback,
+were entirely those of a soldier in undress, He accosted the Quaker
+in these words, ‘So ho! friend Joshua, thou art early to the road this
+morning. Has the spirit moved thee and thy righteous brethren to act
+with some honesty, and pull down yonder tide-nets that keep the fish
+from coming up the river?’
+
+‘Surely, friend, not so,’ answered Joshua, firmly, but good-humouredly
+at the same time; ‘thou canst not expect that our own hands should pull
+down what our purses established. Thou killest the fish with spear,
+line, and coble-net; and we, with snares and with nets, which work by
+the ebb and the flow of the tide. Each doth what seems best in his eyes
+to secure a share of the blessing which Providence hath bestowed on the
+river, and that within his own bounds. I prithee seek no quarrel against
+us, for thou shalt have no wrong at our hand.’
+
+‘Be assured I will take none at the hand of any man, whether his hat be
+cocked or broad-brimmed,’ answered the fisherman. ‘I tell you in fair
+terms, Joshua Geddes, that you and your partners are using unlawful
+craft to destroy the fish in the Solway by stake-nets and wears; and
+that we, who fish fairly, and like men, as our fathers did, have daily
+and yearly less sport and less profit. Do not think gravity or hypocrisy
+can carry it off as you have done. The world knows you, and we know you.
+You will destroy the salmon which makes the livelihood of fifty poor
+families, and then wipe your mouth, and go to make a speech at meeting.
+But do not hope it will last thus. I give you fair warning, we will be
+upon you one morning soon, when we will not leave a stake standing in
+the pools of the Solway; and down the tide they shall every one go, and
+well if we do not send a lessee along with them.’
+
+‘Friend,’ replied Joshua, with a constrained smile, ‘but that I know
+thou dost not mean as thou sayst, I would tell thee we are under the
+protection of this country’s laws; nor do we the less trust to obtain
+their protection, that our principles permit us not, by any act of
+violent resistance, to protect ourselves.’
+
+‘All villainous cant and cowardice,’ exclaimed the fisherman, ‘and
+assumed merely as a cloak to your hypocritical avarice.’
+
+‘Nay, say not cowardice, my friend,’ answered the Quaker, ‘since thou
+knowest there may be as much courage in enduring as in acting; and I
+will be judged by this youth, or by any one else, whether there is not
+more cowardice--even in the opinion of that world whose thoughts are the
+breath in thy nostrils--in the armed oppressor who doth injury, than in
+the defenceless and patient sufferer who endureth it with constancy.’
+
+‘I will change no more words with you on the subject,’ said the
+fisherman, who, as if something moved at the last argument which Mr.
+Geddes had used, now made room for him to pass forward on his journey.
+‘Do not forget, however,’ he added, ‘that you have had fair warning,
+nor suppose that we will accept of fair words in apology for foul play.
+These nets of yours are unlawful--they spoil our fishings--we will
+have them down at all risks and hazards. I am a man of my word, friend
+Joshua.’
+
+‘I trust thou art,’ said the Quaker; ‘but thou art the rather bound to
+be cautious in rashly affirming what thou wilt never execute. For I tell
+thee, friend, that though there is as great a difference between thee
+and one of our people as there is between a lion and a sheep, yet I know
+and believe thou hast so much of the lion in thee, that thou wouldst
+scarce employ thy strength and thy rage upon that which professeth no
+means of resistance. Report says so much good of thee, at least, if it
+says little more.’
+
+‘Time will try,’ answered the fisherman; ‘and hark thee, Joshua, before
+we part I will put thee in the way of doing one good deed, which, credit
+me, is better than twenty moral speeches. Here is a stranger youth, whom
+Heaven has so scantily gifted with brains, that he will bewilder himself
+in the Sands, as he did last night, unless thou wilt kindly show him the
+way to Shepherd’s Bush; for I have been in vain endeavouring to make
+him comprehend the road thither. Hast thou so much charity under thy
+simplicity, Quaker, as to do this good turn?’
+
+‘Nay, it is thou, friend,’ answered Joshua, ‘that dost lack charity, to
+suppose any one unwilling to do so simple a kindness.’
+
+‘Thou art right--I should have remembered it can cost thee nothing.
+Young gentlemen, this pious pattern of primitive simplicity will teach
+thee the right way to the Shepherd’s Bush--aye, and will himself shear
+thee like a sheep, if you come to buying and selling with him.’
+
+He then abruptly asked me, how long I intended to remain at Shepherd’s
+Bush.
+
+I replied, I was at present uncertain--as long probably, as I could
+amuse myself in the neighbourhood.
+
+‘You are fond of sport?’ he added, in the same tone of brief inquiry.
+
+I answered in the affirmative, but added, I was totally inexperienced.
+
+‘Perhaps if you reside here for some days,’ he said, ‘we may meet again,
+and I may have the chance of giving you a lesson.’
+
+Ere I could express either thanks or assent, he turned short round with
+a wave of his hand by way of adieu, and rode back to the verge of the
+dell from which we had emerged together; and as he remained standing
+upon the banks, I could long hear his voice while he shouted down to
+those within its recesses.
+
+Meanwhile the Quaker and I proceeded on our journey for some time in
+silence; he restraining his sober-minded steed to a pace which might
+have suited a much less active walker than myself, and looking on
+me from time to time with an expression of curiosity, mingled with
+benignity. For my part, I cared not to speak first. It happened I had
+never before been in company with one of this particular sect, and,
+afraid that in addressing him I might unwittingly infringe upon some
+of their prejudices or peculiarities, I patiently remained silent. At
+length he asked me, whether I had been long in the service of the laird,
+as men called him.
+
+I repeated the words ‘in his service?’ with such an accent of surprise,
+as induced him to say, ‘Nay, but, friend, I mean no offence; perhaps I
+should have said in his society--an inmate, I mean, in his house?’
+
+‘I am totally unknown to the person from whom we have just parted,’ said
+I, ‘and our connexion is only temporary. He had the charity to give me
+his guidance from the Sands, and a night’s harbourage from the tempest.
+So our acquaintance began, and there it is likely to end; for you may
+observe that our friend is by no means apt to encourage familiarity.’
+
+‘So little so,’ answered my companion, ‘that thy case is, I think, the
+first in which I ever heard of his receiving any one into his house;
+that is, if thou hast really spent the night there.’
+
+‘Why should you doubt it?’ replied I; ‘there is no motive I can have to
+deceive you, nor is the object worth it.’
+
+‘Be not angry with me,’ said the Quaker; ‘but thou knowest that thine
+own people do not, as we humbly endeavour to do, confine themselves
+within the simplicity of truth, but employ the language of falsehood,
+not only for profit, but for compliment, and sometimes for mere
+diversion. I have heard various stories of my neighbour; of most of
+which I only believe a small part, and even then they are difficult to
+reconcile with each other. But this being the first time I ever beard
+of his receiving a stranger within his dwelling, made me express some
+doubts. I pray thee let them not offend thee.’
+
+‘He does not,’ said I, ‘appear to possess in much abundance the means
+of exercising hospitality, and so may be excused from offering it in
+ordinary cases.’
+
+‘That is to say, friend,’ replied Joshua, ‘thou hast supped ill, and
+perhaps breakfasted worse. Now my small tenement, called Mount Sharon,
+is nearer to us by two miles than thine inn; and although going
+thither may prolong thy walk, as taking thee of the straighter road to
+Shepherd’s Bush, yet methinks exercise will suit thy youthful limbs,
+as well as a good plain meal thy youthful appetite. What sayst thou, my
+young acquaintance?’
+
+‘If it puts you not to inconvenience,’ I replied; for the invitation was
+cordially given, and my bread and milk had been hastily swallowed, and
+in small quantity.
+
+‘Nay,’ said Joshua, ‘use not the language of compliment with those who
+renounce it. Had this poor courtesy been very inconvenient, perhaps I
+had not offered it.’
+
+‘I accept the invitation, then,’ said I, ‘in the same good spirit in
+which you give it.’
+
+The Quaker smiled, reached me his hand, I shook it, and we travelled on
+in great cordiality with each other. The fact is, I was much entertained
+by contrasting in my own mind, the open manner of the kind-hearted
+Joshua Geddes, with the abrupt, dark, and lofty demeanour of my
+entertainer on the preceding evening. Both were blunt and unceremonious;
+but the plainness of the Quaker had the character of devotional
+simplicity, and was mingled with the more real kindness, as if honest
+Joshua was desirous of atoning, by his sincerity, for the lack of
+external courtesy. On the contrary, the manners of the fisherman were
+those of one to whom the rules of good behaviour might be familiar, but
+who, either from pride or misanthropy, scorned to observe them. Still
+I thought of him with interest and curiosity, notwithstanding so much
+about him that was repulsive; and I promised myself, in the course of my
+conversation with the Quaker, to learn all that he knew on the subject.
+He turned the conversation, however, into a different channel, and
+inquired into my own condition of life, and views in visiting this
+remote frontier.
+
+I only thought it necessary to mention my name, and add, that I had been
+educated to the law, but finding myself possessed of some independence,
+I had of late permitted myself some relaxation, and was residing at
+Shepherd’s Bush to enjoy the pleasure of angling.
+
+‘I do thee no harm, young man,’ said my new friend, ‘in wishing thee a
+better employment for thy grave hours, and a more humane amusement (if
+amusement thou must have) for those of a lighter character.’
+
+‘You are severe, sir,’ I replied. ‘I heard you but a moment since refer
+yourself to the protection of the laws of the country--if there be laws,
+there must be lawyers to explain, and judges to administer them.’
+
+Joshua smiled, and pointed to the sheep which were grazing on the downs
+over which we were travelling. ‘Were a wolf,’ he said, ‘to come even now
+upon yonder flocks, they would crowd for protection, doubtless, around
+the shepherd and his dogs; yet they are bitten and harassed daily by
+the one, shorn, and finally killed and eaten by the other. But I say not
+this to shock you; for, though laws and lawyers are evils, yet they are
+necessary evils in this probationary state of society, till man shall
+learn to render unto his fellows that which is their due, according
+to the light of his own conscience, and through no other compulsion.
+Meanwhile, I have known many righteous men who have followed thy
+intended profession in honesty and uprightness of walk. The greater
+their merit, who walk erect in a path which so many find slippery.
+
+‘And angling,’ said I:--‘you object to that also as an amusement,
+you who, if I understood rightly what passed between you and my late
+landlord, are yourself a proprietor of fisheries.’
+
+‘Not a proprietor,’ he replied, ‘I am only, in copartnery with others,
+a tacksman or lessee of some valuable salmon-fisheries a little down the
+coast. But mistake me not. The evil of angling, with which I class all
+sports, as they are called, which have the sufferings of animals for
+their end and object, does not consist in the mere catching and killing
+those animals with which the bounty of Providence hath stocked the earth
+for the good of man, but in making their protracted agony a principle of
+delight and enjoyment. I do indeed cause these fisheries to be conducted
+for the necessary taking, killing, and selling the fish; and, in the
+same way, were I a farmer, I should send my lambs to market. But I
+should as soon think of contriving myself a sport and amusement out of
+the trade of the butcher as out of that of the fisher.’
+
+We argued the point no further; for though I thought his arguments a
+little too high-strained, yet as my mind acquitted me of having taken
+delight in aught but the theory of field-sports, I did not think myself
+called upon stubbornly to advocate a practice which had afforded me so
+little pleasure.
+
+We had by this time arrived at the remains of an old finger-post, which
+my host had formerly pointed out as a landmark. Here, a ruinous wooden
+bridge, supported by long posts resembling crutches, served me to get
+across the water, while my new friend sought a ford a good way higher
+up, for the stream was considerably swelled.
+
+As I paused for his rejoining me, I observed an angler at a little
+distance pouching trout after trout, as fast almost as he could cast his
+line; and I own, in spite of Joshua’s lecture on humanity, I could not
+but envy his adroitness and success, so natural is the love of sport
+to our minds, or so easily are we taught to assimilate success in
+field-sports with ideas of pleasure, and with the praise due to address
+and agility. I soon recognized in the successful angler little Benjie,
+who had been my guide and tutor in that gentle art, as you have learned
+from my former letters. I called--I whistled--the rascal recognized me,
+and, starting like a guilty thing, seemed hesitating whether to approach
+or to run away; and when he determined on the former, it was to assail
+me with a loud, clamorous, and exaggerated report of the anxiety of all
+at the Shepherd’s Bush for my personal safety; how my landlady had wept,
+how Sam and the ostler had not the heart to go to bed, but sat up all
+night drinking--and how he himself had been up long before daybreak to
+go in quest of me.
+
+‘And you were switching the water, I suppose,’ said I, ‘to discover my
+dead body?’
+
+This observation produced a long ‘Na--a--a’ of acknowledged detection;
+but, with his natural impudence, and confidence in my good nature, he
+immediately added, ‘that he thought I would like a fresh trout or twa
+for breakfast, and the water being in such a rare trim for the saumon
+raun, [The bait made of salmon-roe salted and preserved. In a swollen
+river, and about the month of October, it is a most deadly bait.] he
+couldna help taking a cast.’
+
+While we were engaged in this discussion, the honest Quaker returned to
+the farther end of the wooden bridge to tell me he could not venture to
+cross the brook in its present state: but would be under the necessity
+to ride round by the stone bridge, which was a mile and a half higher
+up than his own house. He was about to give me directions how to proceed
+without him, and inquire for his sister, when I suggested to him that,
+if he pleased to trust his horse to little Benjie, the boy might carry
+him round by the bridge, while we walked the shorter and more pleasant
+road.
+
+Joshua shook his head, for he was well acquainted with Benjie, who,
+he said, was the naughtiest varlet in the whole neighbourhood.
+Nevertheless, rather than part company, he agreed to put the pony under
+his charge for a short season, with many injunctions that he should not
+attempt to mount, but lead the pony (even Solomon) by the bridle, under
+the assurances of sixpence in case of proper demeanour, and penalty that
+if he transgressed the orders given him, ‘verily he would be scourged.’
+
+Promises cost Benjie nothing, and he showered them out wholesale;
+till the Quaker at length yielded up the bridle to him, repeating his
+charges, and enforcing them by holding up his forefinger. On my part, I
+called to Benjie to leave the fish he had taken at Mount Sharon, making,
+at the same time, an apologetic countenance to my new friend, not
+being quite aware whether the compliment would be agreeable to such a
+condemner of field-sports.
+
+He understood me at once, and reminded me of the practical distinction
+betwixt catching the animals as an object of cruel and wanton sport, and
+eating them as lawful and gratifying articles of food, after they were
+killed. On the latter point he had no scruples; but, on the contrary,
+assured me that this brook contained the real red trout, so highly
+esteemed by all connoisseurs, and that, when eaten within an hour
+of their being caught, they had a peculiar firmness of substance and
+delicacy of flavour, which rendered them an agreeable addition to a
+morning meal, especially when earned, like ours, by early rising, and an
+hour or two’s wholesome exercise.
+
+But to thy alarm be it spoken, Alan, we did not come so far as the
+frying of our fish without further adventure. So it is only to spare thy
+patience, and mine own eyes, that I pull up for the present, and send
+thee the rest of my story in a subsequent letter.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VII
+
+THE SAME TO THE SAME (In continuation.)
+
+Little Benjie, with the pony, having been sent off on the left side of
+the brook, the Quaker and I sauntered on, like the cavalry and infantry
+of the same army occupying the opposite banks of a river, and observing
+the same line of march. But, while my worthy companion was assuring me
+of a pleasant greensward walk to his mansion, little Benjie, who had
+been charged to keep in sight, chose to deviate from the path assigned
+him, and, turning to the right, led his charge, Solomon, out of our
+vision.
+
+‘The villain means to mount him!’ cried Joshua, with more vivacity than
+was consistent with his profession of passive endurance.
+
+I endeavoured to appease his apprehensions, as he pushed on, wiping his
+brow with vexation, assuring him that, if the boy did mount, he would,
+for his own sake, ride gently.
+
+‘You do not know him,’ said Joshua, rejecting all consolation; ‘HE do
+anything gently!--no, he will gallop Solomon--he will misuse the sober
+patience of the poor animal who has borne me so long! Yes, I was given
+over to my own devices when I ever let him touch the bridle, for such a
+little miscreant there never was before him in this country.’
+
+He then proceeded to expatiate on every sort of rustic enormity of which
+he accused Benjie. He had been suspected of snaring partridges--was
+detected by Joshua himself in liming singing-birds--stood fully charged
+with having worried several cats, by aid of a lurcher which attended
+him, and which was as lean, and ragged, and mischievous, as his master.
+Finally, Benjie stood accused of having stolen a duck, to hunt it with
+the said lurcher, which was as dexterous on water as on land. I chimed
+in with my friend, in order to avoid giving him further irritation, and
+declared I should be disposed, from my own experience, to give up Benjie
+as one of Satan’s imps. Joshua Geddes began to censure the phrase as
+too much exaggerated, and otherwise unbecoming the mouth of a reflecting
+person; and, just as I was apologizing for it, as being a term of common
+parlance, we heard certain sounds on the opposite side of the brook,
+which seemed to indicate that Solomon and Benjie were at issue together.
+The sandhills behind which Benjie seemed to take his course, had
+concealed from us, as doubtless he meant they should, his ascent into
+the forbidden saddle, and, putting Solomon to his mettle, which he was
+seldom called upon to exert, they had cantered away together in
+great amity, till they came near to the ford from which the palfrey’s
+legitimate owner had already turned back.
+
+Here a contest of opinions took place between the horse and his rider.
+The latter, according to his instructions, attempted to direct Solomon
+towards the distant bridge of stone; but Solomon opined that the ford
+was the shortest way to his own stable. The point was sharply contested,
+and we heard Benjie gee-hupping, tchek-tcheking, and, above all,
+flogging in great style; while Solomon, who, docile in his general
+habits, was now stirred beyond his patience, made a great trampling and
+recalcitration; and it was their joint noise which we heard, without
+being able to see, though Joshua might too well guess, the cause of it.
+
+Alarmed at these indications, the Quaker began to shout out,
+‘Benjie--thou varlet! Solomon--thou fool!’ when the couple presented
+themselves in full drive, Solomon having now decidedly obtained the
+better of the conflict, and bringing his unwilling rider in high career
+down to the ford. Never was there anger changed so fast into humane
+fear, as that of my good companion. ‘The varlet will be drowned!’ he
+exclaimed--‘a widow’s son!--her only son!--and drowned!--let me go’--And
+he struggled with me stoutly as I hung upon him, to prevent him from
+plunging into the ford.
+
+I had no fear whatever for Benjie; for the blackguard vermin, though he
+could not manage the refractory horse, stuck on his seat like a monkey.
+Solomon and Benjie scrambled through the ford with little inconvenience,
+and resumed their gallop on the other side.
+
+It was impossible to guess whether on this last occasion Benjie was
+running off with Solomon, or Solomon with Benjie; but, judging from
+character and motives, I rather suspected the former. I could not help
+laughing as the rascal passed me, grinning betwixt terror and delight,
+perched on the very pommel of the saddle, and holding with extended arms
+by bridle and mane while Solomon, the bit secured between his teeth,
+and his head bored down betwixt his forelegs, passed his master in this
+unwonted guise as hard as he could pelt.
+
+‘The mischievous bastard!’ exclaimed the Quaker, terrified out of his
+usual moderation of speech--‘the doomed gallows-bird!--he will break
+Solomon’s wind to a certainty.’
+
+I prayed him to be comforted--assured, him a brushing gallop would do
+his favourite no harm and reminded him of the censure he had bestowed on
+me a minute before, for applying a harsh epithet to the boy.
+
+But Joshua was not without his answer; ‘Friend youth,’ he said, ‘thou
+didst speak of the lad’s soul, which thou didst affirm belonged to the
+enemy, and of that thou couldst say nothing of thine own knowledge; on
+the contrary, I did but speak of his outward man, which will assuredly
+be suspended by a cord, if he mendeth not his manners. Men say that,
+young as he is, he is one of the laird’s gang.’
+
+‘Of the laird’s gang!’ said I, repeating the words in surprise. ‘Do you
+mean the person with whom I slept last night? I heard you call him the
+laird. Is he at the head of a gang?’
+
+‘Nay, I meant not precisely a gang,’ said the Quaker, who appeared in
+his haste to have spoken more than he intended--a company, or party, I
+should have said; but thus it is, friend Latimer, with the wisest men
+when they permit themselves to be perturbed with passion, and speak as
+in a fever, or as with the tongue of the foolish and the forward. And
+although thou hast been hasty to mark my infirmity, yet I grieve not
+that thou hast been a witness to it, seeing that the stumbles of the
+wise may be no less a caution to youth and inexperience, than is the
+fall of the foolish.’
+
+This was a sort of acknowledgement of what I had already begun to
+suspect--that my new friend’s real goodness of disposition, joined to
+the acquired quietism of his religious sect, had been unable entirely to
+check the effervescence of a temper naturally warm and hasty.
+
+Upon the present occasion, as if sensible he had displayed a greater
+degree of emotion than became his character, Joshua avoided further
+allusion to Benjie and Solomon, and proceeded to solicit my attention to
+the natural objects around us, which increased in beauty and interest,
+as, still conducted by the meanders of the brook, we left the common
+behind us, and entered a more cultivated and enclosed country, where
+arable and pasture ground was agreeably varied with groves and hedges.
+Descending now almost close to the stream, our course lay through a
+little gate, into a pathway kept with great neatness, the sides of which
+were decorated with trees and flowering shrubs of the hardier species;
+until, ascending by a gentle slope, we issued from the grove, and stood
+almost at once in front of a low but very neat building, of an irregular
+form; and my guide, shaking me cordially by the hand, made me welcome to
+Mount Sharon.
+
+The wood through which we had approached this little mansion was thrown
+around it both on the north and north-west, but, breaking off into
+different directions, was intersected by a few fields well watered and
+sheltered. The house fronted to the south-east, and from thence the
+pleasure-ground, or, I should rather say, the gardens, sloped down
+to the water. I afterwards understood that the father of the present
+proprietor had a considerable taste for horticulture, which had been
+inherited by his son, and had formed these gardens, which, with their
+shaven turf, pleached alleys, wildernesses, and exotic trees and shrubs,
+greatly excelled anything of the kind which had been attempted in the
+neighbourhood.
+
+If there was a little vanity in the complacent smile with which Joshua
+Geddes saw me gaze with delight on a scene so different from the naked
+waste we had that day traversed in company, it might surely be permitted
+to one who, cultivating and improving the beauties of nature, had found
+therein, as he said, bodily health, and a pleasing relaxation for the
+mind. At the bottom of the extended gardens the brook wheeled round in a
+wide semicircle, and was itself their boundary. The opposite side was
+no part of Joshua’s domain, but the brook was there skirted by a
+precipitous rock of limestone, which seemed a barrier of nature’s own
+erecting around his little Eden of beauty, comfort, and peace.
+
+‘But I must not let thee forget,’ said the kind Quaker, ‘amidst thy
+admiration of these beauties of our little inheritance, that thy
+breakfast has been a light one.’
+
+So saying, Joshua conducted me to a small sashed door, opening under
+a porch amply mantled by honeysuckle and clematis, into a parlour
+of moderate size; the furniture of which, in plainness and excessive
+cleanliness, bore the characteristic marks of the sect to which the
+owner belonged.
+
+Thy father’s Hannah is generally allowed to be an exception to all
+Scottish housekeepers, and stands unparalleled for cleanliness among
+the women of Auld Reekie; but the cleanliness of Hannah is sluttishness
+compared to the scrupulous purifications of these people, who seem to
+carry into the minor decencies of life that conscientious rigour which
+they affect in their morals.
+
+The parlour would have been gloomy, for the windows were small and the
+ceiling low; but the present proprietor had rendered it more cheerful
+by opening one end into a small conservatory, roofed with glass, and
+divided from the parlour by a partition of the same. I have never before
+seen this very pleasing manner of uniting the comforts of an apartment
+with the beauties of a garden, and I wonder it is not more practised
+by the great. Something of the kind is hinted at in a paper of the
+SPECTATOR.
+
+As I walked towards the conservatory to view it more closely, the
+parlour chimney engaged my attention. It was a pile of massive stone,
+entirely out of proportion to the size of the apartment. On the front
+had once been an armorial scutcheon; for the hammer, or chisel, which
+had been employed to deface the shield or crest, had left uninjured
+the scroll beneath, which bore the pious motto, ‘TRUST IN GOD.’
+Black-letter, you know, was my early passion, and the tombstones in the
+Greyfriars’ churchyard early yielded up to my knowledge as a decipherer
+what little they could tell of the forgotten dead.
+
+Joshua Geddes paused when he saw my eye fixed on this relic of
+antiquity. ‘Thou canst read it?’ he said.
+
+I repeated the motto, and added, there seemed vestiges of a date.
+
+‘It should be 1537,’ said he; ‘for so long ago, at the least
+computation, did my ancestors, in the blinded times of Papistry, possess
+these lands, and in that year did they build their house.’
+
+‘It is an ancient descent,’ said I, looking with respect upon the
+monument. ‘I am sorry the arms have been defaced.’
+
+It was perhaps impossible for my friend, Quaker as he was, to seem
+altogether void of respect for the pedigree which he began to recount
+to me, disclaiming all the while the vanity usually connected with
+the subject; in short, with the air of mingled melancholy, regret, and
+conscious dignity, with which Jack Fawkes used to tell us at college of
+his ancestor’s unfortunate connexion with the Gunpowder Plot.
+
+‘Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher,’ thus harangued Joshua Gleddes
+of Mount Sharon; ‘if we ourselves are nothing in the sight of Heaven,
+how much less than nothing must be our derivation from rotten bones and
+mouldering dust, whose immortal spirits have long since gone to their
+private account? Yes, friend Latimer, my ancestors were renowned among
+the ravenous and bloodthirsty men who then dwelt in this vexed country;
+and so much were they famed for successful freebooting, robbery, and
+bloodshed, that they are said to have been called Geddes, as likening
+them to the fish called a Jack, Pike, or Luce, and in our country
+tongue, a GED--a goodly distinction truly for Christian men! Yet did
+they paint this shark of the fresh waters upon their shields, and these
+profane priests of a wicked idolatry, the empty boasters called heralds,
+who make engraven images of fishes, fowls, and four-footed beasts, that
+men may fall down and worship them, assigned the ged for the device and
+escutcheon of my fathers, and hewed it over their chimneys, and placed
+it above their tombs; and the men were elated in mind, and became yet
+more ged-like, slaying, leading into captivity, and dividing the spoil,
+until the place where they dwelt obtained the name of Sharing-Knowe,
+from the booty which was there divided amongst them and their
+accomplices. But a better judgement was given to my father’s father,
+Philip Geddes, who, after trying to light his candle at some of the vain
+wildfires then held aloft at different meetings and steeple-houses, at
+length obtained a spark from the lamp of the blessed George Fox, who
+came into Scotland spreading light among darkness, as he himself hath
+written, as plentifully as fly the sparkles from the hoof of the horse
+which gallops swiftly along the stony road.’--Here the good Quaker
+interrupted himself with, ‘And that is very true, I must go speedily to
+see after the condition of Solomon.’
+
+A Quaker servant here entered the room with a tray, and inclining his
+head towards his master, but not after the manner of one who bows, said
+composedly, ‘Thou art welcome home, friend Joshua, we expected thee not
+so early; but what hath befallen Solomon thy horse?’
+
+‘What hath befallen him, indeed?’ said my friend; ‘hath he not been
+returned hither by the child whom they call Benjie?’
+
+‘He hath,’ said his domestic, ‘but it was after a strange fashion; for
+he came hither at a swift and furious pace, and flung the child Benjie
+from his back, upon the heap of dung which is in the stable-yard.’
+
+‘I am glad of it,’ said Joshua, hastily,--‘glad of it, with all my heart
+and spirit! But stay, he is the child of the widow--hath the boy any
+hurt?’
+
+‘Not so’ answered the servant, ‘for he rose and fled swiftly.’
+
+Joshua muttered something about a scourge, and then inquired after
+Solomon’s present condition.
+
+‘He seetheth like a steaming cauldron,’ answered the servant; ‘and
+Bauldie, the lad, walketh him about the yard with a halter, lest he take
+cold.’
+
+Mr. Geddes hastened to the stable-yard to view personally the condition
+of his favourite, and I followed to offer my counsel as a jockey. Don’t
+laugh, Alan, sure I have jockeyship enough to assist a Quaker--in this
+unpleasing predicament.
+
+The lad who was leading the horse seemed to be no Quaker, though his
+intercourse with the family had given him a touch of their prim sobriety
+of look and manner. He assured Joshua that his horse had received no
+injury, and I even hinted that the exercise would be of service to him.
+Solomon himself neighed towards his master, and rubbed his head against
+the good Quaker’s shoulder, as if to assure him of his being quite well;
+so that Joshua returned in comfort to his parlour, where breakfast was
+now about to be displayed.
+
+I have since learned that the affection of Joshua for his pony is
+considered as inordinate by some of his own sect; and that he has been
+much blamed for permitting it to be called by the name of Solomon, or
+any other name whatever; but he has gained so much respect and influence
+among them that they overlook these foibles.
+
+I learned from him (whilst the old servant, Jehoiachim, entering and
+re-entering, seemed to make no end of the materials which he brought in
+for breakfast) that his grandfather Philip, the convert of George Fox,
+had suffered much from the persecution to which these harmless devotees
+were subjected on all sides during that intolerant period, and much
+of their family estate had been dilapidated. But better days dawned
+on Joshua’s father, who, connecting himself by marriage with a wealthy
+family of Quakers in Lancashire, engaged successfully in various
+branches of commerce, and redeemed the remnants of the property,
+changing its name in sense, without much alteration of sound, from the
+Border appellation of Sharing-Knowe, to the evangelical appellation of
+Mount Sharon.
+
+This Philip Geddes, as I before hinted, had imbibed the taste for
+horticulture and the pursuits of the florist, which are not uncommon
+among the peaceful sect he belonged to. He had destroyed the remnants
+of the old peel-house, substituting the modern mansion in its place;
+and while he reserved the hearth of his ancestors, in memory of their
+hospitality, as also the pious motto which they had chanced to assume,
+he failed not to obliterate the worldly and military emblems displayed
+upon the shield and helmet, together with all their blazonry.
+
+In a few minutes after Mr. Geddes had concluded the account; of himself
+and his family, his sister Rachel, the only surviving member of it,
+entered the room. Her appearance is remarkably pleasing, and although
+her age is certainly thirty at least, she still retains the shape and
+motion of an earlier period. The absence of everything like fashion
+or ornament was, as usual, atoned for by the most perfect neatness and
+cleanliness of her dress; and her simple close cap was particularly
+suited to eyes which had the softness and simplicity of the dove’s.
+Her features were also extremely agreeable, but had suffered a little
+through the ravages of that professed enemy to beauty, the small-pox; a
+disadvantage which was in part counterbalanced by a well-formed mouth,
+teeth like pearls, and a pleasing sobriety of smile, that seemed to wish
+good here and hereafter to every one she spoke to. You cannot make
+any of your vile inferences here, Alan, for I have given a full-length
+picture of Rachel Geddes; so that; you cannot say, in this case, as in
+the letter I have just received, that she was passed over as a subject
+on which I feared to dilate. More of this anon.
+
+Well, we settled to our breakfast after a blessing, or rather an
+extempore prayer, which Joshua made upon the occasion, and which
+the spirit moved him to prolong rather more than I felt altogether
+agreeable. Then, Alan, there was such a dispatching of the good things
+of the morning as you have not witnessed since you have seen Darsie
+Latimer at breakfast. Tea and chocolate, eggs, ham, and pastry, not
+forgetting the broiled fish, disappeared with a celerity which seemed
+to astonish the good-humoured Quakers, who kept loading my plate
+with supplies, as if desirous of seeing whether they could, by any
+possibility, tire me out. One hint, however, I received, which put me in
+mind where I was. Miss Geddes had offered me some sweet-cake, which, at
+the moment, I declined; but presently afterwards, seeing it within
+my reach, I naturally enough helped myself to a slice, and had just;
+deposited it beside my plate, when Joshua, mine host, not with the
+authoritative air of Sancho’s doctor, Tirteafuera, but in a very calm
+and quiet manner, lifted it away and replaced it on the dish, observing
+only, ‘Thou didst refuse it before, friend Latimer.’
+
+These good folks, Alan, make no allowance for what your good father
+calls the Aberdeen-man’s privilege, of ‘taking his word again;’ or what
+the wise call second thoughts.
+
+Bating this slight hint that I was among a precise generation, there
+was nothing in my reception that was peculiar--unless, indeed, I were to
+notice the solicitous and uniform kindness with which all the attentions
+of my new friends were seasoned, as if they were anxious to assure me
+that the neglect of worldly compliments interdicted by their sect, only
+served to render their hospitality more sincere. At length my hunger was
+satisfied, and the worthy Quaker, who, with looks of great good nature,
+had watched my progress, thus addressed his sister:--
+
+‘This young man, Rachel, hath last night sojourned in the tents of our
+neighbour whom men call the laird. I am sorry I had not met him the
+evening before, for our neighbour’s hospitality is too unfrequently
+exercised to be well prepared with the means of welcome.’
+
+‘Nay, but, Joshua,’ said Rachel, ‘if our neighbour hath done a kindness,
+thou shouldst not grudge him the opportunity; and if our young friend
+hath fared ill for a night, he will the better relish what Providence
+may send him of better provisions.’
+
+‘And that he may do so at leisure,’ said Joshua, ‘we will pray him,
+Rachel, to tarry a day or twain with us: he is young, and is but now
+entering upon the world, and our habitation may, if he will, be like a
+resting-place, from which he may look abroad upon the pilgrimage which
+he must take, and the path which he has to travel.--What sayest thou,
+friend Latimer? We constrain not our friends to our ways, and thou art,
+I think, too wise to quarrel with us for following our own fashions; and
+if we should even give thee a word of advice, thou wilt not, I think, be
+angry, so that it is spoken in season.’
+
+You know, Alan, how easily I am determined by anything resembling
+cordiality--and so, though a little afraid of the formality of my host
+and hostess, I accepted their invitation, provided I could get some
+messenger to send to Shepherd’s Bush for my servant and portmanteau.
+
+‘Why, truly, friend,’ said Joshua, ‘thy outward frame would be improved
+by cleaner garments; but I will do thine errand myself to the Widow
+Gregson’s house of reception, and send thy lad hither with thy clothes.
+Meanwhile, Rachel will show thee these little gardens, and then will put
+thee in some way of spending thy time usefully, till our meal calls
+us together at the second hour after noon. I bid thee farewell for
+the present, having some space to walk, seeing I must leave the animal
+Solomon to his refreshing rest.’
+
+With these words, Mr. Joshua Geddes withdrew. Some ladies we have known
+would have felt, or at least affected, reserve or embarrassment, at
+being left to do the honours of the grounds to (it will be out, Alan)--a
+smart young fellow--an entire stranger. She went out for a few minutes,
+and returned in her plain cloak and bonnet, with her beaver gloves,
+prepared to act as my guide, with as much simplicity as if she had been
+to wait upon thy father. So forth I sallied with my fair Quakeress.
+
+If the house at Mount Sharon be merely a plain and convenient dwelling,
+of moderate size and small pretensions, the gardens and offices, though
+not extensive, might rival an earl’s in point of care and expense.
+Rachel carried me first to her own favourite resort, a poultry-yard,
+stocked with a variety of domestic fowls, of the more rare as well as
+the most ordinary kinds, furnished with every accommodation which may
+suit their various habits. A rivulet which spread into a pond for the
+convenience of the aquatic birds, trickled over gravel as it passed
+through the yards dedicated to the land poultry, which were thus amply
+supplied with the means they use for digestion.
+
+All these creatures seemed to recognize the presence of their mistress,
+and some especial favourites hastened to her feet, and continued to
+follow her as far as their limits permitted. She pointed out their
+peculiarities and qualities, with the discrimination of one who had made
+natural history her study; and I own I never looked on barn-door
+fowls with so much interest before--at least until they were boiled
+or roasted. I could not help asking the trying question, how she could
+order the execution of any of the creatures of which she seemed so
+careful.
+
+‘It was painful,’ she said, ‘but it was according to the law of their
+being. They must die; but they knew not when death was approaching; and
+in making them comfortable while they lived, we contributed to their
+happiness as much as the conditions of their existence permitted to us.’
+
+I am not quite of her mind, Alan. I do not believe either pigs or
+poultry would admit that the chief end of their being was to be killed
+and eaten. However, I did not press the argument, from which my Quaker
+seemed rather desirous to escape; for, conducting me to the greenhouse,
+which was extensive, and filled with the choicest plants, she pointed
+out an aviary which occupied the farther end, where, she said, she
+employed herself with attending the inhabitants, without being disturbed
+with any painful recollections concerning their future destination.
+
+I will not trouble you with any account of the various hot-houses
+and gardens, and their contents. No small sum of money must have been
+expended in erecting and maintaining them in the exquisite degree
+of good order which they exhibited. The family, I understood, were
+connected with that of the celebrated Millar, and had imbibed his taste
+for flowers, and for horticulture. But instead of murdering botanical
+names, I will rather conduct you to the POLICY, or pleasure-garden,
+which the taste of Joshua or his father had extended on the banks
+betwixt the house and river. This also, in contradistinction to the
+prevailing simplicity, was ornamented in an unusual degree. There were
+various compartments, the connexion of which was well managed, and
+although the whole ground did not exceed five or six acres, it was so
+much varied as to seem four times larger. The space contained close
+alleys and open walks; a very pretty artificial waterfall; a fountain
+also, consisting of a considerable jet-d’eau, whose streams glittered in
+the sunbeams and exhibited a continual rainbow. There was a cabinet of
+verdure, as the French call it, to cool the summer heat, and there was
+a terrace sheltered from the north-east by a noble holly hedge, with all
+its glittering spears where you might have the full advantage of the sun
+in the clear frosty days of winter.
+
+I know that you, Alan, will condemn all this as bad and antiquated; for,
+ever since Dodsley has described the Leasowes, and talked of Brown’s
+imitations of nature and Horace Walpole’s late Essay on Gardening, you
+are all for simple nature--condemn walking up and down stairs in the
+open air and declare for wood and wilderness. But NE QUID NIMIS. I would
+not deface a scene of natural grandeur or beauty, by the introduction
+of crowded artificial decorations; yet such may, I think, be very
+interesting, where the situation, in its natural state, otherwise has no
+particular charms.
+
+So that when I have a country-house (who can say how soon?) you may
+look for grottoes, and cascades, and fountains; nay if you vex me by
+contradiction, perhaps I may go the length of a temple--so provoke me
+not, for you see of what enormities I am capable.
+
+At any rate, Alan, had you condemned as artificial the rest of Friend
+Geddes’s grounds, there is a willow walk by the very verge of the
+stream, so sad, so solemn, and so silent, that it must have commanded
+your admiration. The brook, restrained at the ultimate boundary of the
+grounds by a natural dam-dike or ledge of rocks, seemed, even in
+its present swollen state, scarcely to glide along: and the pale
+willow-trees, dropping their long branches into the stream, gathered
+around them little coronals of the foam that floated down from the more
+rapid stream above. The high rock, which formed the opposite bank of the
+brook, was seen dimly through the branches, and its pale and splintered
+front, garlanded with long streamers of briers and other creeping
+plants, seemed a barrier between the quiet path which we trod, and the
+toiling and bustling world beyond. The path itself, following the sweep
+of the stream, made a very gentle curve; enough, however, served by its
+inflection completely to hide the end of the walk until you arrived at
+it. A deep and sullen sound, which increased as you proceeded, prepared
+you for this termination, which was indeed only a plain root-seat, from
+which you looked on a fall of about six or seven feet, where the brook
+flung itself over the ledge of natural rock I have already mentioned,
+which there crossed its course.
+
+The quiet and twilight seclusion of this walk rendered it a fit scene
+for confidential communing; and having nothing more interesting to
+say to my fair Quaker, I took the liberty of questioning her about the
+laird; for you are, or ought to be, aware, that next to discussing the
+affairs of the heart, the fair sex are most interested in those of their
+neighbours.
+
+I did not conceal either my curiosity, or the check which it had
+received from Joshua, and I saw that my companion answered with
+embarrassment. ‘I must not speak otherwise than truly,’ she said; ‘and
+therefore I tell thee, that my brother dislikes, and that I fear, the
+man of whom thou hast asked me. Perhaps we are both wrong--but he is a
+man of violence, and hath great influence over many, who, following
+the trade of sailors and fishermen, become as rude as the elements with
+which they contend. He hath no certain name among them, which is
+not unusual, their rude fashion being to distinguish each other
+by nicknames; and they have called him the Laird of the Lakes (not
+remembering there should be no one called Lord, save one only) in idle
+derision; the pools of salt water left by the tide among the sands being
+called the Lakes of Solway.’
+
+‘Has he no other revenue than he derives from these sands?’ I asked.
+
+‘That I cannot answer,’ replied Rachel; ‘men say that he wants not
+money, though he lives like an ordinary fisherman, and that he imparts
+freely of his means to the poor around him. They intimate that he is
+a man of consequence, once deeply engaged in the unhappy affair of the
+rebellion, and even still too much in danger from the government
+to assume his own name. He is often absent from his cottage at
+Broken-burn-cliffs, for weeks and months.’
+
+‘I should have thought,’ said I, ‘that the government would scarce, at
+this time of day, be likely to proceed against any one even of the most
+obnoxious rebels. Many years have passed away’--
+
+‘It is true,’ she replied; ‘yet such persons may understand that their
+being connived at depends on their living in obscurity. But indeed there
+can nothing certain be known among these rude people. The truth is not
+in them--most of them participate in the unlawful trade betwixt these
+parts and the neighbouring shore of England; and they are familiar with
+every species of falsehood and deceit.’
+
+‘It is a pity,’ I remarked, ‘your brother should have neighbours of such
+a description, especially as I understand he is at some variance with
+them.’
+
+‘Where, when, and about what matter?’ answered Miss Geddes, with an
+eager and timorous anxiety, which made me regret having touched on the
+subject.
+
+I told her, in a way as little alarming as I could devise, the purport
+of what passed betwixt this Laird of the Lakes and her brother, at their
+morning’s interview.
+
+‘You affright me much,’ answered she; ‘it is this very circumstance
+which has scared me in the watches of the night. When my brother Joshua
+withdrew from an active share in the commercial concerns of my father,
+being satisfied with the portion of worldly substance which he already
+possessed, there were one or two undertakings in which he retained an
+interest, either because his withdrawing might have been prejudicial to
+friends, or because he wished to retain some mode of occupying his time.
+Amongst the more important of these is a fishing station on the coast,
+where, by certain improved modes of erecting snares, opening at the
+advance of the tide, and shutting at the reflux, many more fish are
+taken than can be destroyed by those who, like the men of Broken-burn,
+use only the boat-net and spear, or fishing-rod. They complain of these
+tide-nets, as men call them, as an innovation, and pretend to a right
+to remove and destroy them by the strong hand. I fear me, this man of
+violence, whom they call the laird, will execute these his threats,
+which cannot be without both loss and danger to my brother.’
+
+‘Mr. Geddes,’ said I, ‘ought to apply to the civil, magistrate; there
+are soldiers at Dumfries who would be detached for his protection.’
+
+‘Thou speakest, friend Latimer,’ answered the lady, ‘as one who is
+still in the gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity. God forbid that
+we should endeavour to preserve nets of flax and stakes of wood, or the
+Mammon of gain which they procure for us, by the hands of men of war and
+at the risk of spilling human blood.’
+
+‘I respect your scruples,’ I replied; ‘but since such is your way
+of thinking, your brother ought to avert the danger by compromise or
+submission.’
+
+‘Perhaps it would be best,’ answered Rachel; ‘but what can I say? Even
+in the best-trained temper there may remain some leaven of the old Adam;
+and I know not whether it is this or a better spirit that maketh my
+brother Joshua determine, that though he will not resist force by force,
+neither will he yield up his right to mere threats, or encourage wrong
+to others by yielding to menaces. His partners, he says, confide in his
+steadiness: and that he must not disappoint them by yielding up their
+right for the fear of the threats of man, whose breath is in his
+nostrils.’
+
+This observation convinced me that the spirit of the old sharers of
+the spoil was not utterly departed even from the bosom of the peaceful
+Quaker; and I could not help confessing internally that Joshua had the
+right, when he averred that there was as much courage in sufferance as
+in exertion.
+
+As we approached the farther end of the willow walk, the sullen and
+continuous sound of the dashing waters became still more and more
+audible, and at length rendered it difficult for us to communicate
+with each other. The conversation dropped, but apparently my companion
+continued to dwell upon the apprehensions which it had excited. At the
+bottom of the walk we obtained a view of the cascade, where the swollen
+brook flung itself in foam and tumult over the natural barrier of rock,
+which seemed in vain to attempt to bar its course. I gazed with delight,
+and, turning to express my sentiment to my companion, I observed that
+she had folded her hands in an attitude of sorrowful resignation, which
+showed her thoughts were far from the scene which lay before her.
+When she saw that her abstraction was observed, she resumed her former
+placidity of manner; and having given me sufficient time to admire this
+termination of our sober and secluded walk, proposed that me should
+return to the house through her brother’s farm. ‘Even we Quakers, as
+we are called, have our little pride,’ she said; ‘and my brother Joshua
+would not forgive me, were I not to show thee the fields which he taketh
+delight to cultivate after the newest and best fashion; for which, I
+promise thee, he hath received much praise from good judges, as well as
+some ridicule from those who think it folly to improve on the customs of
+our ancestors.’
+
+As she spoke, she opened a low door, leading through a moss and
+ivy-covered wall, the boundary of the pleasure-ground, into the open
+fields; through which we moved by a convenient path, leading, with good
+taste and simplicity, by stile and hedgerow, through pasturage, and
+arable, and woodland; so that in all ordinary weather, the good man
+might, without even soiling his shoes, perform his perambulation round
+the farm. There were seats also, on which to rest; and though not
+adorned with inscriptions, nor quite so frequent in occurrence as those
+mentioned in the account of the Leasowes, their situation was always
+chosen with respect to some distant prospect to be commanded, or some
+home-view to be enjoyed.
+
+But what struck me most in Joshua’s domain was the quantity and the
+tameness of the game. The hen partridge scarce abandoned the roost, at
+the foot of the hedge where she had assembled her covey, though the path
+went close beside her; and the hare, remaining on her form, gazed at us
+as we passed, with her full dark eye, or rising lazily and hopping to
+a little distance, stood erect to look at us with more curiosity than
+apprehension. I observed to Miss Geddes the extreme tameness of these
+timid and shy animals, and she informed me that their confidence arose
+from protection in the summer, and relief during the winter.
+
+‘They are pets,’ she said, ‘of my brother, who considers them as the
+better entitled to his kindness that they are a race persecuted by the
+world in general. He denieth himself,’ she said, ‘even the company of a
+dog, that these creatures may here at least enjoy undisturbed security.
+Yet this harmless or humane propensity, or humour, hath given offence,’
+she added, ‘to our dangerous neighbours.’
+
+She explained this, by telling me that my host of the preceding night
+was remarkable for his attachment to field-sports, which he pursued
+without much regard to the wishes of the individuals over whose property
+he followed them. The undefined mixture of respect and fear with which
+he was generally regarded induced most of the neighbouring land-holders
+to connive at what they would perhaps in another have punished as a
+trespass; but Joshua Geddes would not permit the intrusion of any
+one upon his premises, and as he had before offended several country
+neighbours, who, because he would neither shoot himself nor permit
+others to do so, compared him to the dog in the manger, so he now
+aggravated the displeasure which the Laird of the Lakes had already
+conceived against him, by positively debarring him from pursuing his
+sport over his grounds--‘So that,’ said Rachel Geddes, ‘I sometimes wish
+our lot had been cast elsewhere than in these pleasant borders, where,
+if we had less of beauty around us, we might have had a neighbourhood of
+peace and, goodwill.’
+
+We at length returned to the house, where Miss Geddes showed me a small
+study, containing a little collection of books, in two separate presses.
+
+‘These,’ said she, pointing to the smaller press, ‘will, if thou
+bestowest thy leisure upon them, do thee good; and these,’ pointing to
+the other and larger cabinet, ‘can, I believe, do thee little harm. Some
+of our people do indeed hold, that every writer who is not with us
+is against us; but brother Joshua is mitigated in his opinions, and
+correspondeth with our friend John Scot of Amwell, who hath himself
+constructed verses well approved of even in the world. I wish thee many
+good thoughts till our family meet at the hour of dinner.’
+
+Left alone, I tried both collections; the first consisted entirely
+of religious and controversial tracts, and the latter formed a small
+selection of history and of moral writers, both in prose and verse.
+
+Neither collection promising much amusement, thou hast, in these close
+pages, the fruits of my tediousness; and truly, I think, writing history
+(one’s self being the subject) is as amusing as reading that of foreign
+countries, at any time.
+
+Sam, still more drunk than sober, arrived in due time with my
+portmanteau, and enabled me to put my dress into order, better befitting
+this temple of cleanliness and decorum, where (to conclude) I believe I
+shall be a sojourner more days than one. [See Note 1.]
+
+PS.--I have noted your adventure, as you home-bred youths may perhaps
+term it, concerning the visit of your doughty laird. We travellers hold
+such an incident no great consequence, though it may serve to embellish
+the uniform life of Brown’s Square. But art thou not ashamed to attempt
+to interest one who is seeing the world at large, and studying human
+nature on a large scale, by so bald a narrative? Why, what does it
+amount to, after all, but that a Tory laird dined with a Whig lawyer? no
+very uncommon matter, especially as you state Mr. Herries to have lost
+the estate, though retaining the designation. The laird behaves with
+haughtiness and impertinence--nothing out of character in that: is NOT
+kicked down stairs, as he ought to have been, were Alan Fairford half
+the man that he would wish his friends to think him. Aye, but then, as
+the young lawyer, instead of showing his friend the door, chose to make
+use of it himself, he overheard the laird aforesaid ask the old lawyer
+concerning Darsie Latimer--no doubt earnestly inquiring after the
+handsome, accomplished inmate of his family, who has so lately made
+Themis his bow and declined the honour of following her farther. You
+laugh at me for my air-drawn castles; but confess, have they not surer
+footing, in general, than two words spoken by such a man as Herries?
+And yet--and yet--I would rally the matter off, Alan; but in dark nights
+even the glow-worm becomes an object of lustre, and to one plunged in
+my uncertainty and ignorance, the slightest gleam that promises
+intelligence is interesting. My life is like the subterranean river in
+the Peak of Derby, visible only where it crosses the celebrated cavern.
+I am here, and this much I know; but where I have sprung from, or
+whither my course of life is like to tend, who shall tell me? Your
+father, too, seemed interested and alarmed, and talked of writing; would
+to Heaven he may!--I send daily to the post-town for letters.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VIII
+
+ALAN FAIRFORD TO DARSIE LATIMER
+
+Thou mayst clap thy wings and crow as thou pleasest. You go in search
+of adventures, but adventures come to me unsought for; and oh! in what a
+pleasing shape came mine, since it arrived in the form of a client--and
+a fair client to boot! What think you of that, Darsie! you who are such
+a sworn squire of dames? Will this not match my adventures with thine,
+that hunt salmon on horseback, and will it not, besides, eclipse
+the history of a whole tribe of Broadbrims?--But I must proceed
+methodically.
+
+When I returned to-day from the College, I was surprised to see a broad
+grin distending the adust countenance of the faithful James Wilkinson,
+which, as the circumstance seldom happens above once a year, was matter
+of some surprise. Moreover, he had a knowing glance with his eye,
+which I should have as soon expected from a dumb-waiter--an article
+of furniture to which James, in his usual state, may be happily
+assimilated. ‘What the devil is the matter, James?’
+
+‘The devil may be in the matter, for aught I ken,’ said James, with
+another provoking grin; ‘for here has been a woman calling for you,
+Maister Alan.’
+
+‘A woman calling for me?’ said I in surprise; for you know well, that
+excepting old Aunt Peggy, who comes to dinner of a Sunday, and the
+still older Lady Bedrooket, who calls ten times a year for the
+quarterly payment of her jointure of four hundred merks, a female scarce
+approaches our threshold, as my father visits all his female clients at
+their own lodgings. James protested, however, that there had been a
+lady calling, and for me. ‘As bonny a lass as I have seen,’ added James,
+‘since I was in the Fusileers, and kept company with Peg Baxter.’ Thou
+knowest all James’s gay recollections go back to the period of his
+military service, the years he has spent in ours having probably been
+dull enough.
+
+‘Did the lady leave no name nor place of address?’
+
+‘No,’ replied James; ‘but she asked when you wad be at hame, and I
+appointed her for twelve o’clock, when the house wad be quiet, and your
+father at the Bank.’
+
+‘For shame, James! how can you think my father’s being at home or abroad
+could be of consequence?--The lady is of course a decent person?’
+
+‘I’se uphaud her that, sir--she is nane of your--WHEW’--(Here James
+supplied a blank with a low whistle)--‘but I didna ken--my maister makes
+an unco wark if a woman comes here.’
+
+I passed into my own room, not ill-pleased that my father was absent,
+notwithstanding I had thought it proper to rebuke James for having so
+contrived it, I disarranged my books, to give them the appearance of a
+graceful confusion on the table, and laying my foils (useless since your
+departure) across the mantelpiece, that the lady might see I was TAM
+MARTE QUAM MERCURIO--I endeavoured to dispose my dress so as to resemble
+an elegant morning deshabille--gave my hair the general shade of powder
+which marks the gentleman--laid my watch and seals on the table, to
+hint that I understood the value of time;--and when I had made all these
+arrangements, of which I am a little ashamed when I think of them, I had
+nothing better to do than to watch the dial-plate till the index
+pointed to noon. Five minutes elapsed, which. I allowed for variation
+of clocks--five minutes more rendered me anxious and doubtful--and five
+minutes more would have made me impatient.
+
+Laugh as thou wilt; but remember, Darsie, I was a lawyer, expecting his
+first client--a young man, how strictly bred up I need not remind you,
+expecting a private interview with a young and beautiful woman. But ere
+the third term of five minutes had elapsed, the door-bell was heard to
+tinkle low and modestly, as if touched by some timid hand.
+
+James Wilkinson, swift in nothing, is, as thou knowest, peculiarly slow
+in answering the door-bell; and I reckoned on five minutes good, ere his
+solemn step should have ascended the stair. Time enough, thought I, for
+a peep through the blinds, and was hastening to the window accordingly.
+But I reckoned without my host; for James, who had his own curiosity
+as well as I, was lying PERDU in the lobby, ready to open at the first
+tinkle; and there was, ‘This way, ma’am--Yes, ma’am--The lady, Mr.
+Alan,’ before I could get to the chair in which I proposed to be
+discovered, seated in all legal dignity. The consciousness of being
+half-caught in the act of peeping, joined to that native air of awkward
+bashfulness of which I am told the law will soon free me, kept me
+standing on the floor in some confusion; while the lady, disconcerted
+on her part, remained on the threshold of the room. James Wilkinson, who
+had his senses most about him, and was perhaps willing to prolong his
+stay in the apartment, busied himself in setting a chair for the lady,
+and recalled me to my good-breeding by the hint. I invited her to take
+possession of it, and bid James withdraw.
+
+My visitor was undeniably a lady, and probably considerably above the
+ordinary rank--very modest, too, judging from the mixture of grace and
+timidity with which she moved, and at my entreaty sat down. Her dress
+was, I should suppose, both handsome and fashionable; but it was much
+concealed by a walking-cloak of green silk, fancifully embroidered; in
+which, though heavy for the season, her person was enveloped, and which,
+moreover, was furnished with a hood.
+
+The devil take that hood, Darsie! for I was just able to distinguish
+that, pulled as it was over the face, it concealed from me, as I was
+convinced, one of the prettiest countenances I have seen, and which,
+from a sense of embarrassment, seemed to be crimsoned with a deep blush.
+I could see her complexion was beautiful--her chin finely turned--her
+lips coral--and her teeth rivals to ivory. But further the deponent
+sayeth not; for a clasp of gold, ornamented with it sapphire, closed
+the envious mantle under the incognita’s throat, and the cursed hood
+concealed entirely the upper part of the face.
+
+I ought to have spoken first, that is certain; but ere I could get my
+phrases well arranged, the young lady, rendered desperate I suppose by
+my hesitation opened the conversation herself.
+
+‘I fear I am an intruder, sir--I expected to meet an elderly gentleman.’
+
+This brought me to myself. ‘My father, madam, perhaps. But you inquired
+for Alan Fairford--my father’s name is Alexander.’
+
+‘It is Mr. Alan Fairford, undoubtedly, with whom I wished to speak,’ she
+said, with greater confusion; ‘but I was told that he was advanced in
+life.’
+
+‘Some mistake, madam, I presume, betwixt my father and myself--our
+Christian names have the same initials, though the terminations are
+different. I--I--I would esteem it a most fortunate mistake if I could
+have the honour of supplying my father’s place in anything that could be
+of service to you.’
+
+‘You are very obliging, sir,’ A pause, during which she seemed
+undetermined whether to rise or sit still.
+
+‘I am just about to be called to the bar, madam,’ said I, in hopes to
+remove her scruples to open her case to me; ‘and if my advice or opinion
+could be of the slightest use, although I cannot presume to say that
+they are much to be depended upon, yet’--
+
+The lady arose. ‘I am truly sensible of your kindness, sir; and I have
+no doubt of your talents. I will be very plain with you--it is you whom
+I came to visit; although, now that we have met, I find it will be much
+better that I should commit my communication to writing.’
+
+‘I hope, madam, you will not be so cruel--so tantalizing, I would
+say. Consider, you are my first client--your business my first
+consultation--do not do me the displeasure of withdrawing your
+confidence because I am a few years younger than you seem to have
+expected. My attention shall make amends for my want of experience.’
+
+‘I have no doubt of either,’ said the lady, in a grave tone, calculated
+to restrain the air of gallantry with which I had endeavoured to address
+her. ‘But when you have received my letter you will find good reasons
+assigned why a written communication will best suit my purpose. I wish
+you, sir, a good morning.’ And she left the apartment, her poor baffled
+counsel scraping, and bowing, and apologizing for anything that might
+have been disagreeable to her, although the front of my offence seems to
+be my having been discovered to be younger than my father.
+
+The door was opened--out she went--walked along the pavement, turned
+down the close, and put the sun, I believe, into her pocket when she
+disappeared, so suddenly did dullness and darkness sink down on the
+square, when she was no longer visible. I stood for a moment as if I
+had been senseless, not recollecting what a fund of entertainment I must
+have supplied to our watchful friends on the other side of the green.
+Then it darted on my mind that I might dog her, and ascertain at least
+who or what she was. Off I set--ran down the close, where she was no
+longer to be seen, and demanded of one of the dyer’s lads whether he had
+seen a lady go down the close, or had observed which way she turned.
+
+‘A leddy!’--said the dyer, staring at me with his rainbow countenance.
+‘Mr. Alan, what takes you out, rinning like daft, without your hat?’
+
+‘The devil take my hat!’ answered I, running back, however, in quest of
+it; snatched it up, and again sallied forth. But as I reached the head
+of the close once more, I had sense enough to recollect that all pursuit
+would be now in vain. Besides, I saw my friend, the journeyman dyer, in
+close confabulation with a pea-green personage of his own profession,
+and was conscious, like Scrub, that they talked of me, because they
+laughed consumedly. I had no mind, by a second sudden appearance, to
+confirm the report that Advocate Fairford was ‘gaen daft,’ which had
+probably spread from Campbell’s Close-foot to the Meal-market Stairs;
+and so slunk back within my own hole again.
+
+My first employment was to remove all traces of that elegant and
+fanciful disposition of my effects, from which I had hoped for so much
+credit; for I was now ashamed and angry at having thought an instant
+upon the mode of receiving a visit which had commenced so agreeably,
+but terminated in a manner so unsatisfactory. I put my folios in their
+places--threw the foils into the dressing-closet--tormenting myself all
+the while with the fruitless doubt, whether I had missed an opportunity
+or escaped a stratagem, or whether the young person had been really
+startled, as she seemed to intimate, by the extreme youth of her
+intended legal adviser. The mirror was not unnaturally called in to aid;
+and that cabinet-counsellor pronounced me rather short, thick-set,
+with a cast of features fitter, I trust, for the bar than the ball--not
+handsome enough for blushing virgins to pine for my sake, or even to
+invent sham cases to bring them to my chambers--yet not ugly enough
+either to scare those away who came on real business--dark, to be sure,
+but--NIGRI SUNT HYACINTHI--there are pretty things to be said in favour
+of that complexion.
+
+At length--as common sense will get the better in all cases when a man
+will but give it fair play--I began to stand convicted in my own mind,
+as an ass before the interview, for having expected too much--an ass
+during the interview, for having failed to extract the lady’s real
+purpose--and an especial ass, now that it was over, for thinking so much
+about it. But I can think of nothing else, and therefore I am determined
+to think of this to some good purpose.
+
+You remember Murtough O’Hara’s defence of the Catholic doctrine of
+confession; because, ‘by his soul, his sins were always a great burden
+to his mind, till he had told them to the priest; and once confessed, he
+never thought more about them.’ I have tried his receipt, therefore; and
+having poured my secret mortification into thy trusty ear, I will think
+no more about this maid of the mist,
+
+   Who, with no face, as ‘twere, outfaced me.
+
+--Four o’clock. Plague on her green mantle, she can be nothing
+better than a fairy; she keeps possession of my head yet! All during
+dinner-time I was terribly absent; but, luckily, my father gave the
+whole credit of my reverie to the abstract nature of the doctrine, VINCO
+VINCENTEM, ERGO VINCO TE; upon which brocard of law the professor this
+morning lectured. So I got an early dismissal to my own crib, and here
+am I studying, in one sense, VINCERE VINCENTEM, to get the better of
+the silly passion of curiosity--I think--I think it amounts to nothing
+else--which has taken such possession of my imagination, and is
+perpetually worrying me with the question--will she write or no? She
+will not--she will not! So says Reason, and adds, Why should she take
+the trouble to enter into correspondence with one who, instead of a
+bold, alert, prompt gallant, proved a chicken-hearted boy, and left her
+the whole awkwardness of explanation, which he should have met half-way?
+But then, says Fancy, she WILL write, for she was not a bit that sort
+of person whom you, Mr. Reason, in your wisdom, take her to be. She was
+disconcerted enough, without my adding to her distress by any impudent
+conduct on my part. And she will write, for--By Heaven, she HAS written,
+Darsie, and with a vengeance! Here is her letter, thrown into the
+kitchen by a caddie, too faithful to be bribed, either by money or
+whisky, to say more than that he received it, with sixpence, from an
+ordinary-looking woman, as he was plying on his station near the Cross.
+
+
+‘FOR ALAN FAIRFORD, ESQUIRE, BARRISTER.
+
+‘SIR,
+
+‘Excuse my mistake of to-day. I had accidentally learnt that Mr. Darsie
+Latimer had an intimate friend and associate in Mr. A. Fairford. When I
+inquired for such a person, he was pointed out to me at the Cross (as
+I think the Exchange of your city is called) in the character of a
+respectable elderly man--your father, as I now understand. On inquiry at
+Brown’s Square, where I understood he resided, I used the full name of
+Alan, which naturally occasioned you the trouble of this day’s visit.
+Upon further inquiry, I am led to believe that you are likely to be the
+person most active in the matter to which I am now about to direct your
+attention; and I regret much that circumstances, arising out of my own
+particular situation, prevent my communicating to you personally what I
+now apprise you of in this matter.
+
+‘Your friend, Mr. Darsie Latimer, is in a situation of considerable
+danger. You are doubtless aware that he has been cautioned not to trust
+himself in England. Now, if he has not absolutely transgressed this
+friendly injunction, he has at least approached as nearly to the menaced
+danger as he could do, consistently with the letter of the prohibition.
+He has chosen his abode in a neighbourhood very perilous to him; and
+it is only by a speedy return to Edinburgh, or at least by a removal to
+some more remote part of Scotland, that he can escape the machinations
+of those whose enmity he has to fear. I must speak in mystery, but my
+words are not the less certain; and, I believe, you know enough of your
+friend’s fortunes to be aware that I could not write this much without
+being even more intimate with them than you are.
+
+‘If he cannot, or will not, take the advice here given, it is my opinion
+that you should join him, if possible, without delay, and use, by
+your personal presence and entreaty, the arguments which may prove
+ineffectual in writing. One word more, and I implore of your candour to
+take it as it is meant. No one supposes that Mr. Fairford’s zeal in his
+friend’s service needs to be quickened by mercenary motives. ‘But report
+says, that Mr. Alan Fairford, not having yet entered on his professional
+career, may, in such a case as this, want the means, though he cannot
+want the inclination, to act with promptitude. The enclosed note Mr.
+Alan Fairford must be pleased to consider as his first professional
+emolument; and she who sends it hopes it will be the omen of unbounded
+success, though the fee comes from a hand so unknown as that of ‘GREEN
+MANTLE’.
+
+A bank-note of L20 was the enclosure, and the whole incident left me
+speechless with astonishment. I am not able to read over the beginning
+of my own letter, which forms the introduction to this extraordinary
+communication. I only know that, though mixed with a quantity of foolery
+(God knows very much different from my present feelings), it gives an
+account sufficiently accurate, of the mysterious person from whom this
+letter comes, and that I have neither time nor patience to separate the
+absurd commentary from the text, which it is so necessary you should
+know.
+
+Combine this warning, so strangely conveyed, with the caution impressed
+on you by your London correspondent, Griffiths, against your visiting
+England--with the character of your Laird of the Solway Lakes--with the
+lawless habits of the people on that frontier country, where warrants
+are not easily executed owing to the jealousy entertained by either
+country of the legal interference of the other; remember, that even Sir
+John Fielding said to my father that he could never trace a rogue beyond
+the Briggend of Dumfries--think that the distinctions of Whig and
+Tory, Papist and Protestant, still keep that country in a loose and
+comparatively lawless state--think of all this, my dearest Darsie, and
+remember that, while at this Mount Sharon of yours, you are residing
+with a family actually menaced with forcible interference, and who,
+while their obstinacy provokes violence, are by principle bound to
+abstain from resistance.
+
+Nay, let me tell you, professionally, that the legality of the mode of
+fishing practised by your friend Joshua is greatly doubted by our
+best lawyers; and that, if the stake-nets be considered as actually an
+unlawful obstruction raised in the channel of the estuary, an assembly
+of persons who shall proceed, VIA FACTI, to pull dawn and destroy them,
+would not, in the eye of the law, be esteemed guilty of a riot. So, by
+remaining where you are, YOU are likely to be engaged in a quarrel with
+which you have nothing to do, and thus to enable your enemies, whoever
+these may be, to execute, amid the confusion of a general hubbub,
+whatever designs they may have against your personal safety.
+Black-fishers, poachers, and smugglers are a sort of gentry that will
+not be much checked, either by your Quaker’s texts, or by your chivalry.
+If you are Don Quixote enough to lay lance in rest, in defence of those
+of the stake-net, and of the sad-coloured garment, I pronounce you but
+a lost knight; for, as I said before, I doubt if these potent redressers
+of wrongs, the justices and constables, will hold themselves warranted
+to interfere. In a word, return, my dear Amadis; the adventure of the
+Solway-nets is not reserved for your worship. Come back, and I will be
+your faithful Sancho Panza upon a more hopeful quest. We will beat
+about together, in search of this Urganda, the Unknown She of the Green
+Mantle, who can read this, the riddle of thy fate, better than wise
+Eppie of Buckhaven, [Well known in the Chap-Book, called the History of
+Buckhaven.] or Cassandra herself.
+
+I would fain trifle, Darsie; for, in debating with you, jests will
+sometimes go farther than arguments; but I am sick at heart and cannot
+keep the ball up. If you have a moment’s regard for the friendship we
+have so often vowed to each other, let my wishes for once prevail over
+your own venturous and romantic temper. I am quite serious in thinking
+that the information communicated to my father by this Mr. Herries, and
+the admonitory letter of the young lady, bear upon each other; and that,
+were you here, you might learn something from one or other, or from
+both, that; might throw light on your birth and parentage. You will not,
+surely, prefer an idle whim to the prospect which is thus held out to
+you?
+
+I would, agreeably to the hint I have received in the young lady’s
+letter (for I am confident that such is her condition), have ere now
+been with you to urge these things, instead of pouring them out upon
+paper. But you know that the day for my trials is appointed; I have
+already gone through the form of being introduced to the examinators,
+and have gotten my titles assigned me. All this should not keep me at
+home, but my father would view any irregularity upon this occasion as a
+mortal blow to the hopes which he has cherished most fondly during his
+life; viz. my being called to the bar with some credit. For my own
+part, I know there is no great difficulty in passing these formal
+examinations, else how have some of our acquaintance got through them?
+But, to my father, these formalities compose an august and serious
+solemnity, to which he has long looked forward, and my absenting myself
+at this moment would wellnigh drive him distracted. Yet I shall go
+altogether distracted myself, if I have not an instant assurance from
+you that you are hastening hither. Meanwhile I have desired Hannah to
+get your little crib into the best order possible. I cannot learn
+that my father has yet written to you; nor has he spoken more of his
+communication with Birrenswork; but when I let him have some inkling
+of the dangers you are at present incurring, I know my request that you
+will return immediately will have his cordial support.
+
+Another reason yet--I must give a dinner, as usual, upon my admission,
+to our friends; and my father, laying aside all his usual considerations
+of economy, has desired it may be in the best style possible.
+Come hither then, dear Darsie! or, I protest to you, I shall send
+examination, admission-dinner, and guests to the devil, and come, in
+person, to fetch you with a vengeance. Thine, in much anxiety, A. F.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IX
+
+ALEXANDER FAIRFORD, W.S., TO MR. DARSIE LATIMER
+
+DEAR MR. DARSIE,
+
+Having been your FACTOR LOCO TUTORIS or rather, I ought to say, in
+correctness (since I acted without warrant from the court), your
+NEGOTIORUM GESTOR, that connexion occasions my present writing. And
+although having rendered an account of my intromissions, which have been
+regularly approved of, not only by yourself (whom I could not prevail
+upon to look at more than the docket and sum total), but also by the
+worthy Mr. Samuel Griffiths of London, being the hand through whom the
+remittances were made, I may, in some sense, be considered as to you
+FUNCTUS OFFICIO; yet to speak facetiously, I trust you will not hold me
+accountable as a vicious intromitter, should I still consider myself as
+occasionally interested in your welfare. My motives for writing, at this
+time, are twofold.
+
+I have met with a Mr. Herries of Birrenswork, a gentleman of very
+ancient descent, but who hath in time past been in difficulties, nor
+do I know if his affairs are yet well redd. Birrenswork says that he
+believes he was very familiar with your father, whom he states to have
+been called Ralph Latimer of Langcote Hall, in Westmoreland; and he
+mentioned family affairs, which it may be of the highest importance to
+you to be acquainted with; but as he seemed to decline communicating
+them to me, I could not civilly urge him thereanent. Thus much I know,
+that Mr. Herries had his own share in the late desperate and unhappy
+matter of 1745, and was in trouble about it, although that is probably
+now over. Moreover, although he did not profess the Popish religion
+openly, he had an eye that way. And both of these are reasons why I have
+hesitated to recommend him to a youth who maybe hath not altogether so
+well founded his opinions concerning Kirk and State, that they might
+not be changed by some sudden wind of doctrine. For I have observed
+ye, Master Darsie, to be rather tinctured with the old leaven of
+prelacy--this under your leave; and although God forbid that you should
+be in any manner disaffected to the Protestant Hanoverian line, yet ye
+have ever loved to hear the blawing, blazing stories which the Hieland
+gentlemen tell of those troublous times, which, if it were their will,
+they had better pretermit, as tending rather to shame than to honour.
+It is come to me also by a sidewind, as I may say, that you have been
+neighbouring more than was needful among some of the pestilent sect of
+Quakers--a people who own neither priest nor king, nor civil magistrate,
+nor the fabric of our law, and will not depone either IN CIVILIBUS
+or CRIMINALIBUS, be the loss to the lieges what it may. Anent which
+heresies, it were good ye read ‘The Snake in the Grass’ or ‘The Foot
+out of the Snare,’ being both well-approved tracts, touching these
+doctrines.
+
+Now, Mr. Darsie, ye are to judge for yourself whether ye can safely to
+your soul’s weal remain longer among these Papists and Quakers--these
+defections on the right hand, and failings away on the left; and truly
+if you can confidently resist these evil examples of doctrine, I think
+ye may as well tarry in the bounds where ye are, until you see Mr.
+Herries of Birrenswork, who does assuredly know more of your matters
+than I thought had been communicated to any man in Scotland. I would
+fain have precognosced him myself on these affairs, but found him
+unwilling to speak out, as I have partly intimated before.
+
+To call a new cause--I have the pleasure to tell you, that Alan has
+passed his private Scots Law examinations with good approbation--a great
+relief to my mind; especially as worthy Mr. Pest told me in my ear there
+was no fear of ‘the callant’, as he familiarly called him, which gives
+me great heart. His public trials, which are nothing in comparison
+save a mere form, are to take place, by order of the Honourable Dean
+of Faculty, on Wednesday first; and on Friday he puts on the gown, and
+gives a bit chack of dinner to his friends and acquaintances, as is, you
+know, the custom. Your company will be wished for there, Master Darsie,
+by more than him, which I regret to think is impossible to have, as well
+by your engagements, as that our cousin, Peter Fairford, comes from the
+West on purpose, and we have no place to offer him but your chamber
+in the wall. And, to be plain with you, after my use and wont, Master
+Darsie, it may be as well that Alan and you do not meet till he is
+hefted as it were to his new calling. You are a pleasant gentleman, and
+full of daffing, which may well become you, as you have enough (as
+I understand) to uphold your merry humour. If you regard the matter
+wisely, you would perchance consider that a man of substance should have
+a douce and staid demeanour; yet you are so far from growing grave and
+considerate with the increase of your annual income, that the richer
+you become, the merrier I think you grow. But this must be at your own
+pleasure, so far as you are concerned. Alan, however (overpassing my
+small savings), has the world to win; and louping and laughing, as you
+and he were wont to do, would soon make the powder flee out of his wig,
+and the pence out of his pocket. Nevertheless, I trust you will meet
+when you return from your rambles; for there is a time, as the wise man
+sayeth, for gathering, and a time for casting away; it is always the
+part of a man of sense to take the gathering time first. I remain,
+dear sir, your well-wishing friend; and obedient to command, ALEXANDER
+FAIRFORD.
+
+PS.--Alan’s Thesis is upon the title DE PERICULO ET COMMODO REI
+VENDITAE, and is a very pretty piece of Latinity.--Ross House, in our
+neighbourhood, is nearly finished, and is thought to excel Duff House in
+ornature.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER X
+
+DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+The plot thickens, Alan. I have your letter, and also one from your
+father. The last makes it impossible for me to comply with the kind
+request which the former urges. No--I cannot be with you, Alan; and
+that, for the best of all reasons--I cannot and ought not to counteract
+your father’s anxious wishes. I do not take it unkind of him that he
+desires my absence. It is natural that he should wish for his son
+what his son so well deserves--the advantage of a wiser and steadier
+companion than I seem to him. And yet I am sure I have often laboured
+hard enough to acquire that decency of demeanour which can no more be
+suspected of breaking bounds, than an owl of catching a butterfly.
+
+But it was in vain that I have knitted my brows till I had the headache,
+in order to acquire the reputation of a grave, solid, and well-judging
+youth. Your father always has discovered, or thought that he discovered,
+a hare-brained eccentricity lying folded among the wrinkles of my
+forehead, which rendered me a perilous associate for the future
+counsellor and ultimate judge. Well, Corporal Nym’s philosophy must
+be my comfort--‘Things must be as they may.’--I cannot come to your
+father’s house, where he wishes not to see me; and as to your coming
+hither,--by all that is dear to me, I vow that if you are guilty of such
+a piece of reckless folly--not to say undutiful cruelty, considering
+your father’s thoughts and wishes--I will never speak to you again as
+long as I live! I am perfectly serious. And besides, your father, while
+he in a manner prohibits me from returning to Edinburgh, gives me the
+strongest reasons for continuing a little while longer in this country,
+by holding out the hope that I may receive from your old friend, Mr.
+Herries of Birrenswork, some particulars concerning my origin, with
+which that ancient recusant seems to be acquainted.
+
+That gentleman mentioned the name of a family in Westmoreland, with
+which he supposes me connected. My inquiries here after such a family
+have been ineffectual, for the borderers, on either side, know little
+of each other. But I shall doubtless find some English person of whom to
+make inquiries, since the confounded fetterlock clapped on my movements
+by old Griffiths, prevents me repairing to England in person. At
+least, the prospect of obtaining some information is greater here than
+elsewhere; it will be an apology for my making a longer stay in this
+neighbourhood, a line of conduct which seems to have your father’s
+sanction, whose opinion must be sounder than that of your wandering
+damoselle.
+
+If the road were paved with dangers which leads to such a discovery, I
+cannot for a moment hesitate to tread it. But in fact there is no peril
+in the case. If the Tritons of the Solway shall proceed to pull down
+honest Joshua’s tide-nets, I am neither Quixote enough in disposition,
+nor Goliath enough in person, to attempt their protection. I have no
+idea of attempting to prop a falling house by putting my shoulders
+against it. And indeed, Joshua gave me a hint that the company which he
+belongs to, injured in the way threatened (some of them being men who
+thought after the fashion of the world), would pursue the rioters
+at law, and recover damages, in which probably his own ideas of
+non-resistance will not prevent his participating. Therefore the whole
+affair will take its course as law will, as I only mean to interfere
+when it may be necessary to direct the course of the plaintiffs to
+thy chambers; and I request they may find thee intimate with all the
+Scottish statutes concerning salmon fisheries, from the LEX AQUARUM,
+downward.
+
+As for the Lady of the Mantle, I will lay a wager that the sun so
+bedazzled thine eyes on that memorable morning, that everything thou
+didst look upon seemed green; and notwithstanding James Wilkinson’s
+experience in the Fusileers, as well as his negative whistle, I will
+venture to hold a crown that she is but a what-shall-call-’um after all.
+Let not even the gold persuade you to the contrary. She may make a shift
+to cause you to disgorge that, and (immense spoil!) a session’s fees
+to boot, if you look not all the sharper about you. Or if it should be
+otherwise, and if indeed there lurk some mystery under this visitation,
+credit me, it is one which thou canst not penetrate, nor can I as yet
+even attempt to explain it; since, if I prove mistaken, and mistaken I
+may easily be, I would be fain to creep into Phalaris’s bull, were
+it standing before me ready heated, rather than be roasted with thy
+raillery. Do not tax me with want of confidence; for the instant I can
+throw any light on the matter thou shalt have it; but while I am only
+blundering about in the dark, I do not choose to call wise folks to see
+me, perchance, break my nose against a post. So if you marvel at this,
+
+  E’en marvel on till time makes all things plain.
+
+In the meantime, kind Alan, let me proceed in my diurnal.
+
+On the third or fourth day after my arrival at Mount Sharon, Time, that
+bald sexton to whom I have just referred you, did certainly limp more
+heavily along with me than he had done at first. The quaint morality
+of Joshua, and Huguenot simplicity of his sister, began to lose much of
+their raciness with their novelty, and my mode of life, by dint of being
+very quiet, began to feel abominably dull. It was, as thou say’st, as
+if the Quakers had put the sun in their pockets--all around was soft
+and mild, and even pleasant; but there was, in the whole routine, a
+uniformity, a want of interest, a helpless and hopeless languor, which
+rendered life insipid. No doubt, my worthy host and hostess felt none
+of this void, this want of excitation, which was becoming oppressive to
+their guest. They had their little round of occupations, charities, and
+pleasures; Rachel had her poultry-yard and conservatory, and Joshua
+his garden. Besides this, they enjoyed, doubtless, their devotional
+meditations; and, on the whole, time glided softly and imperceptibly
+on with them, though to me, who long for stream and cataract, it seemed
+absolutely to stand still. I meditated returning to Shepherd’s Bush, and
+began to think, with some hankering, after little Benjie and the rod.
+The imp has ventured hither, and hovers about to catch a peep of me
+now and then; I suppose the little sharper is angling for a few more
+sixpences. But this would have been, in Joshua’s eyes, a return of the
+washed sow to wallowing in the mire, and I resolved, while I remained
+his guest, to spare him so violent a shock to his prejudices. The next
+point was, to shorten the time of my proposed stay; but, alas! that I
+felt to be equally impossible. I had named a week; and however rashly my
+promise had been pledged, it must be held sacred, even according to the
+letter, from which the Friends permit no deviation.
+
+All these considerations wrought me up to a kind of impatience yesterday
+evening; so that I snatched up my hat, and prepared for a sally beyond
+the cultivated farm and ornamented grounds of Mount Sharon, just as if
+I were desirous to escape from the realms of art, into those of free and
+unconstrained nature.
+
+I was scarcely more delighted when I first entered this peaceful
+demesne, than I now was--such is the instability and inconsistency
+of human nature!--when I escaped from it to the open downs, which had
+formerly seemed so waste and dreary, The air I breathed felt purer and
+more bracing. The clouds, riding high upon a summer breeze, drove, in
+gay succession, over my head, now obscuring the sun, now letting its
+rays stream in transient flashes upon various parts of the landscape,
+and especially upon the broad mirror of the distant Firth of Solway.
+
+I advanced on the scene with the light step of a liberated captive; and,
+like John Bunyan’s Pilgrim, could have found in my heart to sing as
+I went on my way. It seemed as if my gaiety had accumulated while
+suppressed, and that I was, in my present joyous mood, entitled to
+expend the savings of the previous week. But just as I was about to
+uplift a merry stave, I heard, to my joyful surprise, the voices of
+three or more choristers, singing, with considerable success, the lively
+old catch,
+
+  For all our men were very very merry,
+    And all our men were drinking:
+    There were two men of mine,
+    Three men of thine,
+  And three that belonged to old Sir Thom o’ Lyne;
+  As they went to the ferry, they were very very merry,
+    And all our men were drinking.’
+
+[The original of this catch is to be found in Cowley’s witty comedy of
+THE GUARDIAN, the first edition. It does not exist in the second and
+revised edition, called THE CUTTER OF COLEMAN STREET.
+
+  CAPTAIN BLADE.  Ha, ha, boys, another catch.
+             AND ALL OUR MEN ARE VERY VERY MERRY,
+             AND ALL OUR MEN WERE DRINKING.
+  CUTTER.    ONE MAN OF MINE.
+  DOGREL.    TWO MEN OF MINE.
+  BLADE.     THREE MEN OF MINE.
+  CUTTER.    AND ONE MAN OF MINE.
+  OMNES.     AS WE WENT BY THE WAY WE WERE DRUNK, DRUNK, DAMNABLY
+             DRUNK, AND ALL OUR MEN WERE VERY VERY MERRY, &c.
+
+Such are the words, which are somewhat altered and amplified in the
+text. The play was acted in presence of Charles II, then Prince of
+Wales, in 1641. The catch in the text has been happily set to music.]
+
+As the chorus ended, there followed a loud and hearty laugh by way
+of cheers. Attracted by sounds which were so congenial to my present
+feelings, I made towards the spot from which they came,--cautiously,
+however, for the downs, as had been repeatedly hinted to me, had no good
+name; and the attraction of the music, without rivalling that of the
+sirens in melody, might have been followed by similarly inconvenient
+consequences to an incautious amateur.
+
+I crept on, therefore, trusting that the sinuosities of the ground,
+broken as it was into knells and sand-pits, would permit me to obtain
+a sight of the musicians before I should be observed by them. As I
+advanced, the old ditty was again raised. The voices seemed those of a
+man and two boys; they were rough, but kept good time, and were managed
+with too much skill to belong to the ordinary country people.
+
+  Jack looked at the sun, and cried, Fire, fire, fire;
+  Tom stabled his keffel in Birkendale mire;
+  Jem started a calf, and halloo’d for a stag;
+  Will mounted a gate-post instead of his nag:
+  For all our men were very very merry,
+    And all our men were drinking;
+      There were two men of mine,
+      Three men of thine,
+  And three that belonged to old Sir Thom o’ Lyne;
+  As they went to the ferry, they were very very merry,
+    For all our men were drinking.
+
+The voices, as they mixed in their several parts, and ran through them,
+untwisting and again entwining all the links of the merry old catch,
+seemed to have a little touch of the bacchanalian spirit which they
+celebrated, and showed plainly that the musicians were engaged in the
+same joyous revel as the MENYIE of old Sir Thom o’ Lyne. At length I
+came within sight of them, three in number, where they sat cosily niched
+into what you might call a BUNKER, a little sand-pit, dry and snug, and
+surrounded by its banks, and a screen of whins in full bloom.
+
+The only one of the trio whom I recognized as a personal acquaintance
+was the notorious little Benjie, who, having just finished his stave,
+was cramming a huge luncheon of pie-crust into his mouth with one hand,
+while in the other he held a foaming tankard, his eyes dancing with all
+the glee of a forbidden revel; and his features, which have at all times
+a mischievous archness of expression, confessing the full sweetness of
+stolen waters, and bread eaten in secret.
+
+There was no mistaking the profession of the male and female, who were
+partners with Benjie in these merry doings. The man’s long loose-bodied
+greatcoat (wrap-rascal as the vulgar term it), the fiddle-case, with its
+straps, which lay beside him, and a small knapsack which might contain
+his few necessaries; a clear grey eye; features which, in contending
+with many a storm, had not lost a wild and, careless expression of glee,
+animated at present, when he was exercising for his own pleasure the
+arts which he usually practised for bread,--all announced one of those
+peripatetic followers of Orpheus whom the vulgar call a strolling
+fiddler. Gazing more attentively, I easily discovered that though the
+poor musician’s eyes were open, their sense was shut, and that the
+ecstasy with which he turned them up to heaven only derived its apparent
+expression from his own internal emotions, but received no assistance
+from the visible objects around. Beside him sat his female companion, in
+a man’s hat, a blue coat, which seemed also to have been an article of
+male apparel, and a red petticoat. She was cleaner, in person and in
+clothes, than such itinerants generally are; and, having been in her day
+a strapping BONA ROBA, she did not even yet neglect some attention to
+her appearance; wore a large amber necklace, and silver ear-rings, and
+had her laid fastened across her breast with a brooch of the same metal.
+
+The man also looked clean, notwithstanding the meanness of his attire,
+and had a decent silk handkerchief well knotted about his throat, under
+which peeped a clean owerlay. His beard, also, instead of displaying a
+grizzly stubble, unmowed for several days, flowed in thick and comely
+abundance over the breast, to the length of six inches, and mingled with
+his hair, which was but beginning to exhibit a touch of age. To sum up
+his appearance, the loose garment which I have described was secured
+around him by a large old-fashioned belt, with brass studs, in
+which hung a dirk, with a knife and fork, its usual accompaniments.
+Altogether, there was something more wild and adventurous-looking about
+the man than I could have expected to see in an ordinary modern crowder;
+and the bow which he now and then drew across the violin, to direct his
+little choir, was decidedly that of no ordinary performer.
+
+You must understand that many of these observations were the fruits of
+after remark; for I had scarce approached so near as to get a distinct
+view of the party, when my friend Benjie’s lurching attendant, which he
+calls by the appropriate name of Hemp, began to cock his tail and ears,
+and, sensible of my presence, flew, barking like a fury, to the place
+where I had meant to lie concealed till I heard another song. I was
+obliged, however, to jump on my feet, and intimidate Hemp, who would
+otherwise have bit me, by two sound kicks on the ribs, which sent him
+howling back to his master.
+
+Little Benjie seemed somewhat dismayed at my appearance; but,
+calculating on my placability, and remembering, perhaps, that the
+ill-used Solomon was no palfrey of mine, he speedily affected great
+glee, and almost in one breath assured the itinerants that I was ‘a
+grand gentleman, and had plenty of money, and was very kind to poor
+folk;’ and informed me that this was ‘Willie Steenson--Wandering Willie
+the best fiddler that ever kittled thairm with horse-hair.’
+
+The woman rose and curtsied; and Wandering Willie sanctioned his own
+praises with a nod, and the ejaculation, ‘All is true that the little
+boy says.’
+
+I asked him if he was of this country.
+
+‘THIS country!’ replied the blind man--‘I am of every country in broad
+Scotland, and a wee bit of England to the boot. But yet I am, in some
+sense, of this country; for I was born within hearing of the roar of
+Solway. Will I give your honour a touch of the auld bread-winner?’
+
+He preluded as he spoke, in a manner which really excited my curiosity;
+and then, taking the old tune of Galashiels for his theme, he graced
+it with a number of wild, complicated, and beautiful variations; during
+which it was wonderful to observe how his sightless face was lighted up
+under the conscious pride and heartfelt delight in the exercise of his
+own very considerable powers.
+
+‘What think you of that, now, for threescore and twa?’
+
+I expressed my surprise and pleasure.
+
+‘A rant, man--an auld rant,’ said Willie; ‘naething like the music ye
+hae in your ballhouses and your playhouses in Edinbro’; but it’s weel
+aneugh anes in a way at a dykeside. Here’s another--it’s no a Scotch
+tune, but it passes for ane--Oswald made it himsell, I reckon--he has
+cheated mony ane, but he canna cheat Wandering Willie.’
+
+He then played your favourite air of Roslin Castle, with a number of
+beautiful variations, some of which I am certain were almost extempore.
+
+‘You have another fiddle there, my friend,’ said I--‘Have you a
+comrade?’ But Willie’s ears were deaf, or his attention was still busied
+with the tune.
+
+The female replied in his stead, ‘O aye, sir--troth we have a partner--a
+gangrel body like oursells. No but my hinny might have been better if he
+had liked; for mony a bein nook in mony a braw house has been offered to
+my hinny Willie, if he wad but just bide still and play to the gentles.’
+
+‘Whisht, woman! whisht!’ said the blind man, angrily, shaking his locks;
+‘dinna deave the gentleman wi’ your havers. Stay in a house and play to
+the gentles!--strike up when my leddy pleases, and lay down the bow when
+my lord bids! Na, na, that’s nae life for Willie. Look out, Maggie--peer
+out, woman, and see if ye can see Robin coming. Deil be in him! He has
+got to the lee-side of some smuggler’s punch-bowl, and he wunna budge
+the night, I doubt.’
+
+‘That is your consort’s instrument,’ said I--’ Will you give me leave
+to try my skill?’ I slipped at the same time a shilling into the woman’s
+hand.
+
+‘I dinna ken whether I dare trust Robin’s fiddle to ye,’ said Willie,
+bluntly. His wife gave him a twitch. ‘Hout awa, Maggie,’ he said in
+contempt of the hint; ‘though the gentleman may hae gien ye siller, he
+may have nae bowhand for a’ that, and I’ll no trust Robin’s fiddle wi’
+an ignoramus. But that’s no sae muckle amiss,’ he added, as I began to
+touch the instrument; ‘I am thinking ye have some skill o’ the craft.’
+
+To confirm him in this favourable opinion, I began to execute such
+a complicated flourish as I thought must have turned Crowdero into
+a pillar of stone with envy and wonder. I scaled the top of the
+finger-board, to dive at once to the bottom--skipped with flying
+fingers, like Timotheus, from shift to shift--struck arpeggios and
+harmonic tones, but without exciting any of the astonishment which I had
+expected.
+
+Willie indeed listened to me with considerable attention; but I was no
+sooner finished, than he immediately mimicked on his own instrument
+the fantastic complication of tones which I had produced, and made so
+whimsical a parody of my performance, that, although somewhat angry, I
+could not help laughing heartily, in which I was joined by Benjie,
+whose reverence for me held him under no restraint; while the poor dame,
+fearful, doubtless, of my taking offence at this familiarity, seemed
+divided betwixt her conjugal reverence for her Willie, and her desire to
+give him a hint for his guidance.
+
+At length the old man stopped of his own accord, and, as if he had
+sufficiently rebuked me by his mimicry, he said, ‘But for a’ that, ye
+will play very weel wi’ a little practice and some gude teaching. But ye
+maun learn to put the heart into it, man--to put the heart into it.’
+
+I played an air in simpler taste, and received more decided approbation.
+
+‘That’s something like it man. Od, ye are a clever birkie!’
+
+The woman touched his coat again. ‘The gentleman is a gentleman,
+Willie--ye maunna speak that gate to him, hinnie.’
+
+‘The deevil I maunna!’ said Willie; ‘and what for maunna I?--If he was
+ten gentles, he canna draw a bow like me, can he?’
+
+‘Indeed I cannot, my honest friend,’ said I; ‘and if you will go with me
+to a house hard by, I would be glad to have a night with you.’
+
+Here I looked round, and observed Benjie smothering a laugh, which I was
+sure had mischief in it. I seized him suddenly by the ear, and made him
+confess that he was laughing at the thoughts of the reception which a
+fiddler was likely to get from the Quakers at Mount Sharon. I chucked
+him from me, not sorry that his mirth had reminded me in time of what I
+had for the moment forgotten; and invited the itinerant to go with me to
+Shepherd’s Bush, from which I proposed to send word to Mr. Geddes that
+I should not return home that evening. But the minstrel declined this
+invitation also. He was engaged for the night, he said, to a dance in
+the neighbourhood, and vented a round execration on the laziness
+or drunkenness of his comrade, who had not appeared at the place of
+rendezvous.
+
+‘I will go with you instead of him,’ said I, in a sudden whim; ‘and I
+will give you a crown to introduce me as your comrade.’
+
+‘YOU gang instead of Rob the Rambler! My certie, freend, ye are no
+blate!’ answered Wandering Willie, in a tone which announced death to my
+frolic.
+
+But Maggie, whom the offer of the crown had not escaped, began to open
+on that scent with a maundering sort of lecture. ‘Oh Willie! hinny
+Willie, whan will ye learn to be wise? There’s a crown to be win for
+naething but saying ae man’s name instead of anither. And, wae’s me! I
+hae just a shilling of this gentleman’s gieing, and a boddle of my ain;
+and ye wunna, bend your will sae muckle as to take up the siller that’s
+flung at your feet! Ye will die the death of a cadger’s powney, in a
+wreath of drift! and what can I do better than lie doun and die wi’ you?
+for ye winna let me win siller to keep either you or mysell leevin.’
+
+‘Haud your nonsense tongue, woman,’ said Willie, but less absolutely
+than before. ‘Is he a real gentleman, or ane of the player-men?’
+
+‘I’se uphaud him a real gentleman,’ said the woman.
+
+‘I’se uphaud ye ken little of the matter,’ said Willie; ‘let us see haud
+of your hand, neebor, gin ye like.
+
+I gave him my hand. He said to himself, ‘Aye, aye, here are fingers that
+have seen canny service.’ Then running his hand over my hair, my face,
+and my dress, he went on with his soliloquy; ‘Aye, aye, muisted hair,
+braidclaith o’ the best, and seenteen hundred linen on his back, at the
+least o’ it. And how do you think, my braw birkie, that you are to pass
+for a tramping fiddler?’
+
+‘My dress is plain,’ said I,--indeed I had chosen my most ordinary suit,
+out of compliment to my Quaker friends,--‘and I can easily pass for a
+young farmer out upon a frolic. Come, I will double the crown I promised
+you.’
+
+‘Damn your crowns!’ said the disinterested man of music. ‘I would like
+to have a round wi’ you, that’s certain;--but a farmer, and with a hand
+that never held pleugh-stilt or pettle, that will never do. Ye may pass
+for a trades-lad from Dumfries, or a student upon the ramble, or the
+like o’ that. But hark ye, lad; if ye expect to be ranting among the
+queans o’ lasses where ye are gaun, ye will come by the waur, I can tell
+ye; for the fishers are wild chaps, and will bide nae taunts.’
+
+I promised to be civil and cautious; and, to smooth the good woman, I
+slipped the promised piece into her hand. The acute organs of the blind
+man detected this little manoeuvre.
+
+‘Are ye at it again wi’ the siller, ye jaud? I’ll be sworn ye wad rather
+hear ae twalpenny clink against another, than have a spring from Rory
+Dall, [Blind Rorie, a famous musician according to tradition.] if
+he was-coming alive again anes errand. Gang doun the gate to Lucky
+Gregson’s and get the things ye want, and bide there till ele’en hours
+in the morn; and if you see Robin, send him on to me.’
+
+‘Am I no gaun to the ploy, then?’ said Maggie, in a disappointed tone.
+
+‘And what for should ye?’ said her lord and master; ‘to dance a’ night,
+I’se warrant, and no to be fit to walk your tae’s-length the morn, and
+we have ten Scots miles afore us? Na, na. Stable the steed, and pit your
+wife to bed, when there’s night wark to do.’
+
+‘Aweel, aweel, Willie hinnie, ye ken best; but oh, take an unco care o’
+yoursell, and mind ye haena the blessing o’ sight.’
+
+‘Your tongue gars me whiles tire of the blessing of hearing, woman,’
+replied ‘Willie, in answer to this tender exhortation.
+
+But I now put in for my interest. ‘Hollo, good folks, remember that I am
+to send the boy to Mount Sharon, and if you go to the Shepherd’s Bush,
+honest woman, how the deuce am I to guide the blind man where he is
+going? I know little or nothing of the country.’
+
+‘And ye ken mickle less of my hinnie, sir,’ replied Maggie, ‘that
+think he needs ony guiding; he’s the best guide himsell that ye’ll find
+between Criffell and Carlisle. Horse-road and foot-path, parish-road
+and kirk-road, high-road and cross-road, he kens ilka foot of ground in
+Nithsdale.’
+
+‘Aye, ye might have said in braid Scotland, gudewife,’ added the
+fiddler. ‘But gang your ways, Maggie, that’s the first wise word ye hae
+spoke the day. I wish it was dark night, and rain, and wind, for the
+gentleman’s sake, that I might show him there is whiles when ane had
+better want een than have them; for I am as true a guide by darkness as
+by daylight.’
+
+Internally as well pleased that my companion was not put to give me this
+last proof of his skill, I wrote a note with a pencil, desiring Samuel
+to bring my horses at midnight, when I thought my frolic would be
+wellnigh over, to the place to which the bearer should direct him, and I
+sent little Benjie with an apology to the worthy Quakers.
+
+As we parted in different directions, the good woman said, ‘Oh, sir, if
+ye wad but ask Willie to tell ye ane of his tales to shorten the gate!
+He can speak like ony minister frae the pu’pit, and he might have been a
+minister himsell, but’--
+
+‘Haud your tongue, ye fule!’ said Willie,--‘But stay, Meg--gie me
+a kiss, ne maunna part in anger, neither.’--And thus our society
+separated.
+
+[It is certain that in many cases the blind have, by constant exercise
+of their other organs, learned to overcome a defect which one would
+think incapable of being supplied. Every reader must remember the
+celebrated Blind Jack of Knaresborough, who lived by laying out roads.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XI
+
+THE SAME TO THE SAME
+
+You are now to conceive us proceeding in our different directions across
+the bare downs. Yonder flies little Benjie to the northward with Hemp
+scampering at his heels, both running as if for dear life so long as the
+rogue is within sight of his employer, and certain to take the walk very
+easy so soon as he is out of ken. Stepping westward, you see Maggie’s
+tall form and high-crowned hat, relieved by the fluttering of her plaid
+upon the left shoulder, darkening as the distance diminishes her size
+and as the level sunbeams begin to sink upon the sea. She is taking her
+quiet journey to the Shepherd’s Bush.
+
+Then, stoutly striding over the lea, you have a full view of Darsie
+Latimer, with his new acquaintance, Wandering Willie, who, bating that
+he touched the ground now and then with his staff, not in a doubtful
+groping manner, but with the confident air of an experienced pilot,
+heaving the lead when he has the soundings by heart, walks as firmly and
+boldly as if he possessed the eyes of Argus. There they go, each with
+his violin slung at his back, but one of them at least totally ignorant
+whither their course is directed.
+
+And wherefore did you enter so keenly into such a mad frolic? says
+my wise counsellor.--Why, I think, upon the whole, that as a sense of
+loneliness, and a longing for that kindness which is interchanged in
+society, led me to take up my temporary residence at Mount Sharon, the
+monotony of my life there, the quiet simplicity of the conversation of
+the Geddeses, and the uniformity of their amusements and employments,
+wearied out my impatient temper, and prepared me for the first escapade
+which chance might throw in my way.
+
+What would I have given that I could have procured that solemn grave
+visage of thine, to dignify this joke, as it has done full many a one of
+thine own! Thou hast so happy a knack of doing the most foolish things
+in the wisest manner, that thou mightst pass thy extravagances for
+rational actions, even in the eyes of Prudence herself.
+
+From the direction which my guide observed, I began to suspect that the
+dell at Brokenburn was our probable destination; and it became important
+to me to consider whether I could, with propriety, or even perfect
+safety, intrude myself again upon the hospitality of my former host. I
+therefore asked Willie whether we were bound for the laird’s, as folk
+called him.
+
+‘Do ye ken the laird?’ said Willie, interrupting a sonata of Corelli, of
+which he had whistled several bars with great precision.
+
+‘I know the laird a little,’ said I; ‘and therefore I was doubting
+whether I ought to go to his town in disguise.’
+
+‘I should doubt, not a little only, but a great deal, before I took ye
+there, my chap,’ said Wandering Willie; ‘for I am thinking it wad be
+worth little less than broken banes baith to you and me. Na, na,
+chap, we are no ganging to the laird’s, but to a blithe birling at the
+Brokenburn-foot, where there will be mony a braw lad and lass; and
+maybe there may be some of the laird’s folks, for he never comes to sic
+splores himsell. He is all for fowling-piece and salmon-spear, now that
+pike and musket are out of the question.’
+
+‘He has been at soldier, then?’ said I.
+
+‘I’se warrant him a soger,’ answered Willie; ‘but take my advice, and
+speer as little about him as he does about you. Best to let sleeping
+dogs lie. Better say naething about the laird, my man, and tell me
+instead, what sort of a chap ye are that are sae ready to cleik in with
+an auld gaberlunzie fiddler? Maggie says ye’re gentle, but a shilling
+maks a’ the difference that Maggie kens between a gentle and a semple,
+and your crowns wad mak ye a prince of the blood in her een. But I am
+ane that ken full weel that ye may wear good claithes, and have a saft
+hand, and yet that may come of idleness as weel as gentrice.’
+
+I told him my name, with the same addition I had formerly given to
+Mr. Joshua Geddes; that I was a law-student, tired of my studies, and
+rambling about for exercise and amusement.
+
+‘And are ye in the wont of drawing up wi’ a’ the gangrel bodies that
+ye meet on the high-road, or find cowering in a sand-bunker upon the
+links?’ demanded Willie.
+
+‘Oh, no; only with honest folks like yourself, Willie,’ was my reply.
+
+‘Honest folks like me! How do ye ken whether I am honest, or what I am?
+I may be the deevil himsell for what ye ken; for he has power to come
+disguised like an angel of light; and besides he is a prime fiddler. He
+played a sonata to Corelli, ye ken.’
+
+There was something odd in this speech, and the tone in which it was
+said. It seemed as if my companion was not always in his constant mind,
+or that he was willing to try if he could frighten me. I laughed at the
+extravagance of his language, however, and asked him in reply, if he
+was fool enough to believe that the foul fiend would play so silly a
+masquerade.
+
+‘Ye ken little about it--little about it,’ said the old man, shaking his
+head and beard, and knitting his brows, ‘I could tell ye something about
+that.’
+
+What his wife mentioned of his being a tale-teller, as well as
+a musician, now occurred to me; and as you know I like tales of
+superstition, I begged to have a specimen of his talent as we went
+along.
+
+‘It is very true,’ said the blind man, ‘that when I am tired of scraping
+thairm or singing ballants, I whiles mak a tale serve the turn among
+the country bodies; and I have some fearsome anes, that make the auld
+carlines shake on the settle, and the bits o’ bairns skirl on their
+minnies out frae their beds. But this that I am gaun to tell you was
+a thing that befell in our ain house in my father’s time--that is, my
+father was then a hafflins callant; and I tell it to you that it may be
+a lesson to you, that are but a young, thoughtless chap, wha ye draw up
+wi’ on a lonely road; for muckle was the dool and care that came o’t to
+my gudesire.’
+
+He commenced his tale accordingly, in a distinct narrative tone of voice
+which he raised and depressed with considerable skill; at times sinking
+almost into a whisper, and turning his clear but sightless eyeballs upon
+my face, as if it had been possible for him to witness the impression
+which his narrative made upon my features. I will not spare you a
+syllable of it, although it be of the longest; so I make a dash--and
+begin
+
+WANDERING WILLIE’S TALE.
+
+Ye maun have heard of Sir Robert Redgauntlet of that Ilk, who lived in
+these parts before the dear years. The country will lang mind him; and
+our fathers used to draw breath thick if ever they heard him named. He
+was out wi’ the Hielandmen in Montrose’s time; and again he was in the
+hills wi’ Glencairn in the saxteen hundred and fifty-twa; and sae when
+King Charles the Second came in, wha was in sic favour as the Laird of
+Redgauntlet? He was knighted at Lonon court, wi’ the king’s ain sword;
+and being a redhot prelatist, he came down here, rampauging like a lion,
+with commissions of lieutenancy (and of lunacy, for what I ken) to put
+down a’ the Whigs and Covenanters in the country. Wild wark they made of
+it; for the Whigs were as dour as the Cavaliers were fierce, and it was
+which should first tire the other. Redgauntlet was ay for the strong
+hand; and his name is kend as wide in the country as Claverhouse’s or
+Tam Dalyell’s. Glen, nor dargle, nor mountain, nor cave, could hide the
+puir hill-folk when Redgauntlet was out with bugle and bloodhound after
+them, as if they had been sae mony deer. And troth when they fand them,
+they didna mak muckle mair ceremony than a Hielandman wi’ a
+roebuck--it was just, ‘Will ye tak the test?’--if not, ‘Make
+ready--present--fire!’--and there lay the recusant.
+
+Far and wide was Sir Robert hated and feared. Men thought he had a
+direct compact with Satan--that he was proof against steel--and that
+bullets happed aff his buff-coat like hailstanes from a hearth--that
+he had a mear that would turn a hare on the side of Carrifra-gawns [A
+precipitous side of a mountain in Moffatdale.]--and muckle to the same
+purpose, of whilk mair anon. The best blessing they wared on him was,
+‘Deil scowp wi’ Redgauntlet!’ He wasna a bad master to his ain folk,
+though, and was weel aneugh liked by his tenants; and as for the lackies
+and troopers that raid out wi’ him to the persecutions, as the Whigs
+caa’d those killing times, they wad hae drunken themsells blind to his
+health at ony time.
+
+Now you are to ken that my gudesire lived on Redgauntlet’s grund--they
+ca’ the place Primrose Knowe. We had lived on the grund, and under the
+Redgauntlets, since the riding days, and lang before. It was a pleasant
+bit; and I think the air is callerer and fresher there than onywhere
+else in the country. It’s a’ deserted now; and I sat on the broken
+door-cheek three days since, and was glad I couldna see the plight the
+place was in; but that’s a’ wide o’ the mark. There dwelt my gudesire,
+Steenie Steenson, a rambling, rattling chiel’ he had been in his young
+days, and could play weel on the pipes; he was famous at ‘Hoopers and
+Girders’--a’ Cumberland couldna, touch him at ‘Jockie Lattin’--and he
+had the finest finger for the back-lilt between Berwick and Carlisle.
+The like o’ Steenie wasna the sort that they made Whigs o’. And so he
+became a Tory, as they ca’ it, which we now ca’ Jacobites, just out of a
+kind of needcessity, that he might belang to some side or other. He had
+nae ill will to the Whig bodies, and liked little to see the blude rin,
+though, being obliged to follow Sir Robert in hunting and hoisting,
+watching and warding, he saw muckle mischief, and maybe did some, that
+he couldna avoid.
+
+Now Steenie was a kind of favourite with his master, and kend a’ the
+folks about the castle, and was often sent for to play the pipes when
+they were at their merriment. Auld Dougal MacCallum, the butler, that
+had followed Sir Robert through gude and ill, thick and thin, pool and
+stream, was specially fond of the pipes, and ay gae my gudesire his gude
+word wi’ the laird; for Dougal could turn his master round his finger.
+
+Weel, round came the Revolution, and it had like to have broken
+the hearts baith of Dougal and his master. But the change was not
+a’thegether sae great as they feared, and other folk thought for. The
+Whigs made an unco crawing what they wad do with their auld enemies, and
+in special wi’ Sir Robert Redgauntlet. But there were ower mony great
+folks dipped in the same doings, to mak a spick and span new warld. So
+Parliament passed it a’ ower easy; and Sir Robert, bating that he was
+held to hunting foxes instead of Covenanters, remained just the man he
+was. [The caution and moderation of King William III, and his principles
+of unlimited toleration, deprived the Cameronians of the opportunity
+they ardently desired, to retaliate the injuries which they had received
+during the reign of prelacy, and purify the land, as they called it,
+from the pollution of blood. They esteemed the Revolution, therefore,
+only a half measure, which neither comprehended the rebuilding the Kirk
+in its full splendour, nor the revenge of the death of the Saints on
+their persecutors.] His revel was as loud, and his hall as weel
+lighted, as ever it had been, though maybe he lacked the fines of the
+nonconformists, that used to come to stock his larder and cellar; for it
+is certain he began to be keener about the rents than his tenants used
+to find him before, and they behoved to be prompt to the rent-day,
+or else the laird wasna pleased. And he was sic an awsome body, that
+naebody cared to anger him; for the oaths he swore, and the rage that he
+used to get into, and the looks that he put on, made men sometimes think
+him a devil incarnate.
+
+Weel, my gudesire was nae manager--no that he was a very great
+misguider--but he hadna the saving gift, and he got twa terms’ rent in
+arrear. He got the first brash at Whitsunday put ower wi’ fair word
+and piping; but when Martinmas came, there was a summons from the
+grund-officer to come wi’ the rent on a day preceese, or else Steenie
+behoved to flit. Sair wark he had to get the siller; but he was
+weel-freended, and at last he got the haill scraped thegether--a
+thousand merks--the maist of it was from a neighbour they ca’d Laurie
+Lapraik--a sly tod. Laurie had walth o’ gear--could hunt wi’ the hound
+and rin wi’ the hare--and be Whig or Tory, saunt or sinner, as the wind
+stood. He was a professor in this Revolution warld, but he liked an orra
+sough of this warld, and a tune on the pipes weel aneugh at a bytime;
+and abune a’, he thought he had gude security for the siller he lent my
+gudesire ower the stocking at Primrose Knowe.
+
+Away trots my gudesire to Redgauntlet Castle wi’ a heavy purse and a
+light heart, glad to be out of the laird’s danger. Weel, the first thing
+he learned at the castle was, that Sir Robert had fretted himsell into
+a fit of the gout, because he did not appear before twelve’ o’clock. It
+wasna a’thegether for sake of the money, Dougal thought; but because he
+didna like to part wi’ my gudesire aff the grund. Dougal was glad to see
+Steenie, and brought him into the great oak parlour, and there sat
+the laird his leesome lane, excepting that he had beside him a great,
+ill-favoured jackanape, that was a special pet of his; a cankered beast
+it was, and mony an ill-natured trick it played--ill to please it was,
+and easily angered--ran about the haill castle, chattering and yowling,
+and pinching, and biting folk, specially before ill weather, or
+disturbances in the state. Sir Robert caa’d it Major Weir, after the
+warlock that was burnt; [A celebrated wizard, executed at Edinburgh for
+sorcery and other crimes.] and few folk liked either the name or the
+conditions of the creature--they thought there was something in it by
+ordinar--and my gudesire was not just easy in mind when the door shut
+on him, and he saw himself in the room wi’ naebody but the laird, Dougal
+MacCallum, and the major, a thing that hadna chanced to him before.
+
+Sir Robert sat, or, I should say, lay, in a great armed chair, wi’ his
+grand velvet gown, and his feet on a cradle; for he had baith gout and
+gravel, and his face looked as gash and ghastly as Satan’s. Major Weir
+sat opposite to him, in a red laced coat, and the laird’s wig on his
+head; and ay as Sir Robert girned wi’ pain, the jackanape girned too,
+like a sheep’s-head between a pair of tangs--an ill-faur’d, fearsome
+couple they were. The laird’s buff-coat was hung on a pin behind him,
+and his broadsword and his pistols within reach; for he keepit up the
+auld fashion of having the weapons ready, and a horse saddled day and
+night, just as he used to do when he was able to loup on horseback, and
+away after ony of the hill-folk he could get speerings of. Some said it
+was for fear of the Whigs taking vengeance, but I judge it was just his
+auld custom--he wasna, gien to fear onything. The rental-book, wi’
+its black cover and brass clasps, was lying beside him; and a book of
+sculduddry sangs was put betwixt the leaves, to keep it open at the
+place where it bore evidence against the Goodman of Primrose Knowe, as
+behind the hand with his mails and duties. Sir Robert gave my gudesire
+a look, as if he would have withered his heart in his bosom. Ye maun ken
+he had a way of bending his brows, that men saw the visible mark of a
+horseshoe in his forehead, deep dinted, as if it had been stamped there.
+
+‘Are ye come light-handed, ye son of a toom whistle?’ said Sir Robert.
+‘Zounds! if you are’--
+
+My gudesire, with as gude acountenance as he could put on, made a leg,
+and placed the bag of money on the table wi’ a dash, like a man that
+does something clever. The laird drew it to him hastily--‘Is it all
+here, Steenie, man?’
+
+‘Your honour will find it right,’ said my gudesire.
+
+‘Here, Dougal,’ said the laird, ‘gie Steenie a tass of brandy
+downstairs, till I count the siller and write the receipt.’
+
+But they werena weel out of the room, when Sir Robert gied a
+yelloch that garr’d the castle rock. Back ran Dougal--in flew the
+livery-men--yell on yell gied the laird, ilk ane mair awfu’ than the
+ither. My gudesire knew not whether to stand or flee, but he ventured
+back into the parlour, where a’ was gaun hirdy-girdie--naebody to say
+‘come in,’ or ‘gae out.’ Terribly the laird roared for cauld water to
+his feet, and wine to cool his throat; and Hell, hell, hell, and its
+flames, was ay the word in his mouth. They brought him water, and when
+they plunged his swollen feet into the tub, he cried out it was burning;
+and folk say that it DID bubble and sparkle like a seething cauldron. He
+flung the cup at Dougal’s head, and said he had given him blood instead
+of burgundy; and, sure aneugh, the lass washed clotted blood aff the
+carpet; the neist day. The jackanape they caa’d Major Weir, it jibbered
+and cried as if it was mocking its master; my gudesire’s head was like
+to turn--he forgot baith siller and receipt, and downstairs he
+banged; but as he ran, the shrieks came faint and fainter; there was a
+deep-drawn shivering groan, and word gaed through the castle that the
+laird was dead.
+
+Weel, away came my gudesire, wi’ his finger in his mouth, and his best
+hope was that Dougal had seen the money-bag, and heard the laird
+speak of writing the receipt. The young laird, now Sir John, came from
+Edinburgh, to see things put to rights. Sir John and his father never
+gree’d weel. Sir John had been bred an advocate, and afterwards sat in
+the last Scots Parliament and voted for the Union, having gotten, it was
+thought, a rug of the compensations--if his father could have come out
+of his grave, he would have brained him for it on his awn hearthstane.
+Some thought it was easier counting with the auld rough knight than the
+fair-spoken young ane--but mair of that anon.
+
+Dougal MacCallum, poor body, neither grat nor grained, but gaed about
+the house looking like a corpse, but directing, as was his duty, a’
+the order of the grand funeral. Now Dougal looked ay waur and waur when
+night was coming, and was ay the last to gang to his bed, whilk was in
+a little round just opposite the chamber of dais, whilk his master
+occupied while he was living, and where he now lay in state, as they
+caa’d it, weel-a-day! The night before the funeral, Dougal could keep
+his awn counsel nae langer; he came doun with his proud spirit, and
+fairly asked auld Hutcheon to sit in his room with him for an hour. When
+they were in the round, Dougal took ae tass of brandy to himsell, and
+gave another to Hutcheon, and wished him all health and lang life, and
+said that, for himsell, he wasna lang for this world; for that, every
+night since Sir Robert’s death, his silver call had sounded from the
+state chamber, just as it used to do at nights in his lifetime, to call
+Dougal to help to turn him in his bed. Dougal said that being alone
+with the dead on that floor of the tower (for naebody cared to wake Sir
+Robert Redgauntlet like another corpse) he had never daured to answer
+the call, but that now his conscience checked him for neglecting his
+duty; for, ‘though death breaks service,’ said MacCallum, ‘it shall
+never break my service to Sir Robert; and I will answer his next
+whistle, so be you will stand by me, Hutcheon.’
+
+Hutcheon had nae will to the wark, but he had stood by Dougal in battle
+and broil, and he wad not fail him at this pinch; so down the carles
+sat ower a stoup of brandy, and Hutcheon, who was something of a clerk,
+would have read a chapter of the Bible; but Dougal would hear naething
+but a blaud of Davie Lindsay, whilk was the waur preparation.
+
+When midnight came, and the house was quiet as the grave, sure enough
+the silver whistle sounded as sharp and shrill as if Sir Robert was
+blowing it, and up got the twa auld serving-men, and tottered into the
+room where the dead man lay. Hutcheon saw aneugh at the first glance;
+for there were torches in the room, which showed him the foul fiend, in
+his ain shape, sitting on the laird’s coffin! Ower he cowped as if he
+had been dead. He could not tell how lang he lay in a trance at the
+door, but when he gathered himself, he cried on his neighbour, and
+getting nae answer, raised the house, when Dougal was found lying dead
+within twa steps of the bed where his master’s coffin was placed. As for
+the whistle, it was gaen anes and ay; but mony a time was it heard at
+the top of the house on the bartizan, and amang the auld chimneys and
+turrets where the howlets have their nests. Sir John hushed the matter
+up, and the funeral passed over without mair bogle-wark.
+
+But when a’ was ower, and the laird was beginning to settle his affairs,
+every tenant was called up for his arrears, and my gudesire for the full
+sum that stood against him in the rental-book. Weel, away he trots to
+the castle, to tell his story, and there he is introduced to Sir John,
+sitting in his father’s chair, in deep mourning, with weepers and
+hanging cravat, and a small wallring rapier by his side, instead of the
+auld broadsword that had a hundredweight of steel about it, what with
+blade, chape, and basket-hilt. I have heard their communing so often
+tauld ower, that I almost think I was there mysell, though I couldna
+be born at the time. (In fact, Alan, my companion mimicked, with a
+good deal of humour, the flattering, conciliating tone of the tenant’s
+address, and the hypocritical melancholy of the laird’s reply. His
+grandfather, he said, had, while he spoke, his eye fixed on the
+rental-book, as if it were a mastiff-dog that he was afraid would spring
+up and bite him).
+
+‘I wuss ye joy, sir, of the head seat, and the white loaf, and the braid
+lairdship. Your father was a kind man to friends and followers; muckle
+grace to you, Sir John, to fill his shoon--his boots, I suld say, for he
+seldom wore shoon, unless it were muils when he had the gout.’
+
+‘Aye, Steenie,’ quoth the laird, sighing deeply, and putting his
+napkin to his een, ‘his was a sudden call, and he will be missed in the
+country; no time to set his house in order--weel prepared Godward, no
+doubt, which is the root of the matter--but left us behind a tangled
+heap to wind, Steenie.--Hem! hem! We maun go to business, Steenie; much
+to do, and little time to do it in.’
+
+Here he opened the fatal volume. I have heard of a thing they call
+Doomsday Book--I am clear it has been a rental of back-ganging tenants.
+
+‘Stephen,’ said Sir John, still in the same soft, sleekit tone of
+voice--‘Stephen Stevenson, or Steenson, ye are down here for a year’s
+rent behind the hand--due at last term.’
+
+STEPHEN. ‘Please your honour, Sir John, I paid it to your father.’
+
+SIR JOHN. ‘Ye took a receipt, then, doubtless, Stephen; and can produce
+it?’
+
+STEPHEN. ‘Indeed I hadna time, an it like your honour; for nae sooner
+had I set doun the siller, and just as his honour, Sir Robert, that’s
+gaen, drew it till him to count it, and write out the receipt, he was
+ta’en wi’ the pains that removed him.’
+
+‘That was unlucky,’ said Sir John, after a pause. ‘But ye maybe paid
+it in the presence of somebody, I want but a TALIS QUALIS evidence,
+Stephen. I would go ower strictly to work with no poor man.’
+
+STEPHEN. ‘Troth, Sir John, there was naebody in the room but Dougal
+MacCallum the butler. But, as your honour kens, he has e’en followed his
+auld master.
+
+‘Very unlucky again, Stephen,’ said Sir John, without altering his voice
+a single note. ‘The man to whom ye paid the money is dead--and the man
+who witnessed the payment is dead too--and the siller, which should have
+been to the fore, is neither seen nor heard tell of in the repositories.
+How am I to believe a’ this?’
+
+STEPHEN. ‘I dinna, ken, your honour; but there is a bit memorandum
+note of the very coins; for, God help me! I had to borrow out of twenty
+purses; and I am sure that ilka man there set down will take his grit
+oath for what purpose I borrowed the money.’
+
+SIR JOHN. ‘I have little doubt ye BORROWED the money, Steenie. It is the
+PAYMENT to my father that I want to have some proof of.’
+
+STEPHEN. ‘The siller maun be about the house, Sir John. And since your
+honour never got it, and his honour that was canna have taen it wi’ him,
+maybe some of the family may have seen it.’
+
+SIR JOHN. ‘We will examine the servants, Stephen; that is but
+reasonable.’
+
+But lackey and lass, and page and groom, all denied stoutly that they
+had ever seen such a bag of money as my gudesire described. What was
+waur, he had unluckily not mentioned to any living soul of them his
+purpose of paying his rent. Ae quean had noticed something under his
+arm, but she took it for the pipes.
+
+Sir John Redgauntlet ordered the servants out of the room, and then said
+to my gudesire, ‘Now, Steenie, ye see ye have fair play; and, as I have
+little doubt ye ken better where to find the siller than ony other body,
+I beg, in fair terms, and for your own sake, that you will end this
+fasherie; for, Stephen, ye maun pay or flit.’
+
+‘The Lord forgie your opinion,’ said Stephen, driven almost to his wit’s
+end--‘I am an honest man.’
+
+‘So am I, Stephen,’ said his honour; ‘and so are all the folks in the
+house, I hope. But if there be a knave amongst us, it must be he that
+tells the story he cannot prove.’ He paused, and then added, mair
+sternly, ‘If I understand your trick, sir, you want to take advantage
+of some malicious reports concerning things in this family, and
+particularly respecting my father’s sudden death, thereby to cheat me
+out of the money, and perhaps take away my character, by insinuating
+that I have received the rent I am demanding. Where do you suppose this
+money to be? I insist upon knowing.’
+
+My gudesire saw everything look so muckle against him, that he grew
+nearly desperate--however, he shifted from one foot to another, looked
+to every corner of the room, and made no answer.
+
+‘Speak out, sirrah,’ said the laird, assuming a look of his father’s, a
+very particular ane, which he had when he was angry--it seemed as if the
+wrinkles of his frown made that selfsame fearful shape of a horse’s
+shoe in the middle of his brow;--‘Speak out, sir! I WILL know your
+thoughts;--do you suppose that I have this money?’
+
+‘Far be it frae me to say so,’ said Stephen.
+
+‘Do you charge any of my people with having taken it?’
+
+‘I wad be laith to charge them that may be innocent,’ said my gudesire;
+‘and if there be any one that is guilty, I have nae proof.’
+
+‘Somewhere the money must be, if there is a word of truth in your
+story,’ said Sir John; ‘I ask where you think it is--and demand a
+correct answer?’
+
+‘In HELL, if you will have my thoughts of it,’ said my gudesire, driven
+to extremity, ‘in hell! with your father, his jackanape, and his silver
+whistle.’
+
+Down the stairs he ran (for the parlour was nae place for him after such
+a word) and he heard the laird swearing blood and wounds behind him,
+as fast; as ever did Sir Robert, and roaring for the bailie and the
+baron-officer.
+
+Away rode my gudesire to his chief creditor (him they ca’d Laurie
+Lapraik) to try if he could make onything out of him; but when he tauld
+his story, he got but the worst word in his wame--thief, beggar, and
+dyvour, were the saftest terms; and to the boot of these hard terms,
+Laurie brought up the auld story of his dipping his hand in the blood
+of God’s saunts, just as if a tenant could have helped riding with the
+laird, and that a laird like Sir Robert Redgauntlet. My gudesire was, by
+this time, far beyond the bounds of patience, and, while he and
+Laurie were at deil speed the liars, he was wanchancie aneugh to abuse
+Lapraik’s doctrine as weel as the man, ond said things that garr’d
+folks’ flesh grue that heard them;--he wasna just himsell, and he had
+lived wi’ a wild set in his day.
+
+At last they parted, and my gudesire was to ride hame through the wood
+of Pitmurkie, that is a’ fou of black firs, as they say.--I ken the
+wood, but the firs may be black or white for what I can tell.--At the
+entry of the wood there is a wild common, and on the edge of the common,
+a little lonely change-house, that was keepit then by an ostler-wife,
+they suld hae caa’d her Tibbie Faw, and there puir Steenie cried for a
+mutchkin of brandy, for he had had no refreshment the haill day. Tibbie
+was earnest wi’ him to take a bite of meat, but he couldna think o’t,
+nor would he take his foot out of the stirrup, and took off the brandy
+wholely at twa draughts, and named a toast at each:--the first was the
+memory of Sir Robert Redgauntlet, and might he never lie quiet in his
+grave till he had righted his poor bond-tenant; and the second was a
+health to Man’s Enemy, if he would but get him back the pock of siller
+or tell him what came o’t, for he saw the haill world was like to regard
+him as a thief and a cheat, and he took that waur than even the ruin of
+his house and hauld.
+
+On he rode, little caring where. It was a dark night turned, and the
+trees made it yet darker, and he let the beast take its ain road through
+the wood; when all of a sudden, from tired and wearied that it was
+before, the nag began to spring and flee, and stend, that my gudesire
+could hardly keep the saddle. Upon the whilk, a horseman, suddenly
+riding up beside him, said, ‘That’s a mettle beast of yours, freend;
+will you sell him?’ So saying, he touched the horse’s neck with his
+riding-wand, and it fell into its auld heigh-ho of a stumbling trot.
+‘But his spunk’s soon out of him, I think,’ continued the stranger, ‘and
+that is like mony a man’s courage, that thinks he wad do great things
+till he come to the proof.’
+
+My gudesire scarce listened to this, but spurred his horse, with ‘Gude
+e’en to you, freend.’
+
+But it’s like the stranger was ane that doesna lightly yield his point;
+for, ride as Steenie liked, he was ay beside him at the selfsame pace.
+At last my gudesire, Steenie Steenson, grew half angry, and, to say the
+truth, half feared.
+
+‘What is it that ye want with me, freend?’ he said. ‘If ye be a robber,
+I have nae money; if ye be a leal man, wanting company, I have nae heart
+to mirth or speaking; and if ye want to ken the road, I scarce ken it
+mysell.’
+
+‘If you will tell me your grief,’ said the stranger, ‘I am one that,
+though I have been sair miscaa’d in the world, am the only hand for
+helping my freends.’
+
+So my gudesire, to ease his ain heart, mair than from any hope of help,
+told him the story from beginning to end.
+
+‘It’s a hard pinch,’ said the stranger; ‘but I think I can help you.’
+
+‘If you could lend the money, sir, and take a lang day--I ken nae other
+help on earth,’ said my gudesire.
+
+‘But there may be some under the earth,’ said the stranger. ‘Come, I’ll
+be frank wi’ you; I could lend you the money on bond, but you would
+maybe scruple my terms. Now, I can tell you, that your auld laird is
+disturbed in his grave by your curses, and the wailing of your family,
+and if ye daur venture to go to see him, he will give you the receipt.’
+
+My gudesire’s hair stood on end at this proposal, but he thought his
+companion might be some humoursome chield that was trying to frighten
+him, and might end with lending him the money. Besides, he was bauld wi’
+brandy, and desperate wi’ distress; and he said he had courage to go
+to the gate of hell, and a step farther, for that receipt. The stranger
+laughed.
+
+Weel, they rode on through the thickest of the wood, when, all of a
+sudden, the horse stopped at the door of a great house; and, but that he
+knew the place was ten miles off, my father would have thought he was
+at Redgauntlet Castle. They rode into the outer courtyard, through the
+muckle faulding yetts and aneath the auld portcullis; and the whole
+front of the house was lighted, and there were pipes and fiddles, and
+as much dancing and deray within as used to be at Sir Robert’s house at
+Pace and Yule, and such high seasons. They lap off, and my gudesire, as
+seemed to him, fastened his horse to the very ring he had tied him to
+that morning, when he gaed to wait on the young Sir John.
+
+‘God!’ said my gudesire, ‘if Sir Robert’s death be but a dream!’
+
+He knocked at the ha’ door just as he was wont, and his auld
+acquaintance, Dougal MacCallum--just after his wont, too,--came to open
+the door, and said, ‘Piper Steenie, are ye there, lad? Sir Robert has
+been crying for you.’
+
+My gudesire was like a man in a dream--he looked for the stranger, but
+he was gane for the time. At last he just tried to say, ‘Ha! Dougal
+Driveower, are ye living? I thought ye had been dead.’
+
+‘Never fash yoursell wi’ me,’ said Dougal, ‘but look to yoursell; and
+see ye tak naethlng frae ony body here, neither meat, drink, or siller,
+except just the receipt that is your ain.’
+
+So saying, he led the way out through halls and trances that were weel
+kend to my gudesire, and into the auld oak parlour; and there was as
+much singing of profane sangs, and birling of red wine, and speaking
+blasphemy and sculduddry, as had ever been in Redgauntlet Castle when it
+was at the blithest.
+
+But, Lord take us in keeping, what a set of ghastly revellers they were
+that sat around that table! My gudesire kend mony that had long before
+gane to their place, for often had he piped to the most part in the
+hall of Redgauntlet. There was the fierce Middleton, and the dissolute
+Rothes, and the crafty Lauderdale; and Dalyell, with his bald head and
+a beard to his girdle; and Earlshall, with Cameron’s blude on his hand;
+and wild Bonshaw, that tied blessed Mr. Cargill’s limbs till the blude
+sprung; and Dunbarton Douglas, the twice-turned traitor baith to country
+and king. There was the Bluidy Advocate MacKenyie, who, for his worldly
+wit and wisdom had been to the rest as a god. And there was Claverhouse,
+as beautiful as when he lived, with his long, dark, curled locks
+streaming down over his laced buff-coat, and his left hand always on his
+right spule-blade, to hide the wound that the silver bullet had made.
+[See Note 2.] He sat apart from them all, and looked at them with a
+melancholy, haughty countenance; while the rest hallooed, and sang, and
+laughed, that the room rang. But their smiles were fearfully contorted
+from time to time; and their laugh passed into such wild sounds as made
+my gudesire’s very nails grow blue, and chilled the marrow in his banes.
+
+They that waited at the table were just the wicked serving-men and
+troopers, that had done their work and cruel bidding on earth. There
+was the Lang Lad of the Nethertown, that helped to take Argyle; and
+the bishop’s summoner, that they called the Deil’s Rattle-bag; and the
+wicked guardsmen in their laced coats; and the savage Highland Amorites,
+that shed blood like water; and many a proud serving-man, haughty of
+heart and bloody of hand, cringing to the rich, and making them wickeder
+than they would be; grinding the poor to powder, when the rich had
+broken them to fragments. And mony, mony mair were coming and ganging,
+a’ as busy in their vocation as if they had been alive.
+
+Sir Robert Redgauntlet, in the midst of a’ this fearful riot, cried, wi’
+a voice like thunder, on Steenie Piper to come to the board-head where
+he was sitting; his legs stretched out before him, and swathed up with
+flannel, with his holster pistols aside him, while the great broadsword
+rested against his chair, just as my gudesire had seen him the last time
+upon earth--the very cushion for the jackanape was close to him, but the
+creature itself was not there--it wasna its hour, it’s likely; for he
+heard them say as he came forward, ‘Is not the major come yet?’ And
+another answered, ‘The jackanape will be here betimes the morn.’ And
+when my gudesire came forward, Sir Robert, or his ghaist, or the deevil
+in his likeness, said, ‘Weel, piper, hae ye settled wi’ my son for the
+year’s rent?’
+
+With much ado my father gat breath to say that Sir John would not settle
+without his honour’s receipt.
+
+‘Ye shall hae that for a tune of the pipes, Steenie,’ said the
+appearance of Sir Robert--‘Play us up “Weel hoddled, Luckie”.’
+
+Now this was a tune my gudesire learned frae a warlock, that heard it
+when they were worshipping Satan at their meetings, and my gudesire had
+sometimes played it at the ranting suppers in Redgauntlet Castle, but
+never very willingly; and now he grew cauld at the very name of it, and
+said, for excuse, he hadna his pipes wi’ him.
+
+‘MacCallum, ye limb of Beelzebub,’ said the fearfu’ Sir Robert, ‘bring
+Steenie the pipes that I am keeping for him!’
+
+MacCallum brought a pair of pipes might have served the piper of Donald
+of the Isles. But he gave my gudesire a nudge as he offered them; and
+looking secretly and closely, Steenie saw that the chanter was of steel,
+and heated to a white heat; so he had fair warning not to trust his
+fingers with it. So he excused himself again, and said he was faint and
+frightened, and had not wind aneugh to fill the bag.
+
+‘Then ye maun eat and drink, Steenie,’ said the figure; ‘for we
+do little else here; and it’s ill speaking between a fou man and a
+fasting.’
+
+Now these were the very words that the bloody Earl of Douglas said to
+keep the king’s messenger in hand while he cut the head off MacLellan of
+Bombie, at the Threave Castle, [The reader is referred for particulars
+to Pitscottie’s HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.] and that put Steenie mair and mair
+on his guard. So he spoke up like a man, and said he came neither to
+eat, or drink or make minstrelsy; but simply for his ain--to ken what
+was come o’ the money he had paid, and to get a discharge for it; and
+he was so stout-hearted by this time that he charged Sir Robert for
+conscience-sake (he had no power to say the holy name) and as he hoped
+for peace and rest, to spread no snares for him, but just to give him
+his ain.
+
+The appearance gnashed its teeth and laughed, but it took from a large
+pocket-book the receipt, and handed it to Steenie. ‘There is your
+receipt, ye pitiful cur; and for the money, my dog-whelp of a son may go
+look for it in the Cat’s Cradle.’
+
+My gudesire uttered mony thanks, and was about to retire when Sir Robert
+roared aloud, ‘Stop, though, thou sack-doudling son of a whore! I am not
+done with thee. HERE we do nothing for nothing; and you must return on
+this very day twelvemonth, to pay your master the homage that you owe me
+for my protection.’
+
+My father’s tongue was loosed of a suddenty, and he said aloud, ‘I refer
+mysell to God’s pleasure, and not to yours.’
+
+He had no sooner uttered the word than all was dark around him; and he
+sank on the earth with such a sudden shock, that he lost both breath and
+sense.
+
+How lang Steenie lay there, he could not tell; but when he came to
+himsell, he was lying in the auld kirkyard of Redgauntlet parochine just
+at the door of the family aisle, and the scutcheon of the auld knight,
+Sir Robert, hanging over his head. There was a deep morning fog on grass
+and gravestane around him, and his horse was feeding quietly beside the
+minister’s twa cows. Steenie would have thought the whole was a dream,
+but he had the receipt in his hand, fairly written and signed by the
+auld laird; only the last letters of his name were a little disorderly,
+written like one seized with sudden pain.
+
+Sorely troubled in his mind, he left that dreary place, rode through
+the mist to Redgauntlet Castle, and with much ado he got speech of the
+laird.
+
+‘Well, you dyvour bankrupt,’ was the first word, ‘have you brought me my
+rent?’
+
+‘No,’ answered my gudesire, ‘I have not; but I have brought your honour
+Sir Robert’s receipt for it.’
+
+‘Wow, sirrah? Sir Robert’s receipt! You told me he had not given you
+one.’
+
+‘Will your honour please to see if that bit line is right?’
+
+Sir John looked at every line, and at every letter, with much attention;
+and at last, at the date, which my gudesire had not observed,--‘FROM MY
+APPOINTED PLACE,’ he read, ‘THIS TWENTY-FIFTH OF NOVEMBER.’--‘What!
+That is yesterday!--Villain, thou must have gone to hell for this!’
+
+‘I got it from your honour’s father--whether he be in heaven or hell, I
+know not,’ said Steenie.
+
+‘I will delate you for a warlock to the Privy Council!’ said Sir
+John. ‘I will send you to your master, the devil, with the help of a
+tar-barrel and a torch!’
+
+‘I intend to delate mysell to the Presbytery,’ said Steenie, ‘and tell
+them all I have seen last night, whilk are things fitter for them to
+judge of than a borrel man like me.’
+
+Sir John paused, composed himsell, and desired to hear the full history;
+and my gudesire told it him from point to point, as I have told it
+you--word for word, neither more nor less.
+
+Sir John was silent again for a long time, and at last he said, very
+composedly, ‘Steenie, this story of yours concerns the honour of many
+a noble family besides mine; and if it be a leasing-making, to keep
+yourself out of my danger, the least you can expect is to have a redhot
+iron driven through your tongue, and that will be as bad as scauding
+your fingers wi’ a redhot chanter. But yet it may be true, Steenie; and
+if the money cast up I shall not know what to think of it. But where
+shall we find the Cat’s Cradle? There are cats enough about the old
+house, but I think they kitten without the ceremony of bed or cradle.’
+
+‘We were best ask Hutcheon,’ said my gudesire; ‘he kens a’ the odd
+corners about as weel as--another serving-man that is now gane, and that
+I wad not like to name.’
+
+Aweel, Hutcheon, when he was asked, told them, that a ruinous turret,
+lang disused, next to the clock-house, only accessible by a ladder,
+for the opening was on the outside, and far above the battlements, was
+called of old the Cat’s Cradle.
+
+‘There will I go immediately,’ said Sir John; and he took (with what
+purpose, Heaven kens) one of his father’s pistols from the hall-table,
+where they had lain since the night he died, and hastened to the
+battlements.
+
+It was a dangerous place to climb, for the ladder was auld and frail,
+and wanted ane or twa rounds. However, up got Sir John, and entered at
+the turret-door, where his body stopped the only little light that was
+in the bit turret. Something flees at him wi’ a vengeance, maist dang
+him back ower--bang gaed the knight’s pistol, and Hutcheon, that
+held the ladder, and my gudesire that stood beside him, hears a loud
+skelloch. A minute after, Sir John flings the body of the jackanape down
+to them, and cries that the siller is fund, and that they should come up
+and help him. And there was the bag of siller sure aneugh, and mony orra
+thing besides, that had been missing for mony a day. And Sir John, when
+he had riped the turret weel, led my gudesire into the dining-parlour,
+and took him by the hand and spoke kindly to him, and said he was sorry
+he should have doubted his word and that he would hereafter be a good
+master to him to make amends.
+
+‘And now, Steenie,’ said Sir John, ‘although this vision of yours tend,
+on the whole, to my father’s credit, as an honest man, that he should,
+even after his death, desire to see justice done to a poor man like
+you, yet you are sensible that ill-dispositioned men might make bad
+constructions upon it, concerning his soul’s health. So, I think, we had
+better lay the haill dirdum on that ill-deedie creature, Major Weir, and
+say naething about your dream in the wood of Pitmurkie. You had taken
+ower muckle brandy to be very certain about onything; and, Steenie, this
+receipt’ (his hand shook while he held it out),--‘it’s but a queer kind
+of document, and we will do best, I think, to put it quietly in the
+fire.’
+
+‘Od, but for as queer as it is, it’s a’ the voucher I have for my rent,’
+said my gudesire, who was afraid, it may be, of losing the benefit of
+Sir Robert’s discharge.
+
+‘I will bear the contents to your credit in the rental-book, and give
+you a discharge under my own hand,’ said Sir John, ‘and that on the
+spot. And, Steenie, if you can hold your tongue about this matter, you
+shall sit, from this term downward, at an easier rent.’
+
+‘Mony thanks to your honour,’ said Steenie, who saw easily in what
+corner the wind was; ‘doubtless I will be comformable to all your
+honour’s commands; only I would willingly speak wi’ some powerful
+minister on the subject, for I do not like the sort of sommons of
+appointment whilk your honour’s father’--
+
+‘Do not call the phantom my father!’ said Sir John, interrupting him.
+
+‘Weel, then, the thing that was so like him,’ said my gudesire; ‘he
+spoke of my coming back to see him this time twelvemonth, and it’s a
+weight on my conscience.’
+
+‘Aweel, then,’ said Sir John, ‘if you be so much distressed in mind, you
+may speak to our minister of the parish; he is a douce man, regards the
+honour of our family, and the mair that he may look for some patronage
+from me.’
+
+Wi’ that, my father readily agreed that the receipt should be burnt, and
+the laird threw it into the chimney with his ain hand. Burn it would
+not for them, though; but away it flew up the lum, wi’ a lang train of
+sparks at its tail, and a hissing noise like a squib.
+
+My gudesire gaed down to the Manse, and the minister, when he had heard
+the story, said it was his real opinion that though my gudesire had gaen
+very far in tampering with dangerous matters, yet, as he had refused the
+devil’s arles (for such was the offer of meat and drink) and had refused
+to do homage by piping at his bidding, he hoped, that if he held a
+circumspect walk hereafter, Satan could take little advantage by what
+was come and gane. And, indeed, my gudesire, of his ain accord, lang
+foreswore baith the pipes and the brandy--it was not even till the
+year was out, and the fatal day past, that he would so much as take the
+fiddle, or drink usquebaugh or tippeny.
+
+Sir John made up his story about the jackanape as he liked himsell;
+and some believe till this day there was no more in the matter than the
+filching nature of the brute. Indeed, ye’ll no hinder some to threap
+that it was nane o’ the auld Enemy that Dougal and my gudesire saw in
+the laird’s room, but only that wanchancy creature, the major, capering
+on the coffin; and that, as to the blawing on the laird’s whistle that
+was heard after he was dead, the filthy brute could do that as weel as
+the laird himsell, if no better. But Heaven kens the truth, whilk first
+came out by the minister’s wife, after Sir John and her ain gudeman were
+baith in the moulds. And then my gudesire, wha was failed in his limbs,
+but not in his judgement or memory--at least nothing to speak of--was
+obliged to tell the real narrative to his friends, for the credit of his
+good name. He might else have been charged for a warlock. [See Note 3.]
+
+The shades of evening were growing thicker around us as my conductor
+finished his long narrative with this moral--‘Ye see, birkie, it is nae
+chancy thing to tak a stranger traveller for a guide, when you are in an
+uncouth land.’
+
+‘I should not have made that inference,’ said I. ‘Your grandfather’s
+adventure was fortunate for himself, whom it saved from ruin and
+distress; and fortunate for his landlord also, whom it prevented from
+committing a gross act of injustice.’
+
+‘Aye, but they had baith to sup the sauce o’t sooner or later,’ said
+Wandering Willie--‘what was fristed wasna forgiven. Sir John died
+before he was much over three-score; and it was just like of a moment’s
+illness. And for my gudesire, though he departed in fullness of life,
+yet there was my father, a yauld man of forty-five, fell down betwixt
+the stilts of his pleugh, and rase never again, and left nae bairn but
+me, a puir sightless, fatherless, motherless creature, could neither
+work nor want. Things gaed weel aneugh at first; for Sir Redwald
+Redgauntlet, the only son of Sir John, and the oye of auld Sir Robert,
+and, waes me! the last of the honourable house, took the farm aff our
+hands, and brought me into his household to have care of me. He liked
+music, and I had the best teachers baith England and Scotland could gie
+me. Mony a merry year was I wi’ him; but waes me! he gaed out with other
+pretty men in the Forty-five--I’ll say nae mair about it--My head never
+settled weel since I lost him; and if I say another word about it, deil
+a bar will I have the heart to play the night.--Look out, my gentle
+chap,’ he resumed in a different tone, ‘ye should see the lights at
+Brokenburn glen by this time.’
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XII
+
+THE SAME TO THE SAME
+
+  Tam Luter was their minstrel meet,
+    Gude Lord as he could lance,
+  He play’d sae shrill, and sang sae sweet,
+    Till Towsie took a trance.
+  Auld Lightfoot there he did forleet,
+    And counterfeited France;
+  He used himself as man discreet,
+    And up took Morrice danse sae loud,
+  At Christ’s Kirk on the Green that day.
+                                     KING JAMES I.
+
+I continue to scribble at length, though the subject may seem somewhat
+deficient in interest. Let the grace of the narrative, therefore,
+and the concern we take in each other’s matters, make amends for its
+tenuity. We fools of fancy who suffer ourselves, like Malvolio, to be
+cheated with our own visions, have, nevertheless, this advantage over
+the wise ones of the earth, that we have our whole stock of enjoyments
+under our own command, and can dish for ourselves an intellectual
+banquet with most moderate assistance from external objects. It is,
+to be sure, something like the feast which the Barmecide served up to
+Alnaschar; and we cannot expect to get fat upon such diet. But then,
+neither is there repletion nor nausea, which often succeed the grosser
+and more material revel. On the whole, I still pray, with the Ode to
+Castle Building--
+
+  Give me thy hope which sickens not the heart;
+    Give me thy wealth which has no wings to fly;
+  Give me the bliss thy visions can impart:
+    Thy friendship give me, warm in poverty!
+
+And so, despite thy solemn smile and sapient shake of the head, I will
+go on picking such interest as I can out of my trivial adventures, even
+though that interest should be the creation of my own fancy; nor will I
+cease to indict on thy devoted eyes the labour of perusing the scrolls
+in which I shall record my narrative.
+
+My last broke off as we were on the point of descending into the glen
+at Brokenburn, by the dangerous track which I had first travelled EN
+CROUPE, behind a furious horseman, and was now again to brave under the
+precarious guidance of a blind man.
+
+It was now getting dark; but this was no inconvenience to my guide, who
+moved on, as formerly, with instinctive security of step, so that we
+soon reached the bottom, and I could see lights twinkling in the cottage
+which had been my place of refuge on a former occasion. It was not
+thither, however, that our course was directed. We left the habitation
+of the laird to the left, and turning down the brook, soon approached
+the small hamlet which had been erected at the mouth of the stream,
+probably on account of the convenience which it afforded as a harbour
+to the fishing-boats. A large, low cottage, full in our front, seemed
+highly illuminated; for the light not only glanced from every window
+and aperture in its frail walls, but was even visible from rents and
+fractures in the roof, composed of tarred shingles, repaired in part by
+thatch and divot.
+
+While these appearances engaged my attention, that of my companion was
+attracted by a regular succession of sounds, like a bouncing on the
+floor, mixed with a very faint noise of music, which Willie’s acute
+organs at once recognized and accounted for, while to me it was almost
+inaudible. The old man struck the earth with his staff in a violent
+passion. ‘The whoreson fisher rabble! They have brought another violer
+upon my walk! They are such smuggling blackguards, that they must run
+in their very music; but I’ll sort them waur than ony gauger in the
+country.--Stay--hark--it ‘s no a fiddle neither--it’s the pipe and tabor
+bastard, Simon of Sowport, frae the Nicol Forest; but I’ll pipe and
+tabor him!--Let me hae ance my left hand on his cravat, and ye shall see
+what my right will do. Come away, chap--come away, gentle chap--nae time
+to be picking and waling your steps.’ And on he passed with long and
+determined strides, dragging me along with him.
+
+I was not quite easy in his company; for, now that his minstrel pride
+was hurt, the man had changed from the quiet, decorous, I might almost
+say respectable person, which he seemed while he told his tale, into the
+appearance of a fierce, brawling, dissolute stroller. So that when he
+entered the large hut, where a great number of fishers, with their wives
+and daughters, were engaged in eating, drinking, and dancing, I was
+somewhat afraid that the impatient violence of my companion might
+procure us an indifferent reception.
+
+But the universal shout of welcome with which Wandering Willie was
+received--the hearty congratulations--the repeated ‘Here’s t’ ye,
+Willie!’--‘Where hae ya been, ye blind deevil?’ and the call upon him
+to pledge them--above all, the speed with which the obnoxious pipe and
+tabor were put to silence, gave the old man such effectual assurance of
+undiminished popularity and importance, as at once put his jealousy to
+rest, and changed his tone of offended dignity into one better fitted
+to receive such cordial greetings. Young men and women crowded round, to
+tell how much they were afraid some mischance had detained him, and how
+two or three young fellows had set out in quest of him.
+
+‘It was nae mischance, praised be Heaven,’ said Willie, ‘but the absence
+of the lazy loon Rob the Rambler, my comrade, that didna come to meet
+me on the Links; but I hae gotten a braw consort in his stead, worth a
+dozen of him, the unhanged blackguard.’
+
+‘And wha is’t tou’s gotten, Wullie, lad?’ said half a score of voices,
+while all eyes were turned on your humble servant, who kept the best
+countenance he could, though not quite easy at becoming the centre to
+which all eyes were pointed.
+
+‘I ken him by his hemmed cravat,’ said one fellow; ‘it’s Gil Hobson, the
+souple tailor frae Burgh. Ye are welcome to Scotland, ye prick-the-clout
+loon,’ he said, thrusting forth a paw; much the colour of a badger’s
+back, and of most portentous dimensions.
+
+‘Gil Hobson? Gil whoreson!’ exclaimed Wandering Willie; ‘it’s a gentle
+chap that I judge to be an apprentice wi’ auld Joshua Geddes, to the
+quaker-trade.’
+
+‘What trade be’s that, man?’ said he of the badger-coloured fist.
+
+‘Canting and lying,’--said Willie, which produced a thundering laugh;
+‘but I am teaching the callant a better trade, and that is, feasting and
+fiddling.’
+
+Willie’s conduct in thus announcing something like my real character,
+was contrary to compact; and yet I was rather glad he did so, for the
+consequence of putting a trick upon these rude and ferocious men, might,
+in case of discovery, have been dangerous to us both, and I was at the
+same time delivered from the painful effort to support a fictitious
+character. The good company, except perhaps one or two of the young
+women whose looks expressed some desire for better acquaintance, gave
+themselves no further trouble about me; but, while the seniors resumed
+their places near an immense bowl or rather reeking cauldron of
+brandy-punch, the younger arranged themselves on the floor and called
+loudly on Willie to strike up.
+
+With a brief caution to me, to ‘mind my credit, for fishers have ears,
+though fish have none,’ Willie led off in capital style, and I followed,
+certainly not so as to disgrace my companion, who, every now and then,
+gave me a nod of approbation. The dances were, of course, the Scottish
+jigs, and reels, and ‘twasome dances’, with a strathspey or hornpipe for
+interlude; and the want of grace on the part of the performers was amply
+supplied by truth of ear, vigour and decision of step, and the agility
+proper to the northern performers. My own spirits rose with the mirth
+around me, and with old Willie’s admirable execution, and frequent ‘weel
+dune, gentle chap, yet;’--and, to confess the truth, I felt a great deal
+more pleasure in this rustic revel, than I have done at the more formal
+balls and concerts in your famed city, to which I have sometimes made my
+way. Perhaps this was because I was a person of more importance to the
+presiding matron of Brokenburn-foot, than I had the means of rendering
+myself to the far-famed Miss Nickie Murray, the patroness of your
+Edinburgh assemblies. The person I mean was a buxom dame of about
+thirty, her fingers loaded with many a silver ring, and three or four
+of gold; her ankles liberally displayed from under her numerous blue,
+white, and scarlet; short petticoats, and attired in hose of the finest
+and whitest lamb’s-wool, which arose from shoes of Spanish cordwain,
+fastened with silver buckles. She took the lead in my favour, and
+declared, ‘that the brave young gentleman should not weary himself to
+death wi’ playing, but take the floor for a dance or twa.’
+
+‘And what’s to come of me, Dame Martin?’ said Willie.
+
+‘Come o’ thee?’ said the dame; ‘mishanter on the auld beard o’ ye! ye
+could play for twenty hours on end, and tire out the haill countryside
+wi’ dancing before ye laid down your bow, saving for a by-drink or the
+like o’ that.’
+
+‘In troth, dame,’ answered Willie, ‘ye are no sae far wrang; sae if my
+comrade is to take his dance, ye maun gie me my drink, and then bob it
+away like Madge of Middlebie.’
+
+The drink was soon brought; but while Willie was partaking of it,
+a party entered the hut, which arrested my attention at once, and
+intercepted the intended gallantry with which I had proposed to present
+my hand to the fresh-coloured, well-made, white-ankled Thetis, who had
+obtained me manumission from my musical task.
+
+This was nothing less than the sudden appearance of the old woman whom
+the laird had termed Mabel; Cristal Nixon, his male attendant; and the
+young person who had said grace to us when I supped with him.
+
+This young person--Alan, thou art in thy way a bit of a conjurer--this
+young person whom I DID NOT describe, and whom you, for that very
+reason, suspected was not an indifferent object to me--is, I am sorry to
+say it, in very fact not so much so as in prudence she ought. I will not
+use the name of love on this occasion; for I have applied it too often
+to transient whims and fancies to escape your satire, should I venture
+to apply it now. For it is a phrase, I must confess, which I have
+used--a romancer would say, profaned--a little too often, considering
+how few years have passed over my head. But seriously, the fair chaplain
+of Brokenburn has been often in my head when she had no business
+there; and if this can give thee any clue for explaining my motives
+in lingering about the country, and assuming the character of Willie’s
+companion, why, hang thee, thou art welcome to make use of it--a
+permission for which thou need’st not thank me much, as thou wouldst not
+have failed to assume it whether it were given or no.
+
+Such being my feelings, conceive how they must have been excited, when,
+like a beam upon a cloud, I saw this uncommonly beautiful girl enter the
+apartment in which they were dancing; not, however, with the air of
+an equal, but that of a superior, come to grace with her presence the
+festival of her dependants. The old man and woman attended, with looks
+as sinister as hers were lovely, like two of the worst winter months
+waiting upon the bright-eyed May.
+
+When she entered--wonder if thou wilt--she wore A GREEN MANTLE, such as
+thou hast described as the garb of thy fair client, and confirmed what
+I had partly guessed from thy personal description, that my chaplain and
+thy visitor were the same person. There was an alteration on her
+brow the instant she recognized me. She gave her cloak to her female
+attendant, and, after a momentary hesitation, as if uncertain whether to
+advance or retire, she walked into the room with dignity and
+composure, all making way, the men unbonneting, and the women curtsying
+respectfully, as she assumed a chair which was reverently placed for her
+accommodation, apart from others.
+
+There was then a pause, until the bustling mistress of the ceremonies,
+with awkward but kindly courtesy, offered the young lady a glass of
+wine, which was at first declined, and at length only thus far accepted,
+that, bowing round to the festive company, the fair visitor wished them
+all health and mirth, and just touching the brim with her lip, replaced
+it on the salver. There was another pause; and I did not immediately
+recollect, confused as I was by this unexpected apparition, that it
+belonged to me to break it. At length a murmur was heard around me,
+being expected to exhibit,--nay, to lead down the dance,--in consequence
+of the previous conversation.
+
+‘Deil’s in the fiddler lad,’ was muttered from more quarters than
+one--‘saw folk ever sic a thing as a shame-faced fiddler before?’
+
+At length a venerable Triton, seconding his remonstrances with a hearty
+thump on my shoulder, cried out, ‘To the floor--to the floor, and let us
+see how ye can fling--the lasses are a’ waiting.’
+
+Up I jumped, sprang from the elevated station which constituted our
+orchestra, and, arranging my ideas as rapidly as I could, advanced
+to the head of the room, and, instead of offering my hand to the
+white-footed Thetis aforesaid, I venturously made the same proposal to
+her of the Green Mantle.
+
+The nymph’s lovely eyes seemed to open with astonishment at the
+audacity of this offer; and, from the murmurs I heard around me, I also
+understood that it surprised, and perhaps offended, the bystanders. But
+after the first moment’s emotion, she wreathed her neck, and drawing
+herself haughtily up, like one who was willing to show that she was
+sensible of the full extent of her own condescension, extended her hand
+towards me, like a princess gracing a squire of low degree.
+
+There is affectation in all this, thought I to myself, if the Green
+Mantle has borne true evidence--for young ladies do not make visits, or
+write letters to counsel learned in the law, to interfere in the motions
+of those whom they hold as cheap as this nymph seems to do me; and if
+I am cheated by a resemblance of cloaks, still I am interested to show
+myself, in some degree, worthy of the favour she has granted with so
+much state and reserve. The dance to be performed was the old Scots Jig,
+in which you are aware I used to play no sorry figure at La Pique’s,
+when thy clumsy movements used to be rebuked by raps over the knuckles
+with that great professor’s fiddlestick. The choice of the tune was left
+to my comrade Willie, who, having finished his drink, feloniously struck
+up the well-known and popular measure,
+
+  Merrily danced the Quaker’s wife,
+  And merrily danced the Quaker.
+
+An astounding laugh arose at my expense, and I should have been
+annihilated, but that the smile which mantled on the lip of my partner,
+had a different expression from that of ridicule, and seemed to say,
+‘Do not take this to heart.’ And I did not, Alan--my partner danced
+admirably, and I like one who was determined, if outshone, which I could
+not help, not to be altogether thrown into the shade.
+
+I assure you our performance, as well as Willie’s music, deserved
+more polished spectators and auditors; but we could not then have been
+greeted with such enthusiastic shouts of applause as attended while I
+handed my partner to her seat, and took my place by her side, as one who
+had a right to offer the attentions usual on such an occasion. She was
+visibly embarrassed, but I was determined not to observe her confusion,
+and to avail myself of the opportunity of learning whether this
+beautiful creature’s mind was worthy of the casket in which nature had
+lodged it.
+
+Nevertheless, however courageously I formed this resolution, you cannot
+but too well guess the difficulties I must needs have felt in carrying
+it into execution; since want of habitual intercourse with the charmers
+of the other sex has rendered me a sheepish cur, only one grain less
+awkward than thyself. Then she was so very beautiful, and assumed an
+air of so much dignity, that I was like to fall under the fatal error of
+supposing she should only be addressed with something very clever; and
+in the hasty raking which my brains underwent in this persuasion, not a
+single idea occurred that common sense did not reject as fustian on the
+one hand, or weary, flat, and stale triticism on the other. I felt as
+if my understanding were no longer my own, but was alternately under the
+dominion of Aldeborontiphoscophornio, and that of his facetious friend
+Rigdum-Funnidos. How did I envy at that moment our friend Jack Oliver,
+who produces with such happy complacence his fardel of small talk, and
+who, as he never doubts his own powers of affording amusement, passes
+them current with every pretty woman he approaches, and fills up the
+intervals of chat by his complete acquaintance with the exercise of the
+fan, the FLACON, and the other duties of the CAVALIERE SERVENTE. Some
+of these I attempted, but I suppose it was awkwardly; at least the Lady
+Green Mantle received them as a princess accepts the homage of a clown.
+
+Meantime the floor remained empty, and as the mirth of the good meeting
+was somewhat checked, I ventured, as a DERNIER RESSORT, to propose a
+minuet. She thanked me, and told me haughtily enough, ‘she was here
+to encourage the harmless pleasures of these good folks, but was not
+disposed to make an exhibition of her own indifferent dancing for their
+amusement.’
+
+She paused a moment, as if she expected me to suggest something; and as
+I remained silent and rebuked, she bowed her head more graciously, and
+said, ‘Not to affront you, however, a country-dance, if you please.’
+
+What an ass was I, Alan, not to have anticipated her wishes! Should I
+not have observed that the ill-favoured couple, Mabel and Cristal, had
+placed themselves on each side of her seat, like the supporters of the
+royal arms? the man, thick, short, shaggy, and hirsute, as the lion; the
+female, skin-dried, tight-laced, long, lean, and hungry-faced, like the
+unicorn. I ought to have recollected, that under the close inspection
+of two such watchful salvages, our communication, while in repose, could
+not have been easy; that the period of dancing a minuet was not the very
+choicest time for conversation; but that the noise, the exercise,
+and the mazy confusion of a country-dance, where the inexperienced
+performers were every now and then running against each other, and
+compelling the other couples to stand still for a minute at a time,
+besides the more regular repose afforded by the intervals of the dance
+itself, gave the best possible openings for a word or two spoken in
+season, and without being liable to observation.
+
+We had but just led down, when an opportunity of the kind occurred, and
+my partner said, with great gentleness and modesty, ‘It is not perhaps
+very proper in me to acknowledge an acquaintance that is not claimed;
+but I believe I speak to Mr. Darsie Latimer?’
+
+‘Darsie Latimer was indeed the person that had now the honour and
+happiness’--
+
+I would have gone on in the false gallop of compliment, but she cut me
+short. ‘And why,’ she said, ‘is Mr. Latimer here, and in disguise, or at
+least assuming an office unworthy of a man of education?--I beg pardon,’
+she continued,--‘I would not give you pain, but surely making, an
+associate of a person of that description’--
+
+She looked towards my friend Willie, and was silent. I felt heartily
+ashamed of myself, and hastened to say it was an idle frolic, which want
+of occupation had suggested, and which I could not regret, since it had
+procured me the pleasure I at present enjoyed.
+
+Without seeming to notice my compliment, she took the next opportunity
+to say, ‘Will Mr. Latimer permit a stranger who wishes him well to ask,
+whether it is right that, at his active age, he should be in so far void
+of occupation, as to be ready to adopt low society for the sake of idle
+amusement?’
+
+‘You are severe, madam,’ I answered; ‘but I cannot think myself degraded
+by mixing with any society where I meet’--
+
+Here I stopped short, conscious that I was giving my answer an
+unhandsome turn. The ARGUMENTUM AD HOMINEM, the last to which a polite
+man has recourse, may, however, be justified by circumstances, but
+seldom or never the ARGUMENTUM AD FOEMINAM.
+
+She filled up the blank herself which I had left. ‘Where you meet ME, I
+suppose you would say? But the case is different. I am, from my unhappy
+fate, obliged to move by the will of others, and to be in places which
+I would by my own will gladly avoid. Besides, I am, except for these few
+minutes, no participator of the revels--a spectator only, and attended
+by my servants. Your situation is different--you are here by choice,
+the partaker and minister of the pleasures of a class below you in
+education, birth, and fortunes. If I speak harshly, Mr. Latimer,’ she
+added, with much sweetness of manner, ‘I mean kindly.’
+
+I was confounded by her speech, ‘severe in youthful wisdom’; all
+of naive or lively, suitable to such a dialogue, vanished from my
+recollection, and I answered with gravity like her own, ‘I am, indeed,
+better educated than these poor people; but you, madam, whose kind
+admonition I am grateful for, must know more of my condition than I
+do myself--I dare not say I am their superior in birth, since I know
+nothing of my own, or in fortunes, over which hangs an impenetrable
+cloud.’
+
+‘And why should your ignorance on these points drive you into low
+society and idle habits?’ answered my female monitor. ‘Is it manly to
+wait till fortune cast her beams upon you, when by exertion of your own
+energy you might distinguish yourself? Do not the pursuits of learning
+lie open to you--of manly ambition--of war? But no--not of war, that has
+already cost you too dear.’
+
+‘I will be what you wish me to be,’ I replied with eagerness--‘You have
+but to choose my path, and you shall see if I do not pursue it with
+energy, were it only because you command me.’
+
+‘Not because I command you,’ said the maiden, ‘but because reason,
+common sense, manhood, and, in one word, regard for your own safety,
+give the same counsel.’
+
+‘At least permit me to reply, that reason and sense never assumed
+a fairer form--of persuasion,’ I hastily added; for she turned from
+me--nor did she give me another opportunity of continuing what I had
+to say till the next pause of the dance, when, determined to bring our
+dialogue to a point, I said, ‘You mentioned manhood also, and in the
+same breath, personal danger. My ideas of manhood suggest that it is
+cowardice to retreat before dangers of a doubtful character. You, who
+appear to know so much of my fortunes that I might call you my guardian
+angel, tell me what these dangers are, that I may judge whether manhood
+calls on me to face or to fly them.’
+
+She was evidently perplexed by this appeal.
+
+‘You make me pay dearly for acting as your humane adviser,’ she replied
+at last: ‘I acknowledge an interest in your fate, and yet I dare not
+tell you whence it arises; neither am I at liberty to say why, or from
+whom, you are in danger; but it is not less true that danger is near
+and imminent. Ask me no more, but, for your own sake, begone from this
+country. Elsewhere you are safe--here you do but invite your fate.’
+
+‘But am I doomed to bid thus farewell to almost the only human being who
+has showed an interest in my welfare? Do not say so--say that we shall
+meet again, and the hope shall be the leading star to regulate my
+course!’
+
+‘It is more than probable,’ she said--‘much more than probable, that we
+may never meet again. The help which I now render you is all that may be
+in my power; it is such as I should render to a blind man whom I might
+observe approaching the verge of a precipice; it ought to excite no
+surprise, and requires no gratitude.’
+
+So saying, she again turned from me, nor did she address me until the
+dance was on the point of ending, when she said, ‘Do not attempt to
+speak to or approach me again in the course of the night; leave the
+company as soon as you can, but not abruptly, and God be with you.’
+
+I handed her to her seat, and did not quit the fair palm I held, without
+expressing my feelings by a gentle pressure. She coloured slightly, and
+withdrew her hand, but not angrily. Seeing the eyes of Cristal and Mabel
+sternly fixed on me, I bowed deeply, and withdrew from her; my heart
+saddening, and my eyes becoming dim in spite of me, as the shifting
+crowd hid us from each other.
+
+It was my intention to have crept back to my comrade Willie, and resumed
+my bow with such spirit as I might, although, at the moment, I would
+have given half my income for an instant’s solitude. But my retreat was
+cut off by Dame Martin, with the frankness--if it is not an inconsistent
+phrase-of rustic coquetry, that goes straight up to the point.
+
+‘Aye, lad, ye seem unco sune weary, to dance sae lightly? Better the nag
+that ambles a’ the day, than him that makes a brattle for a mile, and
+then’s dune wi’ the road.’
+
+This was a fair challenge, and I could not decline accepting it.
+Besides, I could see Dame Martin was queen of the revels; and so many
+were the rude and singular figures about me, that I was by no means
+certain whether I might not need some protection. I seized on her
+willing hand, and we took our places in the dance, where, if I did not
+acquit myself with all the accuracy of step and movement which I had
+before attempted, I at least came up to the expectations of my partner,
+who said, and almost swore, ‘I was prime at it;’ while, stimulated
+to her utmost exertions, she herself frisked like a kid, snapped her
+fingers like castanets, whooped like a Bacchanal, and bounded from the
+floor like a tennis-ball,--aye, till the colour of her garters was no
+particular mystery. She made the less secret of this, perhaps, that they
+were sky-blue, and fringed with silver.
+
+The time has been that this would have been special fun; or rather, last
+night was the only time I can recollect these four years when it would
+not have been so; yet, at this moment, I cannot tell you how I longed
+to be rid of Dame Martin. I almost wished she would sprain one of those
+‘many-twinkling’ ankles, which served her so alertly; and when, in the
+midst of her exuberant caprioling, I saw my former partner leaving
+the apartment, and with eyes, as I thought, turning towards me, this
+unwillingness to carry on the dance increased to such a point, that I
+was almost about to feign a sprain or a dislocation myself, in order to
+put an end to the performance. But there were around me scores of old
+women, all of whom looked as if they might have some sovereign recipe
+for such an accident; and, remembering Gil Blas, and his pretended
+disorder in the robber’s cavern, I thought it as wise to play Dame
+Martin fair, and dance till she thought proper to dismiss me. What I did
+I resolved to do strenuously, and in the latter part of the exhibition
+I cut and sprang from the floor as high and as perpendicularly as Dame
+Martin herself; and received, I promise you, thunders of applause, for
+the common people always prefer exertion and agility to grace. At length
+Dame Martin could dance no more, and, rejoicing at my release, I led her
+to a seat, and took the privilege of a partner to attend her.
+
+‘Hegh, sirs,’ exclaimed Dame Martin, ‘I am sair forfoughen! Troth!
+callant, I think ye hae been amaist the death o’ me.’
+
+I could only atone for the alleged offence by fetching her some
+refreshment, of which she readily partook.
+
+‘I have been lucky in my partners,’ I said, ‘first that pretty young
+lady, and then you, Mrs. Martin.’
+
+‘Hout wi’ your fleeching,’ said Dame Martin. ‘Gae wa--gae wa, lad; dinna
+blaw in folk’s lugs that gate; me and Miss Lilias even’d thegither! Na,
+na, lad--od, she is maybe four or five years younger than the like o’
+me,--bye and attour her gentle havings.’
+
+‘She is the laird’s daughter?’ said I, in as careless a tone of inquiry
+as I could assume.
+
+‘His daughter, man? Na, na, only his niece--and sib aneugh to him, I
+think.’
+
+‘Aye, indeed,’ I replied; ‘I thought she had borne his name?’
+
+‘She bears her ain name, and that’s Lilias.’
+
+‘And has she no other name?’ asked I.
+
+‘What needs she another till she gets a gudeman?’ answered my Thetis,
+a little miffed perhaps--to use the women’s phrase--that I turned
+the conversation upon my former partner, rather than addressed it to
+herself.
+
+There was a little pause, which was interrupted by Dame Martin
+observing, ‘They are standing up again.’
+
+‘True,’ said I, having no mind to renew my late violent CAPRIOLE, and I
+must go help old Willie.’
+
+Ere I could extricate myself, I heard poor Thetis address herself to
+a sort of merman in a jacket of seaman’s blue, and a pair of trousers
+(whose hand, by the way, she had rejected at an earlier part of the
+evening) and intimate that she was now disposed to take a trip.
+
+‘Trip away, then, dearie,’ said the vindictive man of the waters,
+without offering his hand; ‘there,’ pointing to the floor, ‘is a roomy
+berth for you.’
+
+Certain I had made one enemy, and perhaps two, I hastened to my original
+seat beside Willie, and began to handle my bow. But I could see that my
+conduct had made an unfavourable impression; the words, ‘flory conceited
+chap,’--‘hafflins gentle,’ and at length, the still more alarming
+epithet of ‘spy,’ began to be buzzed about, and I was heartily glad when
+the apparition of Sam’s visage at the door, who was already possessed of
+and draining a can of punch, gave me assurance that my means of retreat
+were at hand. I intimated as much to Willie, who probably had heard
+more of the murmurs of the company than I had, for he whispered, ‘Aye,
+aye,--awa wi’ ye--ower lang here--slide out canny--dinna let them see ye
+are on the tramp.’
+
+I slipped half a guinea into the old man’s hand, who answered, ‘Truts
+pruts! nonsense but I ‘se no refuse, trusting ye can afford it. Awa wi’
+ye--and if ony body stops ye, cry on me.’
+
+I glided, by his advice, along the room as if looking for a partner,
+joined Sam, whom I disengaged with some difficulty from his can, and
+we left the cottage together in a manner to attract the least possible
+observation. The horses were tied in a neighbouring shed, and as
+the moon was up, and I was now familiar with the road, broken and
+complicated as it is, we soon reached the Shepherd’s Bush, where the old
+landlady was sitting up waiting for us, under some anxiety of mind, to
+account for which she did not hesitate to tell me that some folks had
+gone to Brokenburn from her house, or neighbouring towns, that did not
+come so safe back again. ‘Wandering Willie,’ she said, ‘was doubtless a
+kind of protection.’
+
+Here Willie’s wife, who was smoking in the chimney corner, took up the
+praises of her ‘hinnie,’ as she called him, and endeavoured to awaken
+my generosity afresh, by describing the dangers from which, as she was
+pleased to allege, her husband’s countenance had assuredly been the
+means of preserving me. I was not, however, to be fooled out of
+more money at this time, and went to bed in haste, full of vanous
+cogitations.
+
+I have since spent a couple of days betwixt Mount Sharon and this place,
+and betwixt reading, writing to thee this momentous history, forming
+plans for seeing the lovely Lilias, and--partly, I think, for the sake
+of contradiction--angling a little in spite of Joshua’a scruples--though
+I am rather liking the amusement better as I begin to have some success
+in it.
+
+And now, my dearest Alan, you are in full possession of my secret--let
+me as frankly into the recesses of your bosom. How do you feel towards
+this fair ignis fatuus, this lily of the desert? Tell me honestly; for
+however the recollection of her may haunt my own mind, my love for Alan
+Fairford surpasses the love of woman, I know, too, that when you DO
+love, it will be to
+
+  Love once and love no more.
+
+A deep-consuming passion, once kindled in a breast so steady as yours,
+would never be extinguished but with life. I am of another and more
+volatile temper, and though I shall open your next with a trembling hand
+and uncertain heart, yet let it bring a frank confession that this fair
+unknown has made a deeper impression on your gravity than you reckoned
+for, and you will see I can tear the arrow from my own wound, barb and
+all. In the meantime, though I have formed schemes once more to see her,
+I will, you may rely on it, take no step for putting them into practice.
+I have refrained from this hitherto, and I give you my word of honour,
+I shall continue to do so; yet why should you need any further assurance
+from one who is so entirely yours as D.L.
+
+PS.--I shall be on thorns till I receive your answer. I read, and
+re-read your letter, and cannot for my soul discover what your real
+sentiments are. Sometimes I think you write of her as one in jest--and
+sometimes I think that cannot be. Put me at ease as soon as possible.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIII
+
+ALAN FAIRFORD TO DARSIE LATIMER
+
+I write on the instant, as you direct; and in a tragi-comic humour, for
+I have a tear in my eye and a smile on my cheek. Dearest Darsie, sure
+never a being but yourself could be so generous--sure never a being but
+yourself could be so absurd! I remember when you were a boy you wished
+to make your fine new whip a present to old Aunt Peggy, merely because
+she admired it; and now, with like unreflecting and inappropriate
+liberality, you would resign your beloved to a smoke-dried young
+sophister, who cares not one of the hairs which it is his occupation to
+split, for all the daughters of Eve. I in love with your Lilias--your
+Green Mantle--your unknown enchantress!--why I scarce saw her for five
+minutes, and even then only the tip of her chin was distinctly visible.
+She was well made, and the tip of her chin was of a most promising cast
+for the rest of the face; but, Heaven save you! she came upon business!
+and for a lawyer to fall in love with a pretty client on a single
+consultation, would be as wise as if he became enamoured of a
+particularly bright sunbeam which chanced for a moment to gild his
+bar-wig. I give you my word I am heart-whole and moreover, I assure you,
+that before I suffer a woman to sit near my heart’s core, I must see her
+full face, without mask or mantle, aye, and know a good deal of her
+mind into the bargain. So never fret yourself on my account, my kind and
+generous Darsie; but, for your own sake, have a care and let not an idle
+attachment, so lightly taken up, lead you into serious danger.
+
+On this subject I feel so apprehensive, that now when I am decorated
+with the honours of the gown, I should have abandoned my career at the
+very starting to come to you, but for my father having contrived to
+clog my heels with fetters of a professional nature. I will tell you the
+matter at length, for it is comical enough; and why should not you
+list to my juridical adventures, as well as I to those of your fiddling
+knight-errantry?
+
+It was after dinner, and I was considering how I might best introduce
+to my father the private resolution I had formed to set off for
+Dumfriesshire, or whether I had not better run away at once, and plead
+my excuse by letter, when, assuming the peculiar look with which he
+communicates any of his intentions respecting me, that he suspects may
+not be altogether acceptable, ‘Alan,’ he said, ‘ye now wear a gown--ye
+have opened shop, as we would say of a more mechanical profession; and,
+doubtless, ye think the floor of the courts is strewed with guineas, and
+that ye have only to stoop down to gather them?’
+
+‘I hope I am sensible, sir,’ I replied, ‘that I have some knowledge and
+practice to acquire, and must stoop for that in the first place.’
+
+‘It is well said,’ answered my father; and, always afraid to give too
+much encouragement, added, ‘Very well said, if it be well acted up
+to--Stoop to get knowledge and practice is the very word. Ye know very
+well, Alan, that in the other faculty who study the ARS MEDENDI, before
+the young doctor gets to the bedsides of palaces, he must, as they call
+it, walk the hospitals; and cure Lazarus of his sores, before he be
+admitted to prescribe for Dives, when he has gout or indigestion’--
+
+‘I am aware, sir, that’--
+
+‘Whisht--do not interrupt the court. Well--also the chirurgeons have
+a useful practice, by which they put their apprentices and tyrones to
+work; upon senseless dead bodies, to which, as they can do no good, so
+they certainly can do as little harm; while at the same time the tyro,
+or apprentice, gains experience, and becomes fit to whip off a leg or
+arm from a living subject, as cleanly as ye would slice an onion.’
+
+‘I believe I guess your meaning, sir,’ answered I; ‘and were it not for
+a very particular engagement’--
+
+‘Do not speak to me of engagements; but whisht--there is a good lad--and
+do not interrupt the court.’
+
+My father, you know, is apt--be it said with all filial duty--to be a
+little prolix in his harangues. I had nothing for it but to lean back
+and listen.
+
+‘Maybe you think, Alan, because I have, doubtless, the management of
+some actions in dependence, whilk my worthy clients have intrusted
+me with, that I may think of airting them your way INSTANTER; and so
+setting you up in practice, so far as my small business or influence may
+go; and, doubtless, Alan, that is a day whilk I hope may come round. But
+then, before I give, as the proverb hath it, “My own fish-guts to my own
+sea-maws,” I must, for the sake of my own character, be very sure that
+my sea-maw can pick them to some purpose. What say ye?’
+
+‘I am so far,’ answered I, ‘from wishing to get early into practice,
+sir, that I would willingly bestow a few days’--
+
+‘In further study, ye would say, Alan. But that is not the way
+either--ye must walk the hospitals--ye must cure Lazarus--ye must cut
+and carve on a departed subject, to show your skill.’
+
+‘I am sure,’ I replied, ‘I will undertake the cause of any poor man with
+pleasure, and bestow as much pains upon it as if it were a duke’s; but
+for the next two or three days’--
+
+‘They must be devoted to close study, Alan--very close study indeed; for
+ye must stand primed for a hearing, IN PRESENTIA DOMINORUM, upon Tuesday
+next.’
+
+‘I, sir?’ I replied in astonishment--‘I have not opened my mouth in the
+Outer House yet!’
+
+‘Never mind the court of the Gentiles, man,’ said my father; ‘we will
+have you into the Sanctuary at once--over shoes, over boots.’
+
+‘But, sir, I should really spoil any cause thrust on me so hastily.’
+
+‘Ye cannot spoil it, Alan,’ said my father, rubbing his hands with much
+complacency; ‘that is the very cream of the business, man--it is just,
+as I said before, a subject upon whilk all the TYRONES have been trying
+their whittles for fifteen years; and as there have been about ten or a
+dozen agents concerned, and each took his own way, the case is come to
+that pass, that Stair or Amiston could not mend it; and I do not think
+even you, Alan, can do it much harm--ye may get credit by it, but ye can
+lose none.’
+
+‘And pray what is the name of my happy client, sir?’ said I,
+ungraciously enough, I believe.
+
+‘It is a well-known name in the Parliament House,’ replied my father.
+‘To say the truth, I expect him every moment; it is Peter Peebles.’ [See
+Note 4.]
+
+‘Peter Peebles!’ exclaimed I, in astonishment; ‘he is an insane
+beggar--as poor as Job, and as mad as a March hare!’
+
+‘He has been pleaing in the court for fifteen years,’ said my father, in
+a tone of commiseration, which seemed to acknowledge that this fact
+was enough to account for the poor man’s condition both in mind and
+circumstances.
+
+‘Besides, sir,’ I added, ‘he is on the Poor’s Roll; and you know there
+are advocates regularly appointed to manage those cases; and for me to
+presume to interfere’--
+
+‘Whisht, Alan!--never interrupt the court--all THAT is managed for ye
+like a tee’d ball’ (my father sometimes draws his similes from his once
+favourite game of golf); ‘you must know, Alan, that Peter’s cause was
+to have been opened by young Dumtoustie--ye may ken the lad, a son of
+Dumtoustie of that ilk, member of Parliament for the county of--, and a
+nephew of the laird’s younger brother, worthy Lord Bladderskate, whilk
+ye are aware sounds as like being akin to a peatship [Formerly, a
+lawyer, supposed to be under the peculiar patronage of any particular
+judge, was invidiously termed his PEAT or PET.] and a sheriffdom, as a
+sieve is sib to a riddle. Now, Peter Drudgeit, my lord’s clerk, came to
+me this morning in the House, like ane bereft of his wits; for it seems
+that young Dumtoustie is ane of the Poor’s lawyers, and Peter Peebles’s
+process had been remitted to him of course. But so soon as the
+harebrained goose saw the pokes [Process-bags.] (as indeed, Alan, they
+are none of the least) he took fright, called for his nag, lap on, and
+away to the country is he gone; and so? said Peter, my lord is at his
+wit’s end wi’ vexation, and shame, to see his nevoy break off the course
+at the very starting. “I’ll tell you, Peter,” said I, “were I my lord,
+and a friend or kinsman of mine should leave the town while the court
+was sitting, that kinsman, or be he what he liked, should never darken
+my door again.” And then, Alan, I thought to turn the ball our own way;
+and I said that you were a gey sharp birkie, just off the irons, and if
+it would oblige my lord, and so forth, you would open Peter’s cause on
+Tuesday, and make some handsome apology for the necessary absence of
+your learned friend, and the loss which your client and the court had
+sustained, and so forth. Peter lap at the proposition like a cock at a
+grossart; for, he said, the only chance was to get a new hand, that did
+not ken the charge he was taking upon him; for there was not a lad of
+two sessions’ standing that was not dead-sick of Peter Peebles and his
+cause; and he advised me to break the matter gently to you at the
+first; but I told him you were, a good bairn, Alan, and had no will and
+pleasure in these matters but mine.’
+
+What could I say, Darsie, in answer to this arrangement, so very well
+meant--so very vexatious at the same time? To imitate the defection and
+flight of young Dumtoustie, was at once to destroy my father’s hopes
+of me for ever; nay, such is the keenness with which he regards all
+connected with his profession, it might have been a step to breaking
+his heart. I was obliged, therefore, to bow in sad acquiescence, when my
+father called to James Wilkinson to bring the two bits of pokes he would
+find on his table.
+
+Exit James, and presently re-enters, bending under the load of two huge
+leathern bags, full of papers to the brim, and labelled on the greasy
+backs with the magic impress of the clerks of court, and the title,
+PEEBLES AGAINST PLAINSTANES. This huge mass was deposited on the table,
+and my father, with no ordinary glee in his countenance, began to draw
+out; the various bundles of papers, secured by none of your red tape
+or whipcord, but stout, substantial casts of tarred rope, such as might
+have held small craft at their moorings.
+
+I made a last and desperate effort to get rid of the impending job. ‘I
+am really afraid, sir, that this case seems so much complicated, and
+there is so little time to prepare, that we had better move the court to
+supersede it till next session.’
+
+‘How, sir?--how, Alan?’ said my father--‘Would you approbate and
+reprobate, sir? You have accepted the poor man’s cause, and if you have
+not his fee in your pocket, it is because he has none to give you; and
+now would you approbate and reprobate in the same breath of your mouth?
+Think of your oath of office, Alan, and your duty to your father, my
+dear boy.’
+
+Once more, what could I say? I saw from my father’s hurried and alarmed
+manner, that nothing could vex him so much as failing in the point he
+had determined to carry, and once more intimated my readiness to do my
+best, under every disadvantage.
+
+‘Well, well, my boy,’ said my father, ‘the Lord will make your days long
+in the land, for the honour you have given to your father’s grey hairs.
+You may find wiser advisers, Alan, but none that can wish you better.’
+
+My father, you know, does not usually give way to expressions of
+affection, and they are interesting in proportion to their rarity. My
+eyes began to fill at seeing his glisten; and my delight at having given
+him such sensible gratification would have been unmixed but for the
+thoughts of you. These out of the question, I could have grappled with
+the bags, had they been as large as corn-sacks. But, to turn what
+was grave into farce, the door opened, and Wilkinson ushered in Peter
+Peebles.
+
+You must have seen this original, Darsie, who, like others in the same
+predicament, continues to haunt the courts of justice, where he has made
+shipwreck of time, means, and understanding. Such insane paupers have
+sometimes seemed to me to resemble wrecks lying upon the shoals on the
+Goodwin Sands, or in Yarmouth Roads, warning other vessels to keep aloof
+from the banks on which they have been lost; or rather, such ruined
+clients are like scarecrows and potato-bogies, distributed through the
+courts to scare away fools from the scene of litigation.
+
+The identical Peter wears a huge greatcoat threadbare and patched
+itself, yet carefully so disposed and secured by what buttons remain,
+and many supplementary pins, as to conceal the still more infirm state
+of his under garments. The shoes and stockings of a ploughman were,
+however, seen to meet at his knees with a pair of brownish, blackish
+breeches; a rusty-coloured handkerchief, that has been black in its
+day, surrounded his throat, and was an apology for linen. His hair, half
+grey, half black, escaped in elf-locks around a huge wig, made of tow,
+as it seemed to me, and so much shrunk that it stood up on the very top
+of his head; above which he plants, when covered, an immense cocked hat,
+which, like the chieftain’s banner in an ancient battle, may be seen
+any sederunt day betwixt nine and ten, high towering above all
+the fluctuating and changeful scene in the Outer House, where his
+eccentricities often make him the centre of a group of petulant and
+teasing boys, who exercise upon him every art of ingenious torture.
+His countenance, originally that of a portly, comely burgess, is now
+emaciated with poverty and anxiety, and rendered wild by an insane
+lightness about the eyes; a withered and blighted skin and complexion;
+features begrimed with snuff, charged with the self-importance peculiar
+to insanity; and a habit of perpetually speaking to himself. Such was
+my unfortunate client; and I must allow, Darsie, that my profession had
+need to do a great deal of good, if, as is much to be feared, it brings
+many individuals to such a pass.
+
+After we had been, with a good deal of form, presented to each other,
+at which time I easily saw by my father’s manner that he was desirous of
+supporting Peter’s character in my eyes, as much as circumstances would
+permit, ‘Alan,’ he said, ‘this is the gentleman who has agreed to accept
+of you as his counsel, in place of young Dumtoustie.’
+
+‘Entirely out of favour to my old acquaintance your father, said Peter.
+with a benign and patronizing countenance, ‘out of respect to your
+father, and my old intimacy with Lord Bladderskate. Otherwise, by the
+REGIAM MAJESTATEM! I would have presented a petition and complaint
+against Daniel Dumtoustie, Advocate, by name and surname--I would, by
+all the practiques!--I know the forms of process; and I am not to be
+triffled with.’
+
+My father here interrupted my client, and reminded him that there was a
+good deal of business to do, as he proposed to give the young counsel
+an outline of the state of the conjoined process, with a view to letting
+him into the merits of the cause, disencumbered from the points of form.
+‘I have made a short abbreviate, Mr. Peebles,’ said he; ‘having sat up
+late last night, and employed much of this morning in wading through
+these papers, to save Alan some trouble, and I am now about to state the
+result.’
+
+‘I will state it myself,’ said Peter, breaking in without reverence upon
+his solicitor.
+
+‘No, by no means,’ said my father; ‘I am your agent for the time.’
+
+‘Mine eleventh in number,’ said Peter; ‘I have a new one every year; I
+wish I could get a new coat as regularly.’
+
+‘Your agent for the time,’ resumed my father; ‘and you, who are
+acquainted with the forms, know that the client states the cause to the
+agent--the agent to the counsel’--
+
+‘The counsel to the Lord Ordinary,’ continued Peter, once set a-going,
+like the peal of an alarm clock, ‘the Ordinary to the Inner House, the
+President to the Bench. It is just like the rope to the man, the man to
+the ox, the ox to the water, the water to the fire’--
+
+‘Hush, for Heaven’s sake, Mr. Peebles,’ said my father, cutting his
+recitation short; ‘time wears on--we must get to business--you must
+not interrupt the court, you know.--Hem, hem! From this abbreviate it
+appears’--
+
+‘Before you begin,’ said Peter Peebles ‘I’ll thank you to order me a
+morsel of bread and cheese, or some cauld meat, or broth, or the like
+alimentary provision; I was so anxious to see your son, that I could not
+eat a mouthful of dinner.’
+
+Heartily glad, I believe, to have so good a chance of stopping his
+client’s mouth effectually, my father ordered some cold meat; to which
+James Wilkinson, for the honour of the house, was about to add the
+brandy bottle, which remained on the sideboard, but, at a wink from my
+father, supplied its place with small beer. Peter charged the provisions
+with the rapacity of a famished lion; and so well did the diversion
+engage him, that though, while my father stated the case, he looked at
+him repeatedly, as if he meant to interrupt his statement, yet he always
+found more agreeable employment for his mouth, and returned to the
+cold beef with an avidity which convinced me he had not had such an
+opportunity for many a day of satiating his appetite. Omitting much
+formal phraseology, and many legal details, I will endeavour to give
+you, in exchange for your fiddler’s tale, the history of a litigant, or
+rather, the history of his lawsuit.
+
+‘Peter Peebles and Paul Plainstanes,’ said my father, entered into
+partnership, in the year--, as mercers and linendrapers, in the
+Luckenbooths, and carried on a great line of business to mutual
+advantage. But the learned counsel needeth not to be told, SOCIETAS EST
+MATER DISCORDIARUM, partnership oft makes pleaship. The company being
+dissolved by mutual consent, in the year--, the affairs had to be wound
+up, and after certain attempts to settle the matter extra-judicially,
+it was at last brought into the court, and has branched out into several
+distinct processes, most of whilk have been conjoined by the Ordinary.
+It is to the state of these processes that counsel’s attention is
+particularly directed. There is the original action of Peebles v.
+Plainstanes, convening him for payment of 3000l., less or more, as
+alleged balance due by Plainstanes. Secondly, there is a counter action,
+in which Plainstanes is pursuer and Peebles defender, for 2500l.,
+less or more, being balance alleged per contra, to be due by Peebles.
+Thirdly, Mr. Peeble’s seventh agent advised an action of Compt and
+Reckoning at his instance, wherein what balance should prove due on
+either side might be fairly struck and ascertained. Fourthly, to meet
+the hypothetical case, that Peebles might be found liable in a balance
+to Plainstanes, Mr. Wildgoose, Mr. Peebles’s eighth agent, recommended a
+Multiplepoinding, to bring all parties concerned into the field.’
+
+My brain was like to turn at this account of lawsuit within lawsuit,
+like a nest of chip-boxes, with all of which I was expected to make
+myself acquainted.
+
+‘I understand,’ I said, ‘that Mr. Peebles claims a sum of money from
+Plainstanes--how then can he be his debtor? and if not his debtor, how
+can he bring a Multiplepoinding, the very summons of which sets forth,
+that the pursuer does owe certain monies, which he is desirous to pay by
+warrant of a judge?’ [Multiplepoinding is, I believe, equivalent to what
+is called in England a case of Double Distress.]
+
+‘Ye know little of the matter, I doubt, friend,’ said Mr. Peebles; ‘a
+Multiplepoinding is the safest REMEDIUM JURIS in the whole; form of
+process. I have known it conjoined with a declarator of marriage.--Your
+beef is excellent,’ he said to my father, who in vain endeavoured to
+resume his legal disquisition; ‘but something highly powdered--and the
+twopenny is undeniable; but it is small swipes--small swipes--more of
+hop than malt-with your leave, I’ll try your black bottle.’
+
+My father started to help him with his own hand, and in due measure;
+but, infinitely to my amusement, Peter got possession of the bottle by
+the neck, and my father’s ideas of hospitality were far too scrupulous
+to permit his attempting, by any direct means, to redeem it; so that
+Peter returned to the table triumphant, with his prey in his clutch.
+
+‘Better have a wine-glass, Mr. Peebles,’ said my father, in an
+admonitory tone, ‘you will find it pretty strong.’
+
+‘If the kirk is ower muckle, we can sing mass in the quire,’ said Peter,
+helping himself in the goblet out of which he had been drinking the
+small beer. ‘What is it, usquebaugh?--BRANDY, as I am an honest man! I
+had almost forgotten the name and taste of brandy. Mr. Fairford elder,
+your good health’ (a mouthful of brandy), ‘Mr. Alan Fairford, wishing
+you well through your arduous undertaking’ (another go-down of the
+comfortable liquor). ‘And now, though you have given a tolerable
+breviate of this great lawsuit, of whilk everybody has heard something
+that has walked the boards in the Outer House (here’s to ye again,
+by way of interim decreet) yet ye have omitted to speak a word of the
+arrestments.’
+
+‘I was just coming to that point, Mr. Peebles.’
+
+‘Or of the action of suspension of the charge on the bill.’
+
+‘I was just coming to that.’
+
+‘Or the advocation of the Sheriff-Court process.’
+
+‘I was just coming to it.’
+
+‘As Tweed comes to Melrose, I think,’ said the litigant; and then
+filling his goblet about a quarter full of brandy, as if in absence of
+mind, ‘Oh, Mr. Alan Fairford, ye are a lucky man to buckle to such a
+cause as mine at the very outset! it is like a specimen of all causes,
+man. By the Regiam, there is not a REMEDIUM JURIS in the practiques
+but ye’ll find a spice o’t. Here’s to your getting weel through with
+it--Pshut--I am drinking naked spirits, I think. But if the heathen he
+ower strong, we’ll christen him with the brewer’ (here he added a
+little small beer to his beverage, paused, rolled his eyes, winked,
+and proceeded),--‘Mr. Fairford--the action of assault and battery,
+Mr. Fairford, when I compelled the villain Plainstanes to pull my
+nose within two steps of King Charles’s statue, in the Parliament
+Close--there I had him in a hose-net. Never man could tell me how to
+shape that process--no counsel that ever selled mind could condescend
+and say whether it were best to proceed by way of petition and
+complaint, AD VINDICTAM PUBLICAM, with consent of his Majesty’s
+advocate, or by action on the statute for battery PENDENTE LITE, whilk
+would be the winning my plea at once, and so getting a back-door out of
+court.--By the Regiam, that beef and brandy is unco het at my heart--I
+maun try the ale again’ (sipped a little beer); ‘and the ale’s but
+cauld, I maun e’en put in the rest of the brandy.’
+
+He was as good as his word, and proceeded in so loud and animated
+a style of elocution, thumping the table, drinking and snuffing
+alternately, that my father, abandoning all attempts to interrupt him,
+sat silent and ashamed, suffering, and anxious for the conclusion of the
+scene.
+
+‘And then to come back to my pet process of all--my battery and assault
+process, when I had the good luck to provoke him to pull my nose at
+the very threshold of the court, whilk was the very thing I wanted--Mr.
+Pest, ye ken him, Daddie Fairford? Old Pest was for making it out
+HAMESUCKEN, for he said the court might be said--said--ugh!--to be my
+dwelling-place. I dwell mair there than ony gate else, and the essence
+of hamesucken is to strike a man in his dwelling-place--mind that, young
+advocate--and so there’s hope Plainstanes may be hanged, as many has
+for a less matter; for, my lords,--will Pest say to the Justiciary
+bodies,--my lords, the Parliament House is Peebles’ place of
+dwelling, says he--being COMMUNE FORUM, and COMMUNE FORUM EST COMMUNE
+DOMICILIUM--Lass, fetch another glass of and score it--time to gae
+hame--by the practiques, I cannot find the jug--yet there’s twa of them,
+I think. By the Regiam, Fairford--Daddie Fairford--lend us twal pennies
+to buy sneeshing, mine is done--Macer, call another cause.’
+
+The box fell from his hands, and his body would at the same time have
+fallen from the chair, had not I supported him.
+
+‘This is intolerable,’ said my father--‘Call a chairman, James
+Wilkinson, to carry this degraded, worthless, drunken beast home.’
+
+When Peter Peebles was removed from this memorable consultation, under
+the care of an able-bodied Celt, my father hastily bundled up the
+papers, as a showman, whose exhibition has miscarried, hastes to remove
+his booth. ‘Here are my memoranda, Alan,’ he said, in a hurried way;
+‘look them carefully over--compare them with the processes, and turn
+it in your head before Tuesday. Many a good speech has been made for a
+beast of a client; and hark ye, lad, hark ye--I never intended to cheat
+you of your fee when all was done, though I would have liked to have
+heard the speech first; but there is nothing like corning the horse
+before the journey. Here are five goud guineas in a silk purse--of your
+poor mother’s netting, Alan--she would have been a blithe woman to have
+seen her young son with a gown on his back--but no more of that--be a
+good boy, and to the work like a tiger.’
+
+I did set to work, Darsie; for who could resist such motives? With my
+father’s assistance, I have mastered the details, confused as they are;
+and on Tuesday I shall plead as well for Peter Peebles as I could for
+a duke. Indeed, I feel my head so clear on the subject as to be able
+to write this long letter to you; into which, however, Peter and his
+lawsuit have insinuated themselves so far as to show you how much they
+at present occupy my thoughts. Once more, be careful of yourself, and
+mindful of me, who am ever thine, while ALAN FAIRFORD.
+
+From circumstances, to be hereafter mentioned, it was long ere this
+letter reached the person to whom it was addressed.
+
+
+          * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+NARRATIVE
+
+The advantage of laying before the reader, in the words of the actors
+themselves, the adventures which we must otherwise have narrated in
+our own, has given great popularity to the publication of epistolary
+correspondence, as practised by various great authors, and by ourselves
+in the preceding chapters. Nevertheless, a genuine correspondence of
+this kind (and Heaven forbid it should be in any respect sophisticated
+by interpolations of our own!) can seldom be found to contain all in
+which it is necessary to instruct the reader for his full comprehension
+of the story. Also it must often happen that various prolixities and
+redundancies occur in the course of an interchange of letters, which
+must hang as a dead weight on the progress of the narrative. To avoid
+this dilemma, some biographers have used the letters of the personages
+concerned, or liberal extracts from them, to describe particular
+incidents, or express the sentiments which they entertained; while they
+connect them occasionally with such portions of narrative, as may serve
+to carry on the thread of the story.
+
+It is thus that the adventurous travellers who explore the summit of
+Mont Blanc now move on through the crumbling snowdrift so slowly, that
+their progress is almost imperceptible, and anon abridge their journey
+by springing over the intervening chasms which cross their path, with
+the assistance of their pilgrim-staves. Or, to make a briefer simile,
+the course of story-telling which we have for the present adopted,
+resembles the original discipline of the dragoons, who were trained to
+serve either on foot or horseback, as the emergencies of the service
+required. With this explanation, we shall proceed to narrate some
+circumstances which Alan Fairford did not, and could not, write to his
+correspondent.
+
+Our reader, we trust, has formed somewhat approaching to a distinct
+idea of the principal characters who have appeared before him during
+our narrative; but in case our good opinion of his sagacity has been
+exaggerated, and in order to satisfy such as are addicted to the
+laudable practice of SKIPPING (with whom we have at times a strong
+fellow-feeling), the following particulars may not be superfluous.
+
+Mr. Saunders Fairford, as he was usually called, was a man of business
+of the old school, moderate in his charges, economical and even
+niggardly in his expenditure, strictly honest in conducting his own
+affairs and those of his clients, but taught by long experience to be
+wary and suspicious in observing the motions of others. Punctual as the
+clock of Saint Giles tolled nine, the neat dapper form of the little
+hale old gentleman was seen at the threshold of the court hall, or at
+farthest, at the head of the Back Stairs, trimly dressed in a complete
+suit of snuff-coloured brown, with stockings of silk or woollen as,
+suited the weather; a bob-wig, and a small cocked hat; shoes blacked
+as Warren would have blacked them; silver shoe-buckles, and a gold
+stock-buckle. A nosegay in summer, and a sprig of holly in winter,
+completed his well-known dress and appearance. His manners corresponded
+with his attire, for they were scrupulously civil, and not a little
+formal. He was an elder of the kirk, and, of course, zealous for King
+George and the Government even to slaying, as he had showed by taking
+up arms in their cause. But then, as he had clients and connexions
+of business among families of opposite political tenets, he was
+particularly cautious to use all the conventional phrases which the
+civility of the time had devised, as an admissible mode of language
+betwixt the two parties. Thus he spoke sometimes of the Chevalier, but
+never either of the Prince, which would have been sacrificing his own
+principles, or of the Pretender, which would have been offensive to
+those of others. Again, he usually designated the Rebellion as the
+AFFAIR of 1745, and spoke of any one engaged in it as a person who had
+been OUT at a certain period. [OLD-FASHIONED SCOTTISH CIVILITY.--Such
+were literally the points of politeness observed in general society
+during the author’s youth, where it was by no means unusual in a company
+assembled by chance, to find individuals who had borne arms on one
+side or other in the civil broils of 1745. Nothing, according to my
+recollection, could be more gentle and decorous than the respect
+these old enemies paid to each other’s prejudices. But in this I speak
+generally. I have witnessed one or two explosions.] So that, on the
+whole, Mr. Fairford was a man much liked and respected on all sides,
+though his friends would not have been sorry if he had given a dinner
+more frequently, as his little cellar contained some choice old wine, of
+which, on such rare occasions he was no niggard.
+
+The whole pleasure of this good old-fashioned man of method, besides
+that which he really felt in the discharge of his daily business, was
+the hope to see his son Alan, the only fruit of a union which death
+early dissolved, attain what in the father’s eyes was the proudest of
+all distinctions--the rank and fame of a well-employed lawyer.
+
+Every profession has its peculiar honours, and Mr. Fairford’s mind was
+constructed upon so limited and exclusive a plan, that he valued nothing
+save the objects of ambition which his own presented. He would have
+shuddered at Alan’s acquiring the renown of a hero, and laughed with
+scorn at the equally barren laurels of literature; it was by the path of
+the law alone that he was desirous to see him rise to eminence, and
+the probabilities of success or disappointment were the thoughts of his
+father by day, and his dream by night.
+
+The disposition of Alan Fairford, as well as his talents, were such as
+to encourage his father’s expectations. He had acuteness of intellect,
+joined to habits of long and patient study, improved no doubt by the
+discipline of his father’s house; to which, generally speaking, he
+conformed with the utmost docility, expressing no wish for greater or
+more frequent relaxation than consisted with his father’s anxious and
+severe restrictions. When he did indulge in any juvenile frolics, his
+father had the candour to lay the whole blame upon his more mercurial
+companion, Darsie Latimer.
+
+This youth, as the reader must be aware, had been received as an inmate
+into the family of Mr. Fairford, senior, at a time when some of the
+delicacy of constitution which had abridged the life of his consort
+began to show itself in the son, and when the father was, of course,
+peculiarly disposed to indulge his slightest wish. That the young
+Englishman was able to pay a considerable board, was a matter of no
+importance to Mr. Fairford; it was enough that his presence seemed to
+make his son cheerful and happy. He was compelled to allow that ‘Darsie
+was a fine lad, though unsettled,’ and he would have had some difficulty
+in getting rid of him, and the apprehensions which his levities excited,
+had it not been for the voluntary excursion which gave rise to the
+preceding correspondence, and in which Mr. Fairford secretly rejoiced,
+as affording the means of separating Alan from his gay companion, at
+least until he should have assumed, and become accustomed to, the duties
+of his dry and laborious profession.
+
+But the absence of Darsie was far from promoting the end which the elder
+Mr. Fairford had expected and desired. The young men were united by the
+closest bonds of intimacy; and the more so, that neither of them sought
+nor desired to admit any others into their society. Alan Fairford was
+averse to general company, from a disposition naturally reserved,
+and Darsie Latimer from a painful sense of his own unknown origin,
+peculiarly afflicting in a country where high and low are professed
+genealogists. The young men were all in all to each other; it is no
+wonder, therefore, that their separation was painful, and that its
+effects upon Alan Fairford, joined to the anxiety occasioned by the
+tenor of his friend’s letters, greatly exceeded what the senior had
+anticipated. The young man went through his usual duties, his studies,
+and the examinations to which he was subjected, but with nothing like
+the zeal and assiduity which he had formerly displayed; and his anxious
+and observant father saw but too plainly that his heart was with his
+absent comrade.
+
+A philosopher would have given way to this tide of feeling, in hopes to
+have diminished its excess, and permitted the youths to have been
+some time together, that their intimacy might have been broken off by
+degrees; but Mr. Fairford only saw the more direct mode of continued
+restraint, which, however, he was desirous of veiling under some
+plausible pretext. In the anxiety which he felt on this occasion, he had
+held communication with an old acquaintance, Peter Drudgeit, with whom
+the reader is partly acquainted. ‘Alan,’ he said, ‘was ance wud, and
+ay waur; and he was expecting every moment when he would start off in a
+wildgoose-chase after the callant Latimer; Will Sampson, the horse-hirer
+in Candlemaker Row, had given him a hint that Alan had been looking for
+a good hack, to go to the country for a few days. And then to oppose
+him downright--he could not but think on the way his poor mother was
+removed. Would to Heaven he was yoked to some tight piece of business,
+no matter whether well or ill paid, but some job that would hamshackle
+him at least until the courts rose, if it were but for decency’s sake.’
+
+Peter Drudgeit sympathized, for Peter had a son, who, reason or none,
+would needs exchange the torn and inky fustian sleeves for the blue
+jacket and white lapelle; and he suggested, as the reader knows, the
+engaging our friend Alan in the matter of Poor Peter Peebles, just
+opened by the desertion of young Dumtoustie, whose defection would be at
+the same time concealed; and this, Drudgeit said, ‘would be felling two
+dogs with one stone.’
+
+With these explanations, the reader will hold a man of the elder
+Fairford’s sense and experience free from the hazardous and impatient
+curiosity with which boys fling a puppy into a deep pond, merely to see
+if the creature can swim. However confident in his son’s talents, which
+were really considerable, he would have been very sorry to have involved
+him in the duty of pleading a complicated and difficult case, upon
+his very first appearance at the bar, had he not resorted to it as an
+effectual way to prevent the young man from taking a step which his
+habits of thinking represented as a most fatal one at his outset of
+life.
+
+Betwixt two evils, Mr. Fairford chose that which was in his own
+apprehension the least; and, like a brave officer sending forth his son
+to battle, rather chose he should die upon the breach, than desert the
+conflict with dishonour. Neither did he leave him to his own unassisted
+energies. Like Alpheus preceding Hercules, he himself encountered the
+Augean mass of Peter Peebles’ law-matters. It was to the old man a
+labour of love to place in a clear and undistorted view the real merits
+of this case, which the carelessness and blunders of Peter’s former
+solicitors had converted into a huge chaotic mass of unintelligible
+technicality; and such was his skill and industry, that he was
+able, after the severe toil of two or three days, to present to the
+consideration of the young counsel the principal facts of the case, in
+a light equally simple and comprehensible. With the assistance of a
+solicitor so affectionate and indefatigable, Alan Fairford was enabled,
+then the day of trial arrived, to walk towards the court, attended by
+his anxious yet encouraging parent, with some degree of confidence that
+he would lose no reputation upon this arduous occasion.
+
+They were met at the door of the court by Poor Peter Peebles in his
+usual plenitude of wig and celsitude of hat. He seized on the young
+pleader like a lion on his prey. ‘How is a’ wi’ you, Mr. Alan--how is
+a’ wi’ you, man? The awfu’ day is come at last--a day that will be lang
+minded in this house. Poor Peter Peebles against Plainstanes--conjoined
+proceases--Hearing in presence--stands for the Short Roll for this
+day--I have not been able to sleep for a week for thinking of it, and, I
+dare to say, neither has the Lord President himsell--for such a cause!!
+But your father garr’d me tak a wee drap ower muckle of his pint bottle
+the other night; it’s no right to mix brandy wi’ business, Mr. Fairford.
+I would have been the waur o’ liquor if I would have drank as muckle as
+you twa would have had me. But there’s a time for a’ things, and if
+ye will dine with me after the case is heard, or whilk is the same, or
+maybe better, I’LL gang my ways hame wi’ YOU, and I winna object to a
+cheerfu’ glass, within the bounds of moderation.’
+
+Old Fairford shrugged his shoulders and hurried past the client, saw
+his son wrapped in the sable bombazine, which, in his eyes, was more
+venerable than an archbishop’s lawn, and could not help fondly patting
+his shoulder, and whispering to him to take courage, and show he was
+worthy to wear it. The party entered the Outer Hall of the court, (once
+the place of meeting of the ancient Scottish Parliament), and which
+corresponds to the use of Westminster Hall in England, serving as a
+vestibule to the Inner House, as it is termed, and a place of dominion
+to certain sedentary personages called Lords Ordinary.
+
+The earlier part of the morning was spent by old Fairford in reiterating
+his instructions to Alan, and in running from one person to another,
+from whom he thought he could still glean some grains of information,
+either concerning the point at issue, or collateral cases. Meantime,
+Poor Peter Peebles, whose shallow brain was altogether unable to bear
+the importance of the moment, kept as close to his young counsel as
+shadow to substance, affected now to speak loud, now to whisper in his
+ear, now to deck his ghastly countenance with wreathed smiles, now to
+cloud it with a shade of deep and solemn importance, and anon to contort
+it with the sneer of scorn and derision. These moods of the client’s
+mind were accompanied with singular ‘mockings and mowings,’ fantastic
+gestures, which the man of rags and litigation deemed appropriate to his
+changes of countenance. Now he brandished his arm aloft, now thrust his
+fist straight out, as if to knock his opponent down. Now he laid his
+open palm on his bosom, and now hinging it abroad, he gallantly snapped
+his fingers in the air.
+
+These demonstrations, and the obvious shame and embarrassment of Alan
+Fairford, did not escape the observation of the juvenile idlers in the
+hall. They did not, indeed, approach Peter with their usual familiarity,
+from some feeling of deference towards Fairford, though many accused
+him of conceit in presuming to undertake, at this early stage of his
+practice, a case of considerable difficulty. But Alan, notwithstanding
+this forbearance, was not the less sensible that he and his companion
+were the subjects of many a passing jest, and many a shout of laughter,
+with which that region at all times abounds.
+
+At length the young counsel’s patience gave way, and as it threatened to
+carry his presence of mind and recollection along with it, Alan frankly
+told his father, that unless he was relieved from the infliction of his
+client’s personal presence and instructions, he must necessarily throw
+up his brief, and decline pleading the case.
+
+‘Hush, hush, my dear Alan,’ said the old gentleman, almost at his
+own wit’s end upon hearing this dilemma; ‘dinna mind the silly
+ne’er-do-weel; we cannot keep the man from hearing his own cause, though
+he be not quite right in the head.’
+
+‘On my life, sir,’ answered Alan, ‘I shall be unable to go on, he drives
+everything out of my remembrance; and if I attempt to speak seriously of
+the injuries he has sustained, and the condition he is reduced to, how
+can I expect but that the very appearance of such an absurd scarecrow
+will turn it all into ridicule?’
+
+‘There is something in that,’ said Saunders Fairford, glancing a look
+at Poor Peter, and then cautiously inserting his forefinger under his
+bob-wig, in order to rub his temple and aid his invention; ‘he is no
+figure for the fore-bar to see without laughing; but how to get rid
+of him? To speak sense, or anything like it, is the last thing he will
+listen to. Stay, aye,--Alan, my darling, hae patience; I’ll get him off
+on the instant, like a gowff ba’.’
+
+So saying, he hastened to his ally, Peter Drudgeit, who on seeing him
+with marks of haste in his gait, and care upon his countenance, clapped
+his pen behind his ear, with ‘What’s the stir now, Mr. Saunders? Is
+there aught wrang?’
+
+‘Here’s a dollar, man,’ said Mr. Saunders; ‘now, or never, Peter, do me
+a good turn. Yonder’s your namesake, Peter Peebles, will drive the swine
+through our bonny hanks of yarn; get him over to John’s Coffeehouse,
+man--gie him his meridian--keep him there, drunk or sober, till the
+hearing is ower.’ [The simile is obvious, from the old manufacture of
+Scotland, when the gudewife’s thrift, as the yarn wrought in the winter
+was called, when laid down to bleach by the burn-side, was peculiarly
+exposed to the inroads of pigs, seldom well regulated about a Scottish
+farm-house.]
+
+‘Eneugh said,’ quoth Peter Drudgeit, no way displeased with his own
+share in the service required, ‘We’se do your bidding.’
+
+Accordingly, the scribe was presently seen whispering in the ear of
+Peter Peebles, whose response came forth in the following broken form:--
+
+‘Leave the court for ae minute on this great day of judgement? not I, by
+the Reg--Eh! what? Brandy, did ye say--French brandy?--couldna ye fetch
+a stoup to the bar under your coat, man? Impossible? Nay, if it’s clean
+impossible, and if we have an hour good till they get through the single
+bill and the summar-roll, I carena if I cross the close wi’ you; I am
+sure I need something to keep my heart up this awful day; but I’ll no
+stay above an instant--not above a minute of time--nor drink aboon a
+single gill,’
+
+In a few minutes afterwards, the two Peters were seen moving through the
+Parliament Close (which new-fangled affectation has termed a Square),
+the triumphant Drudgeit leading captive the passive Peebles, whose legs
+conducted him towards the dramshop, while his reverted eyes were
+fixed upon the court. They dived into the Cimmerian abysses of John’s
+Coffeehouse, [See Note 5.] formerly the favourite rendezvous of the
+classical and genial Doctor Pitcairn, and were for the present seen no
+more.
+
+Relieved from his tormentor, Alan Fairford had time to rally his
+recollections, which, in the irritation of his spirits, had nearly
+escaped him, and to prepare himself far a task, the successful discharge
+or failure in which must, he was aware, have the deepest influence upon
+his fortunes. He had pride, was not without a consciousness of talent,
+and the sense of his father’s feelings upon the subject impelled him to
+the utmost exertion. Above all, he had that sort of self-command
+which is essential to success in every arduous undertaking, and he was
+constitutionally free from that feverish irritability by which
+those whose over-active imaginations exaggerate difficulties, render
+themselves incapable of encountering such when they arrive.
+
+Having collected all the scattered and broken associations which were
+necessary, Alan’s thoughts reverted to Dumfriesshire, and the precarious
+situation in which he feared his beloved friend had placed himself; and
+once and again he consulted his watch, eager to have his present task
+commenced and ended, that he might hasten to Darsie’s assistance. The
+hour and moment at length arrived. The macer shouted, with all his
+well-remembered brazen strength of lungs, ‘Poor Peter Peebles VERSUS
+Plainstanes, PER Dumtoustie ET Tough!--Maister Da-a-niel Dumtoustie!’
+Dumtoustie answered not the summons, which, deep and swelling as it was,
+could not reach across the Queensferry; but our Maister Alan Fairford
+appeared in his place.
+
+The court was very much crowded; for much amusement had been received
+on former occasions when Peter had volunteered his own oratory, and
+had been completely successful in routing the gravity of the whole
+procedure, and putting to silence, not indeed the counsel of the
+opposite party, but his own.
+
+Both bench and audience seemed considerably surprised at the juvenile
+appearance of the young man who appeared in the room of Dumtoustie, for
+the purpose of opening this complicated and long depending process, and
+the common herd were disappointed at the absence of Peter the client,
+the Punchinello of the expected entertainment. The judges looked with
+a very favourable countenance on our friend Alan, most of them being
+acquainted, more or less, with so old a practitioner as his father, and
+all, or almost all, affording, from civility, the same fair play to the
+first pleading of a counsel, which the House of Commons yields to the
+maiden speech of one of its members.
+
+Lord Bladderskate was an exception to this general expression of
+benevolence. He scowled upon Alan, from beneath his large, shaggy, grey
+eyebrows, just as if the young lawyer had been usurping his nephew’s
+honours, instead of covering his disgrace; and, from feelings which did
+his lordship little honour, he privately hoped the young man would not
+succeed in the cause which his kinsman had abandoned.
+
+Even Lord Bladderskate, however, was, in spite of himself, pleased with
+the judicious and modest tone in which Alan began his address to the
+court, apologizing for his own presumption, and excusing it by the
+sudden illness of his learned brother, for whom the labour of opening
+a cause of some difficulty and importance had been much more worthily
+designed. He spoke of himself as he really was, and of young Dumtoustie
+as what he ought to have been, taking care not to dwell on either topic
+a moment longer than was necessary. The old judge’s looks became benign;
+his family pride was propitiated, and, pleased equally with the modesty
+and civility of the young man whom he had thought forward and officious,
+he relaxed the scorn of his features into an expression of profound
+attention; the highest compliment, and the greatest encouragement, which
+a judge can render to the counsel addressing him.
+
+Having succeeded in securing the favourable attention of the court,
+the young lawyer, using the lights which his father’s experience and
+knowledge of business had afforded him, proceeded with an address and
+clearness, unexpected from one of his years, to remove from the case
+itself those complicated formalities with which it had been loaded, as a
+surgeon strips from a wound the dressings which had been hastily wrapped
+round it, in order to proceed to his cure SECUNDUM ARTEM. Developed of
+the cumbrous and complicated technicalities of litigation, with which
+the perverse obstinacy of the client, the inconsiderate haste or
+ignorance of his agents, and the evasions of a subtle adversary, had
+invested the process, the cause of Poor Peter Peebles, standing upon
+its simple merits, was no bad subject for the declamation of a young
+counsel, nor did our friend Alan fail to avail himself of its strong
+points.
+
+He exhibited his client as a simple-hearted, honest, well-meaning
+man, who, during a copartnership of twelve years, had gradually become
+impoverished, while his partner (his former clerk) having no funds but
+his share of the same business, into which he had been admitted without
+any advance of stock, had become gradually more and more wealthy.
+
+‘Their association,’ said Alan, and the little flight was received
+with some applause, ‘resembled the ancient story of the fruit which was
+carved with a knife poisoned on one side of the blade only, so that
+the individual to whom the envenomed portion was served, drew decay and
+death from what afforded savour and sustenance to the consumer of the
+other moiety.’ He then plunged boldly into the MARE MAGNUM of accompts
+between the parties; he pursued each false statement from the waste-book
+to the day-book, from the day-book to the bill-book, from the bill-book
+to the ledger; placed the artful interpolations and insertions of the
+fallacious Plainstanes in array against each other, and against the
+fact; and availing himself to the utmost of his father’s previous
+labours, and his own knowledge of accompts, in which he had been
+sedulously trained, he laid before the court a clear and intelligible
+statement of the affairs of the copartnery, showing, with precision,
+that a large balance must, at the dissolution, have been due to his
+client, sufficient to have enabled him to have carried on business on
+his own account, and thus to have retained his situation in society as
+an independent and industrious tradesman. ‘But instead of this justice
+being voluntarily rendered by the former clerk to his former master,--by
+the party obliged to his benefactor,--by one honest man to another,--his
+wretched client had been compelled to follow his quondam clerk, his
+present debtor, from court to court; had found his just claims met with
+well-invented but unfounded counter-claims, had seen his party shift
+his character of pursuer or defender, as often as Harlequin effects his
+transformations, till, in a chase so varied and so long, the unhappy
+litigant had lost substance, reputation, and almost the use of reason
+itself, and came before their lordships an object of thoughtless
+derision to the unreflecting, of compassion to the better-hearted, and
+of awful meditation to every one who considered that, in a country where
+excellent laws were administered by upright and incorruptible judges, a
+man might pursue an almost indisputable claim through all the mazes of
+litigation; lose fortune, reputation, and reason itself in the chase,
+and now come before the supreme court of his country in the wretched
+condition of his unhappy client, a victim to protracted justice, and to
+that hope delayed which sickens the heart.’
+
+The force of this appeal to feeling made as much impression on the Bench
+as had been previously effected by the clearness of Alan’s argument.
+The absurd form of Peter himself, with his tow-wig, was fortunately not
+present to excite any ludicrous emotion, and the pause that took place
+when the young lawyer had concluded his speech, was followed by a murmur
+of approbation, which the ears of his father drank in as the sweetest
+sounds that had ever entered them. Many a hand of gratulation was thrust
+out to his grasp, trembling as it was with anxiety, and finally with
+delight; his voice faltering as he replied, ‘Aye, aye, I kend Alan was
+the lad to make a spoon or spoil a horn.’ [Said of an adventurous gipsy,
+who resolves at all risks to convert a sheep’s horn into a spoon.]
+
+The counsel on the other side arose, an old practitioner, who had noted
+too closely the impression made by Alan’s pleading not to fear the
+consequences of an immediate decision. He paid the highest compliments
+to his very young brother--‘the Benjamin, as he would presume to call
+him, of the learned Faculty--said the alleged hardships of Mr.
+Peebles were compensated by his being placed in a situation where
+the benevolence of their lordships had assigned him gratuitously such
+assistance as he might not otherwise have obtained at a high price--and
+allowed his young brother had put many things in such a new point of
+view, that, although he was quite certain of his ability to refute them,
+he was honestly desirous of having a few hours to arrange his answer,
+in order to be able to follow Mr. Fairford from point to point. He
+had further to observe, there was one point of the case to which
+his brother, whose attention had been otherwise so wonderfully
+comprehensive, had not given the consideration which he expected; it was
+founded on the interpretation of certain correspondence which had passed
+betwixt the parties soon after the dissolution of the copartnery.’
+
+The court having heard Mr. Tough, readily allowed him two days for
+preparing himself, hinting at the same time that he might find his task
+difficult, and affording the young counsel, with high encomiums upon the
+mode in which he had acquitted himself, the choice of speaking,
+either now or at the next calling of the cause, upon the point which
+Plainstanes’s lawyer had adverted to.
+
+Alan modestly apologized for what in fact had been an omission very
+pardonable in so complicated a case, and professed himself instantly
+ready to go through that correspondence, and prove that it was in
+form and substance exactly applicable to the view of the case he had
+submitted to their lordships. He applied to his father, who sat behind
+him, to hand him, from time to time, the letters, in the order in which
+he meant to read and comment upon them.
+
+Old Counsellor Tough had probably formed an ingenious enough scheme to
+blunt the effect of the young lawyer’s reasoning, by thus obliging him
+to follow up a process of reasoning, clear and complete in itself, by
+a hasty and extemporary appendix. If so, he seemed likely to be
+disappointed; for Alan was well prepared on this as on other parts of
+the cause, and recommenced his pleading with a degree of animation which
+added force even to what he had formerly stated, and might perhaps have
+occasioned the old gentleman to regret his having again called him up,
+when his father, as he handed him the letters, put one into his hand
+which produced a singular effect on the pleader.
+
+At the first glance, he saw that the paper had no reference to the
+affairs of Peter Peebles; but the first glance also showed him, what,
+even at that time, and in that presence, he could not help reading; and
+which, being read, seemed totally to disconcert his ideas. He stopped
+short in his harangue--gazed on the paper with a look of surprise and
+horror-uttered an exclamation, and flinging down the brief which he had
+in his hand, hurried out of court without returning a single word of
+answer to the various questions, ‘What was the matter?’--‘Was he taken
+unwell?’--‘Should not a chair be called?’ &c. &c. &c.
+
+The elder Mr. Fairford, who remained seated, and looking as senseless as
+if he had been made of stone, was at length recalled to himself by the
+anxious inquiries of the judges and the counsel after his son’s health.
+He then rose with an air, in which was mingled the deep habitual
+reverence in which he held the court, with some internal cause of
+agitation, and with difficulty mentioned something of a mistake--a piece
+of bad news--Alan, he hoped would be well enough to-morrow. But unable
+to proceed further, he clasped his hands together, exclaiming, ‘My son!
+my son!’ and left the court hastily, as if in pursuit of him.
+
+‘What’s the matter with the auld bitch next?’ [Tradition ascribes this
+whimsical style of language to the ingenious and philosophical Lord
+Kaimes.] said an acute metaphysical judge, though somewhat coarse in
+his manners, aside to his brethren. ‘This is a daft cause,
+Bladderskate--first, it drives the poor man mad that aught it--then your
+nevoy goes daft with fright, and flies the pit--then this smart young
+hopeful is aff the hooks with too hard study, I fancy--and now auld
+Saunders Fairford is as lunatic as the best of them. What say ye till’t,
+ye bitch?’
+
+‘Nothing, my lord,’ answered Bladderskate, much too formal to admire the
+levities in which his philosophical brother sometimes indulged--‘I say
+nothing, but pray to Heaven to keep our own wits.’
+
+‘Amen, amen,’ answered his learned brother; ‘for some of us have but few
+to spare.’
+
+The court then arose, and the audience departed, greatly wondering at
+the talent displayed by Alan Fairford at his first appearance in a case
+so difficult and so complicated, and assigning a hundred conjectural
+causes, each different from the others, for the singular interruption
+which had clouded his day of success. The worst of the whole was, that
+six agents, who had each come to the separate resolution of thrusting a
+retaining fee into Alan’s hand as he left the court, shook their heads
+as they returned the money into their leathern pouches, and said, ‘that
+the lad was clever, but they would like to see more of him before they
+engaged him in the way of business--they did not like his lowping away
+like a flea in a blanket.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Had our friend Alexander Fairford known the consequences of his son’s
+abrupt retreat from the court, which are mentioned in the end of the
+last chapter, it might have accomplished the prediction of the lively
+old judge, and driven him utterly distracted. As it was, he was
+miserable enough. His son had risen ten degrees higher in his estimation
+than ever by his display of juridical talents, which seemed to assure
+him that the applause of the judges and professors of the law, which, in
+his estimation, was worth that of all mankind besides, authorized to
+the fullest extent the advantageous estimate which even his parental
+partiality had been induced to form of Alan’s powers. On the other hand,
+he felt that he was himself a little humbled, from a disguise which he
+had practised towards this son of his hopes and wishes.
+
+The truth was, that on the morning of this eventful day, Mr. Alexander
+Fairford had received from his correspondent and friend, Provost Crosbie
+of Dumfries, a letter of the following tenor:
+
+‘DEAR SIR, ‘Your respected favour of 25th ultimo, per favour of
+Mr. Darsie Latimer, reached me in safety, and I showed to the young
+gentleman such attention as he was pleased to accept of. The object of
+my present writing is twofold. First, the council are of opinion that
+you should now begin to stir in the thirlage cause; and they think they
+will be able, from evidence NOVITER REPERTUM, to enable you to amend
+your condescendence upon the use and wont of the burgh, touching
+the GRANA INVECTA ET ILLATA. So you will please consider yourself as
+authorized to speak to Mr. Pest, and lay before him the papers which you
+will receive by the coach. The council think that a fee of two guineas
+may be sufficient on this occasion, as Mr. Pest had three for drawing
+the original condescendence.
+
+‘I take the opportunity of adding that there has been a great riot among
+the Solway fishermen, who have destroyed, in a masterful manner,
+the stake-nets set up near the mouth of this river; and have besides
+attacked the house of Quaker Geddes, one of the principal partners of
+the Tide-net Fishing Company, and done a great deal of damage. Am sorry
+to add, young Mr. Latimer was in the fray and has not since been heard
+of. Murder is spoke of, but that may be a word of course. As the young
+gentleman has behaved rather oddly while in these parts, as in declining
+to dine with me more than once, and going about the country with
+strolling fiddlers and such-like, I rather hope that his present absence
+is only occasioned by a frolic; but as his servant has been making
+inquiries of me respecting his master, I thought it best to acquaint
+you in course of post. I have only to add that our sheriff has taken
+a precognition, and committed one or two of the rioters. If I can be
+useful in this matter, either by advertising for Mr. Latimer as
+missing, publishing a reward, or otherwise, I will obey your respected
+instructions, being your most obedient to command, ‘WILLIAM CROSBIE.’
+
+When Mr. Fairford received this letter, and had read it to an end,’ his
+first idea was to communicate it to his son, that an express might be
+instantly dispatched, or a king’s messenger sent with proper authority
+to search after his late guest.
+
+The habits of the fishers were rude; as he well knew, though not
+absolutely sanguinary or ferocious; and there had been instances of
+their transporting persons who had interfered in their smuggling trade
+to the Isle of Man and elsewhere, and keeping them under restraint for
+many weeks. On this account, Mr. Fairford was naturally led to
+feel anxiety concerning the fate of his late inmate; and, at a less
+interesting moment, would certainly have set out himself, or licensed
+his son to go in pursuit of his friend.
+
+But, alas! he was both a father and an agent. In the one capacity, he
+looked on his son as dearer to him than all the world besides; in the
+other, the lawsuit which he conducted was to him like an infant to its
+nurse, and the case of Poor Peter Peebles against Plainstanes was, he
+saw, adjourned, perhaps SINE DIE, should this document reach the hands
+of his son. The mutual and enthusiastical affection betwixt the young
+men was well known to him; and he concluded that if the precarious state
+of Latimer were made known to Alan Fairford, it would render him not
+only unwilling, but totally unfit, to discharge the duty of the day to
+which the old gentleman attached such ideas of importance.
+
+On mature reflection, therefore, he resolved, though not without
+some feelings of compunction, to delay communicating to his son the
+disagreeable intelligence which he had received, until the business of
+the day should be ended. The delay, he persuaded himself, could be of
+little consequence to Darsie Latimer, whose folly, he dared to say, had
+led him into some scrape which would meet an appropriate punishment in
+some accidental restraint, which would be thus prolonged for only a few
+hours longer. Besides, he would have time to speak to the sheriff of the
+county--perhaps to the King’s Advocate--and set about the matter in
+a regular manner, or, as he termed it, as summing up the duties of
+a solicitor, to AGE AS ACCORDS. [A Scots law phrase, of no very
+determinate import, meaning, generally, to do what is fitting.]
+
+The scheme, as we have seen, was partially successful, and was only
+ultimately defeated, as he confessed to himself with shame, by his own
+very unbusiness-like mistake of shuffling the provost’s letter, in the
+hurry and anxiety of the morning, among some papers belonging to Peter
+Peebles’s affairs, and then handing it to his son, without observing
+the blunder. He used to protest, even till the day of his death, that he
+never had been guilty of such an inaccuracy as giving a paper out of his
+hand without looking at the docketing, except on that unhappy occasion,
+when, of all others, he had such particular reason to regret his
+negligence.
+
+Disturbed by these reflections, the old gentleman had, for the first
+time in his life, some disinclination, arising from shame and vexation,
+to face his own son; so that to protract for a little the meeting,
+which he feared would be a painful one, he went to wait upon the
+sheriff-depute, who he found had set off for Dumfries in great haste to
+superintend in person the investigation which had been set on foot by
+his substitute. This gentleman’s clerk could say little on the subject
+of the riot, excepting that it had been serious, much damage done to
+property, and some personal violence offered to individuals; but, as far
+as he had yet heard, no lives lost on the spot.
+
+Mr. Fairford was compelled to return home with this intelligence; and
+on inquiring at James Wilkinson where his son was, received for answer,
+that ‘Maister Alan was in his own room, and very busy.’
+
+‘We must have our explanation over,’ said Saunders Fairford to himself.
+‘Better a finger off, as ay wagging;’ and going to the door of his son’s
+apartment, he knocked at first gently--then more loudly--but received
+no answer. Somewhat alarmed at this silence, he opened the door of the
+chamber it was empty--clothes lay mixed in confusion with the law-books
+and papers, as if the inmate had been engaged in hastily packing for a
+journey. As Mr. Fairford looked around in alarm, his eye was arrested
+by a sealed letter lying upon his son’s writing-table, and addressed to
+himself. It contained the following words:--
+
+‘MY DEAREST FATHER, ‘You will not, I trust, be surprised, nor perhaps
+very much displeased, to learn that I am on my way to Dumfriesshire, to
+learn, by my own personal investigation, the present state of my dear
+friend, and afford him such relief as may be in my power, and which, I
+trust, will be effectual. I do not presume to reflect upon you, dearest
+sir, for concealing from me information of so much consequence to my
+peace of mind and happiness; but I hope your having done so will be, if
+not an excuse, at least some mitigation of my present offence, in taking
+a step of consequence without consulting your pleasure; and, I must
+further own, under circumstances which perhaps might lead to your
+disapprobation of my purpose. I can only say, in further apology, that
+if anything unhappy, which Heaven forbid! shall have occurred to the
+person who, next to yourself, is dearest to me in this world, I shall
+have on my heart, as a subject of eternal regret, that being in a
+certain degree warned of his danger and furnished with the means
+of obviating it, I did not instantly hasten to his assistance, but
+preferred giving my attention to the business of this unlucky morning.
+No view of personal distinction, nothing, indeed, short of your earnest
+and often expressed wishes, could have detained me in town till this
+day; and having made this sacrifice to filial duty, I trust you will
+hold me excused if I now obey the calls of friendship and humanity. Do
+not be in the least anxious on my account; I shall know, I trust, how
+to conduct myself with due caution in any emergence which may occur,
+otherwise my legal studies for so many years have been to little
+purpose. I am fully provided with money, and also with arms, in case of
+need; but you may rely on my prudence in avoiding all occasions of using
+the latter, short of the last necessity. God almighty bless you, my
+dearest father! and grant that you may forgive the first, and, I trust,
+the last act approaching towards premeditated disobedience, of which I
+either have now, or shall hereafter have, to accuse myself. I remain,
+till death, your dutiful and affectionate son, ALAN FAIRFORD.’
+
+‘PS.--I shall write with the utmost regularity, acquainting you with my
+motions, and requesting your advice. I trust my stay will be very short,
+and I think it possible that I may bring back Darsie along with me.’
+
+‘The paper dropped from the old man’s hand when he was thus assured
+of the misfortune which he apprehended. His first idea was to get a
+postchaise and pursue the fugitive; but he recollected that, upon the
+very rare occasions when Alan had shown himself indocile to the PATRIA
+POTESTAS, his natural ease and gentleness of disposition seemed hardened
+into obstinacy, and that now, entitled, as arrived at the years of
+majority and a member of the learned faculty, to direct his own motions,
+there was great doubt, whether, in the event of his overtaking his son,
+he might be able to prevail upon him to return back. In such a risk of
+failure he thought it wiser to desist from his purpose, especially as
+even his success in such a pursuit would give a ridiculous ECLAT to the
+whole affair, which could not be otherwise than prejudicial to his son’s
+rising character.
+
+Bitter, however, were Saunders Fairford’s reflections, as again
+picking up the fatal scroll, he threw himself into his son’s leathern
+easy-chair, and bestowed upon it a disjointed commentary, ‘Bring back
+Darsie? little doubt of that--the bad shilling is sure enough to come
+back again. I wish Darsie no worse ill than that he were carried where
+the silly fool, Alan, should never see him again. It was an ill hour
+that he darkened my doors in, for, ever since that, Alan has given up
+his ain old-fashioned mother-wit for the tother’s capernoited maggots
+and nonsense. Provided with money? you must have more than I know of,
+then, my friend, for I trow I kept you pretty short, for your own good.
+Can he have gotten more fees? or, does he think five guineas has neither
+beginning nor end? Arms! What would he do with arms, or what would any
+man do with them that is not a regular soldier under government, or else
+a thief-taker? I have had enough of arms, I trow, although I carried
+them for King George and the government. But this is a worse strait than
+Falkirk field yet. God guide us, we are poor inconsistent creatures! To
+think the lad should have made so able an appearance, and then bolted
+off this gate, after a glaiket ne’er-do-weel, like a hound upon a false
+scent! Las-a-day! it’s a sore thing to see a stunkard cow kick down
+the pail when it’s reaming fou. But, after all, it’s an ill bird that
+defiles its ain nest. I must cover up the scandal as well as I can.
+What’s the matter now, James?’
+
+‘A message, sir,’ said James Wilkinson, ‘from my Lord President; and he
+hopes Mr. Alan is not seriously indisposed.’
+
+‘From the Lord President? the Lord preserve us!--I’ll send an answer
+this instant; bid the lad sit down, and ask him to drink, James. Let me
+see,’ continued he, taking a sheet of gilt paper ‘how we are to draw our
+answers.’
+
+Ere his pen had touched the paper, James was in the room again.
+
+‘What now, James?’
+
+‘Lord Bladderskate’s lad is come to ask how Mr. Alan is, as he left; the
+court’--
+
+‘Aye, aye, aye,’ answered Saunders, bitterly; ‘he has e’en made a
+moonlight flitting, like my lord’s ain nevoy.’
+
+‘Shall I say sae, sir?’ said James, who, as an old soldier, was literal
+in all things touching the service.
+
+‘The devil! no, no!--Bid the lad sit down and taste our ale. I will
+write his lordship an answer.’
+
+Once more the gilt paper was resumed, and once more the door was opened
+by James.
+
+‘Lord ------ sends his servitor to ask after Mr. Alan.’
+
+‘Oh, the deevil take their civility!’ said poor Saunders, set him down
+to drink too--I will write to his lordship.’
+
+‘The lads will bide your pleasure, sir, as lang as I keep the bicker
+fou; but this ringing is like to wear out the bell, I think; there are
+they at it again.’
+
+He answered the fresh summons accordingly, and came back to inform Mr.
+Fairford that the Dean of Faculty was below, inquiring for Mr. Alan.
+‘Will I set him down to drink, too?’ said James.
+
+‘Will you be an idiot, sir?’ said Mr. Fairford. ‘Show Mr. Dean into the
+parlour.’
+
+In going slowly downstairs, step by step, the perplexed man of business
+had time enough to reflect, that if it be possible to put a fair gloss
+upon a true story, the verity always serves the purpose better than any
+substitute which ingenuity can devise. He therefore told his learned
+visitor, that although his son had been incommoded by the heat of the
+court, and the long train of hard study, by day and night, preceding
+his exertions, yet he had fortunately so far recovered, as to be in
+condition to obey upon the instant a sudden summons which had called him
+to the country, on a matter of life and death.
+
+‘It should be a serious matter indeed that takes my young friend away
+at this moment,’ said the good-natured dean. ‘I wish he had stayed to
+finish his pleading, and put down old Tough. Without compliment, Mr.
+Fairford, it was as fine a first appearance as I ever heard. I should
+be sorry your son did not follow it up in a reply. Nothing like striking
+while the iron is hot.’
+
+Mr. Saunders Fairford made a bitter grimace as he acquiesced in an
+opinion which was indeed decidedly his own; but he thought it most
+prudent to reply, ‘that the affair which rendered his son Alan’s
+presence in the country absolutely necessary, regarded the affairs of a
+young gentleman of great fortune, who was a particular friend of Alan’s,
+and who never took any material step in his affairs without consulting
+his counsel learned in the law.’
+
+‘Well, well, Mr. Fairford, you know best,’ answered the learned dean;
+‘if there be death or marriage in the case, a will or a wedding is to
+be preferred to all other business. I am happy Mr. Alan is so much
+recovered as to be able for travel, and wish you a very good morning.’
+
+Having thus taken his ground to the Dean of Faculty, Mr. Fairford
+hastily wrote cards in answer to the inquiry of the three judges,
+accounting for Alan’s absence in the same manner. These, being properly
+sealed and addressed, he delivered to James with directions to dismiss
+the particoloured gentry, who, in the meanwhile, had consumed a gallon
+of twopenny ale, while discussing points of law, and addressing each
+other by their masters’ titles. [The Scottish judges are distinguished
+by the title of lord prefixed to their own temporal designation. As
+the ladies of these official dignitaries do not bear any share in their
+husbands’ honours, they are distinguished only by their lords’ family
+name. They were not always contented with this species of Salique law,
+which certainly is somewhat inconsistent. But their pretensions to title
+are said to have been long since repelled by James V, the sovereign who
+founded the College of Justice. ‘I,’ said he, ‘made the caries lords,
+but who the devil made the carlines ladies?’]
+
+The exertion which these matters demanded, and the interest which so
+many persons of legal distinction appeared to have taken in his
+son, greatly relieved the oppressed spirit of Saunders Fairford, who
+continued, to talk mysteriously of the very important business which had
+interfered with his son’s attendance during the brief remainder of the
+session. He endeavoured to lay the same unction to his own heart; but
+here the application was less fortunate, for his conscience told him
+that no end, however important, which could be achieved in Darsie
+Latimer’s affairs, could be balanced against the reputation which Alan
+was like to forfeit by deserting the cause of Poor Peter Peebles.
+
+In the meanwhile, although the haze which surrounded the cause, or
+causes, of that unfortunate litigant had been for a time dispelled by
+Alan’s eloquence, like a fog by the thunder of artillery, yet it seemed
+once more to settle down upon the mass of litigation, thick as the
+palpable darkness of Egypt, at the very sound of Mr. Tough’s voice, who,
+on the second day after Alan’s departure, was heard in answer to the
+opening counsel. Deep-mouthed, long-breathed, and pertinacious, taking
+a pinch of snuff betwixt every sentence, which otherwise seemed
+interminable--the veteran pleader prosed over all the themes which had
+been treated so luminously by Fairford: he quietly and imperceptibly
+replaced all the rubbish which the other had cleared away, and succeeded
+in restoring the veil of obscurity and unintelligibility which had for
+many years darkened the case of Peebles against Plainstanes; and
+the matter was once more hung up by a remit to an accountant, with
+instruction to report before answer. So different a result from that
+which the public had been led to expect from Alan’s speech gave rise to
+various speculations.
+
+The client himself opined, that it was entirely owing, first, to his
+own absence during the first day’s pleading, being, as he said,
+deboshed with brandy, usquebaugh, and other strong waters, at John’s
+Coffee-house, PER AMBAGES of Peter Drudgeit, employed to that effect by
+and through the device, counsel, and covyne of Saunders Fairford,
+his agent, or pretended agent. Secondly by the flight and voluntary
+desertion of the younger Fairford, the advocate; on account of which, he
+served both father and son with a petition and complaint against them,
+for malversation in office. So that the apparent and most probable issue
+of this cause seemed to menace the melancholy Mr. Saunders Fairford,
+with additional subject for plague and mortification; which was the more
+galling, as his conscience told him that the case was really given away,
+and that a very brief resumption of the former argument, with reference
+to the necessary authorities and points of evidence, would have enabled
+Alan, by the mere breath, as it were, of his mouth, to blow away the
+various cobwebs with which Mr. Tough had again invested the proceedings.
+But it went, he said, just like a decreet in absence, and was lost for
+want of a contradictor.
+
+In the meanwhile, nearly a week passed over without Mr. Fairford hearing
+a word directly from his son. He learned, indeed, by a letter from Mr.
+Crosbie, that the young counsellor had safely reached Dumfries, but had
+left that town upon some ulterior researches, the purpose of which
+he had not communicated. The old man, thus left to suspense, and to
+mortifying recollections, deprived also of the domestic society to which
+he had been habituated, began to suffer in body as well as in mind. He
+had formed the determination of setting out in person for Dumfriesshire,
+when, after having been dogged, peevish, and snappish to his clerks and
+domestics, to an unusual and almost intolerable degree, the acrimonious
+humours settled in a hissing-hot fit of the gout, which is a well-known
+tamer of the most froward spirits, and under whose discipline we shall,
+for the present, leave him, as the continuation of this history assumes,
+with the next division, a form somewhat different from direct narrative
+and epistolary correspondence, though partaking of the character of
+both.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+JOURNAL OF DARSIE LATIMER (The following address is written on the
+inside of the envelope which contained the Journal.)
+
+Into what hands soever these leaves may fall, they will instruct
+him, during a certain time at least, in the history of the life of an
+unfortunate young man, who, in the heart of a free country, and without
+any crime being laid to his charge, has been, and is, subjected to a
+course of unlawful and violent restraint. He who opens this letter, is
+therefore conjured to apply to the nearest magistrate, and, following
+such indications as the papers may afford, to exert himself for the
+relief of one, who, while he possesses every claim to assistance
+which oppressed innocence can give, has, at the same time, both the
+inclination and the means of being grateful to his deliverers. Or, if
+the person obtaining these letters shall want courage or means to effect
+the writer’s release, he is, in that case, conjured, by every duty of a
+man to his fellow mortals, and of a Christian towards one who professes
+the same holy faith, to take the speediest measures for conveying them
+with speed and safety to the hands of Alan Fairford, Esq., Advocate,
+residing in the family of his father, Alexander Fairford, Esq., Writer
+to the Signet, Brown’s Square, Edinburgh. He may be assured of a liberal
+reward, besides the consciousness of having discharged a real duty to
+humanity.
+
+MY DEAREST ALAN, Feeling as warmly towards you in doubt and in distress,
+as I ever did in the brightest days of our intimacy, it is to you whom
+I address a history which may perhaps fall into very different hands. A
+portion of my former spirit descends to my pen when I write your name,
+and indulging the happy thought that you may be my deliverer from my
+present uncomfortable and alarming situation, as you have been my guide
+and counsellor on every former occasion, I will subdue the dejection
+which would otherwise overwhelm me. Therefore, as, Heaven knows, I have
+time enough to write, I will endeavour to pour my thoughts out, as fully
+and freely as of old, though probably without the same gay and happy
+levity.
+
+If the papers should reach other hands than yours, still I will not
+regret this exposure of my feelings; for, allowing for an ample share of
+the folly incidental to youth and inexperience, I fear not that I have
+much to be ashamed of in my narrative; nay, I even hope that the open
+simplicity and frankness with which I am about to relate every singular
+and distressing circumstance, may prepossess even a stranger in my
+favour; and that, amid the multitude of seemingly trivial circumstances
+which I detail at length, a clue may be found to effect my liberation.
+
+Another chance certainly remains--the Journal, as I may call it,
+may never reach the hands, either of the dear friend to whom it is
+addressed, or those of an indifferent stranger, but may become the prey
+of the persons by whom I am at present treated as a prisoner. Let it be
+so--they will learn from it little but what they already know; that,
+as a man and an Englishman, my soul revolts at the usage which I have
+received; that I am determined to essay every possible means to obtain
+my freedom; that captivity has not broken my spirit, and that, although
+they may doubtless complete their oppression by murder, I am still
+willing to bequeath my cause to the justice of my country. Undeterred,
+therefore, by the probability that my papers may be torn from me, and
+subjected to the inspection of one in particular, who, causelessly
+my enemy already, may be yet further incensed at me for recording the
+history of my wrongs, I proceed to resume the history of events which
+have befallen me since the conclusion of my last letter to my dear Alan
+Fairford, dated, if I mistake not, on the 5th day of this still current
+month of August.
+
+Upon the night preceding the date of that letter, I had been present,
+for the purpose of an idle frolic, at a dancing party at the village of
+Brokenburn, about six miles from Dumfries; many persons must have seen
+me there, should the fact appear of importance sufficient to require
+investigation. I danced, played on the violin, and took part in the
+festivity till about midnight, when my servant, Samuel Owen, brought me
+my horses, and I rode back to a small inn called Shepherd’s Bush, kept
+by Mrs. Gregson, which had been occasionally my residence for about a
+fortnight past. I spent the earlier part of the forenoon in writing a
+letter, which I have already mentioned, to you, my dear Alan, and which,
+I think, you must have received in safety. Why did I not follow your
+advice, so often given me? Why did I linger in the neighbourhood of a
+danger, of which a kind voice had warned me? These are now unavailing
+questions; I was blinded by a fatality, and remained, fluttering like a
+moth around the candle, until I have been scorched to some purpose.
+
+The greater part of the day had passed, and time hung heavy on my hands.
+I ought, perhaps, to blush at recollecting what has been often objected
+to me by the dear friend to whom this letter is addressed, viz. the
+facility with which I have, in moments of indolence, suffered my motions
+to be, directed by any person who chanced to be near me, instead of
+taking the labour of thinking or deciding for myself. I had employed for
+some time, as a sort of guide and errand-boy, a lad named Benjamin, the
+son of one widow Coltherd, who lives near the Shepherd’s Bush, and I
+cannot but remember that, upon several occasions, I had of late suffered
+him to possess more influence over my motions than at all became the
+difference of our age and condition. At present, he exerted himself to
+persuade me that it was the finest possible sport to see the fish taken
+out from the nets placed in the Solway at the reflux of the tide, and
+urged my going thither this evening so much, that, looking back on the
+whole circumstances, I cannot but think he had some especial motive for
+his conduct. These particulars I have mentioned, that if these papers
+fall into friendly hands, the boy may be sought after and submitted to
+examination.
+
+His eloquence being unable to persuade me that I should take any
+pleasure in seeing the fruitless struggles of the fish when left in the
+nets and deserted by the tide, he artfully suggested, that Mr. and Miss
+Geddes, a respectable Quaker family well known in the neighbourhood
+and with whom I had contracted habits of intimacy, would possibly be
+offended if I did not make them an early visit. Both, he said, had been
+particularly inquiring the reasons of my leaving their house rather
+suddenly on the previous day. I resolved, therefore, to walk up to Mount
+Sharon and make my apologies; and I agreed to permit the boy to attend
+upon me, and wait my return from the house, that I might fish on my way
+homeward to Shepherd’s Bush, for which amusement, he assured me, I would
+find the evening most favourable. I mention this minute circumstance,
+because I strongly suspect that this boy had a presentiment how the
+evening was to terminate with me, and entertained the selfish though
+childish wish of securing to himself an angling-rod which he had often
+admired, as a part of my spoils. I may do the boy wrong, but I had
+before remarked in him the peculiar art of pursuing the trifling objects
+of cupidity proper to his age, with the systematic address of much riper
+years.
+
+When we had commenced our walk, I upbraided him with the coolness of
+the evening, considering the season, the easterly wind, and other
+circumstances, unfavourable for angling. He persisted in his own story,
+and made a few casts, as if to convince me of my error, but caught
+no fish; and, indeed, as I am now convinced, was much more intent on
+watching my motions than on taking any. When I ridiculed him once more
+on his fruitless endeavours, he answered with a sneering smile, that
+‘the trouts would not rise, because there was thunder in the air;’ an
+intimation which, in one sense, I have found too true.
+
+I arrived at Mount Sharon; was received by my friends there with their
+wonted kindness; and after being a little rallied on my having suddenly
+left them on the preceding evening, I agreed to make atonement
+by staying all night, and dismissed the lad who attended with my
+fishing-rod, to carry that information to Shepherd’s Bush. It may be
+doubted whether he went thither, or in a different direction.
+
+Betwixt eight and nine o’clock, when it began to become dark, we walked
+on the terrace to enjoy the appearance of the firmament, glittering with
+ten million stars; to which a slight touch of early frost gave tenfold
+lustre. As we gazed on this splendid scene, Miss Geddes, I think, was
+the first to point out to our admiration a shooting or falling star,
+which, she said, drew a long train after it. Looking to the part of
+the heavens which she pointed out, I distinctly observed two successive
+sky-rockets arise and burst in the sky.
+
+‘These meteors,’ said Mr. Geddes, in answer to his sister’s observation,
+‘are not formed in heaven, nor do they bode any good to the dwellers
+upon earth.’
+
+As he spoke, I looked to another quarter of the sky, and a rocket, as if
+a signal in answer to those which had already appeared, rose high from
+the earth, and burst apparently among the stars.
+
+Mr. Geddes seemed very thoughtful for some minutes, and then said to
+his sister, ‘Rachel, though it waxes late. I must go down to the fishing
+station, and pass the night in the overseer’s room there.’
+
+‘Nay, then,’ replied the lady, ‘I am but too well assured that the sons
+of Belial are menacing these nets and devices. Joshua, art thou a man of
+peace, and wilt thou willingly and wittingly thrust thyself where thou
+mayst be tempted by the old man Adam within thee, to enter into debate
+and strife?’
+
+‘I am a man of peace, Rachel,’ answered Mr. Geddes, ‘even to the utmost
+extent which our friends can demand of humanity; and neither have I ever
+used, nor, with the help of God, will I at any future time employ, the
+arm of flesh to repel or to revenge injuries. But if I can, by mild
+reasons and firm conduct, save those rude men from committing a crime,
+and the property belonging to myself and others from sustaining damage,
+surely I do but the duty of a man and a Christian.’
+
+With these words, he ordered his horse instantly; and his sister,
+ceasing to argue with him, folded her arms upon her bosom, and looked up
+to heaven with a resigned and yet sorrowful countenance.
+
+These particulars may appear trivial; but it is better, in my present
+condition, to exert my faculties in recollecting the past, and in
+recording it, than waste them in vain and anxious anticipations of the
+future.
+
+It would have been scarcely proper in me to remain in the house from
+which the master was thus suddenly summoned away; and I therefore begged
+permission to attend him to the fishing station, assuring his sister
+that I would be a guarantee for his safety.
+
+That proposal seemed to give much pleasure to Miss Geddes. ‘Let it be
+so, brother,’ she said; ‘and let the young man have the desire of his
+heart, that there may be a faithful witness to stand by thee in the hour
+of need, and to report how it shall fare with thee.
+
+‘Nay, Rachel,’ said the worthy man, ‘thou art to blame in this, that
+to quiet thy apprehensions on my account, thou shouldst thrust into
+danger--if danger it shall prove to be--this youth, our guest; for
+whom, doubtless, in case of mishap, as many hearts will ache as may be
+afflicted on our account.’
+
+‘No, my good friend,’ said I, taking Mr. Geddes’s hand, ‘I am not so
+happy as you suppose me. Were my span to be concluded this evening, few
+would so much as know that such a being had existed for twenty years on
+the face of the earth; and of these few, only one would sincerely regret
+me. Do not, therefore, refuse me the privilege attending you; and of
+showing, by so trifling an act of kindness, that if I have few friends,
+I am at least desirous to serve them.’
+
+‘Thou hast a kind heart, I warrant thee,’ said Joshua Geddes, returning
+the pressure of my hand. ‘Rachel, the young man shall go with me. Why
+should he not face danger, in order to do justice and preserve peace?
+There is that within me,’ he added, looking upwards, and with a passing
+enthusiasm which I had not before observed and the absence of
+which perhaps rather belonged to the sect than to his own personal
+character--‘I say, I have that within which assures me, that though the
+ungodly may rage even like the storm of the ocean, they shall not have
+freedom to prevail against us.’
+
+Having spoken thus, Mr. Geddes appointed a pony to be saddled for my
+use; and having taken a basket with some provisions, and a servant
+to carry back the horses for which there was no accommodation at the
+fishing station, we set off about nine o’clock at night, and after
+three-quarters of an hour’s riding, arrived at our place of destination.
+
+The station consists, or then consisted, of huts for four or five
+fishermen, a cooperage and shed, and a better sort of cottage at which
+the superintendent resided. We gave our horses to the servant, to be
+carried back to Mount Sharon; my companion expressing himself humanely
+anxious for their safety--and knocked at the door of the house. At
+first we only heard a barking of dogs; but these animals became quiet on
+snuffing beneath the door, and acknowledging the presence of friends. A
+hoarse voice then demanded, in rather unfriendly accents, who we were,
+and what we wanted and it was not; until Joshua named himself, and
+called upon his superintendent to open, that the latter appeared at the
+door of the hut, attended by three large dogs of the Newfoundland breed.
+He had a flambeau in his hand, and two large heavy ship-pistols stuck
+into his belt. He was a stout elderly man, who had been a sailor, as I
+learned, during the earlier part of his life, and was now much confided
+in by the Fishing Company, whose concerns he directed under the orders
+of Mr. Geddes.
+
+‘Thou didst not expect me to-night, friend Davies?’ said my friend to
+the old man, who was arranging seats for us by the fire.
+
+‘No, Master Geddes,’ answered he, ‘I did not expect you, nor, to speak
+the truth, did I wish for you either.’
+
+‘These are plain terms: John Davies,’ answered Mr. Geddes.
+
+‘Aye, aye, sir, I know your worship loves no holiday speeches.’
+
+‘Thou dost guess, I suppose, what brings us here so late, John Davies?’
+said Mr. Geddes.
+
+‘I do suppose, sir,’ answered the superintendent, ‘that it was because
+those d--d smuggling wreckers on the coast are showing their lights to
+gather their forces, as they did the night before they broke down the
+dam-dyke and weirs up the country; but if that same be the case, I wish
+once more you had stayed away, for your worship carries no fighting
+tackle aboard, I think; and there will be work for such ere morning,
+your worship.’
+
+‘Worship is due to Heaven only, John Davies,’ said Geddes, ‘I have often
+desired thee to desist from using that phrase to me.’
+
+‘I won’t, then,’ said John; ‘no offence meant: But how the devil can a
+man stand picking his words, when he is just going to come to blows?’
+
+‘I hope not, John Davies,’ said Joshua Geddes. ‘Call in the rest of the
+men, that I may give them their instructions.’
+
+‘I may cry till doomsday Master Geddes, ere a soul answers--the cowardly
+lubbers have all made sail--the cooper, and all the rest of them, so
+soon as they heard the enemy were at sea. They have all taken to the
+long-boat, and left the ship among the breakers, except little Phil and
+myself--they have, by--!’
+
+‘Swear not at all, John Davies--thou art an honest man; and I believe,
+without an oath, that thy comrades love their own bones better than
+my goods and chattels. And so thou hast no assistance but little Phil
+against a hundred men or two?’
+
+‘Why, there are the dogs, your honour knows, Neptune and Thetis--and
+the puppy may do something; and then though your worship--I beg
+pardon--though your honour be no great fighter, this young gentleman may
+bear a hand.’
+
+‘Aye, and I see you are provided with arms,’ said Mr. Geddes; ‘let me
+see them.’
+
+‘Aye, aye, sir; here be a pair of buffers will bite as well as
+bark--these will make sure of two rogues at least. It would be a shame
+to strike without firing a shot. Take care, your honour, they are
+double-shotted.’
+
+‘Aye, John Davies, I will take care of them, throwing the pistols into a
+tub of water beside him; ‘and I wish I could render the whole generation
+of them useless at the same moment.’
+
+A deep shade of displeasure passed over John Davies’s weatherbeaten
+countenance. ‘Belike your honour is going to take the command yourself,
+then?’ he said, after a pause. ‘Why, I can be of little use now; and
+since your worship, or your honour, or whatever you are, means to strike
+quietly, I believe you will do it better without me than with me, for I
+am like enough to make mischief, I admit; but I’ll never leave my post
+without orders.’
+
+‘Then you have mine, John Davies, to go to Mount Sharon directly, and
+take the boy Phil with you. Where is he?’
+
+‘He is on the outlook for these scums of the earth,’ answered Davies;
+‘but it is to no purpose to know when they come, if we are not to stand
+to our weapons.’
+
+‘We will use none but those of sense and reason, John.’
+
+‘And you may just as well cast chaff against the wind, as speak sense
+and reason to the like of them.’
+
+‘Well, well, be it so,’ said Joshua; ‘and now, John Davies, I know thou
+art what the world calls a brave fellow, and I have ever found thee an
+honest one. And now I command you to go to Mount Sharon, and let Phil
+lie on the bank-side--see the poor boy hath a sea-cloak, though--and
+watch what happens there, and let him bring you the news; and if
+any violence shall be offered to the property there, I trust to your
+fidelity to carry my sister to Dumfries to the house of our friends
+the Corsacks, and inform the civil authorities of what mischief hath
+befallen.’
+
+The old seaman paused a moment. ‘It is hard lines for me,’ he said, ‘to
+leave your honour in tribulation; and yet, staying here, I am only like
+to make bad worse; and your honour’s sister, Miss Rachel, must be looked
+to, that’s certain; for if the rogues once get their hand to mischief,
+they will come to Mount Sharon after they have wasted and destroyed this
+here snug little roadstead, where I thought to ride at anchor for life.’
+
+‘Right, right, John Davies,’ said Joshua Geddes; ‘and best call the dogs
+with you.’
+
+‘Aye, aye, sir,’ said the veteran, ‘for they are something of my mind,
+and would not keep quiet if they saw mischief doing; so maybe they might
+come to mischief, poor dumb creatures. So God bless your honour--I
+mean your worship--I cannot bring my mouth to say fare you well. Here,
+Neptune, Thetis! come, dogs, come.’
+
+So saying, and with a very crestfallen countenance, John Davies left the
+hut.
+
+‘Now there goes one of the best and most faithful creatures that ever
+was born,’ said Mr. Geddes, as the superintendent shut the door of the
+cottage. ‘Nature made him with a heart that would not have suffered him
+to harm a fly; but thou seest, friend Latimer, that as men arm their
+bull-dogs with spiked collars, and their game-cocks with steel spurs, to
+aid them in fight, so they corrupt, by education, the best and mildest
+natures, until fortitude and spirit become stubbornness and ferocity.
+Believe me, friend Latimer, I would as soon expose my faithful household
+dog to a vain combat with a herd of wolves, as yon trusty creature to
+the violence of the enraged multitude. But I need say little on this
+subject to thee, friend Latimer, who, I doubt not, art trained to
+believe that courage is displayed and honour attained, not by doing
+and suffering as becomes a man that which fate calls us to suffer and
+justice commands us to do, but because thou art ready to retort violence
+for violence, and considerest the lightest insult as a sufficient cause
+for the spilling of blood, nay, the taking of life. But, leaving these
+points of controversy to a more fit season, let us see what our basket
+of provision contains; for in truth, friend Latimer, I am one of those
+whom neither fear nor anxiety deprives of their ordinary appetite.’
+
+We found the means of good cheer accordingly, which Mr. Geddes seemed to
+enjoy as much as if it had been eaten in a situation of perfect safety;
+nay, his conversation appeared to be rather more gay than on ordinary
+occasions. After eating our supper, we left the hut together, and walked
+for a few minutes on the banks of the sea. It was high water, and the
+ebb had not yet commenced. The moon shone broad and bright upon the
+placid face of the Solway Firth, and showed a slight ripple upon the
+stakes, the tops of which were just visible above the waves, and on
+the dark-coloured buoys which marked the upper edge of the enclosure of
+nets. At a much greater distance--for the estuary is here very wide--the
+line of the English coast was seen on the verge of the water, resembling
+one of those fog-banks on which mariners are said to gaze, uncertain
+whether it be land or atmospherical delusion.
+
+‘We shall be undisturbed for some hours,’ said Mr. Geddes; ‘they will
+not come down upon us: till the state of the tide permits them to
+destroy the tide-nets. Is it not strange to think that human passions
+will so soon transform such a tranquil scene as this into one of
+devastation and confusion?’
+
+It was indeed a scene of exquisite stillness; so much so, that the
+restless waves of the Solway seemed, if not absolutely to sleep, at
+least to slumber; on the shore no night-bird was heard--the cock had not
+sung his first matins, and we ourselves walked more lightly than by day,
+as if to suit the sounds of our own paces to the serene tranquillity
+around us. At length, the plaintive cry of a dog broke the silence, and
+on our return to the cottage, we found that the younger of the three
+animals which had gone along with John Davies, unaccustomed, perhaps,
+to distant journeys, and the duty of following to heel, had strayed from
+the party, and, unable to rejoin them, had wandered back to the place of
+its birth.
+
+‘Another feeble addition to our feeble garrison,’ said Mr. Geddes, as he
+caressed the dog, and admitted it into the cottage. ‘Poor thing! as thou
+art incapable of doing any mischief, I hope thou wilt sustain none. At
+least thou mayst do us the good service of a sentinel, and permit us to
+enjoy a quiet repose, under the certainty that thou wilt alarm us when
+the enemy is at hand.’
+
+There were two beds in the superintendent’s room, upon which we threw
+ourselves. Mr. Geddes, with his happy equanimity of temper, was asleep
+in the first five minutes. I lay for some time in doubtful and anxious
+thoughts, watching the fire, and the motions of the restless dog, which,
+disturbed probably at the absence of John Davies, wandered from the
+hearth to the door and back again, then came to the bedside and licked
+my hands and face, and at length, experiencing no repulse to its
+advances, established itself at my feet, and went to sleep, an example
+which I soon afterwards followed.
+
+The rage of narration, my dear Alan--for I will never relinquish the
+hope that what I am writing may one day reach your hands--has
+not forsaken me, even in my confinement, and the extensive though
+unimportant details into which I have been hurried, renders it necessary
+that I commence another sheet. Fortunately, my pygmy characters
+comprehend a great many words within a small space of paper.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+DARSIE LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+The morning was dawning, and Mr. Geddes and I myself were still sleeping
+soundly, when the alarm was given by my canine bedfellow, who first
+growled deeply at intervals, and at length bore more decided testimony
+to the approach of some enemy. I opened the door of the cottage, and
+perceived, at the distance of about two hundred yards, a small but close
+column of men, which I would have taken for a dark hedge, but that I
+could perceive it was advancing rapidly and in silence.
+
+The dog flew towards them, but instantly ran howling back to me, having
+probably been chastised by a stick or a stone. Uncertain as to the plan
+of tactics or of treaty which Mr. Geddes might think proper to adopt, I
+was about to retire into the cottage, when he suddenly joined me at the
+door, and, slipping his arm through mine, said, ‘Let us go to meet them
+manfully; we have done nothing to be ashamed of.--Friends,’ he said,
+raising his voice as we approached them, ‘who and what are you, and with
+what purpose are you here on my property?’
+
+A loud cheer was the answer returned, and a brace of fiddlers who
+occupied the front of the march immediately struck up the insulting air,
+the words of which begin--
+
+  Merrily danced the Quaker’s wife,
+  And merrily danced the Quaker.
+
+Even at that moment of alarm, I think I recognized the tones of the
+blind fiddler, Will, known by the name of Wandering Willie, from his
+itinerant habits. They continued to advance swiftly and in great order,
+in their front
+
+  The fiery fiddlers playing martial airs;
+
+when, coming close up, they surrounded us by a single movement, and
+there was a universal cry, ‘Whoop, Quaker--whoop, Quaker! Here have we
+them both, the wet Quaker and the dry one.’
+
+‘Hang up the wet Quaker to dry, and wet the dry one with a ducking,’
+answered another voice.
+
+‘Where is the sea-otter, John Davies, that destroyed more fish than any
+sealch upon Ailsa Craig?’ exclaimed a third voice. ‘I have an old crow
+to pluck with him, and a pock to put the feathers in.’
+
+We stood perfectly passive; for, to have attempted resistance against
+more than a hundred men, armed with guns, fish-spears, iron-crows,
+spades, and bludgeons, would have been an act of utter insanity. Mr.
+Geddes, with his strong sonorous voice, answered the question about the
+superintendent in a manner the manly indifference of which compelled
+them to attend to him.
+
+‘John Davies,’ he said, ‘will, I trust, soon be at Dumfries’--
+
+‘To fetch down redcoats and dragoons against us, you canting old
+villain!’
+
+A blow was, at the same time, levelled at my friend, which I parried by
+interposing the stick I had in my hand. I was instantly struck down, and
+have a faint recollection of hearing some crying, ‘Kill the young spy!’
+and others, as I thought, interposing on my behalf. But a second blow
+on the head, received in the scuffle, soon deprived me of sense and
+consciousness, and threw me into it state of insensibility, from which
+I did not recover immediately. When I did come to myself, I was lying
+on the bed from which I had just risen before the fray, and my poor
+companion, the Newfoundland puppy, its courage entirely cowed by the
+tumult of the riot, had crept as close to me as it could, and lay
+trembling and whining, as if under the most dreadful terror. I doubted
+at first whether I had not dreamed of the tumult, until, as I attempted
+to rise, a feeling of pain and dizziness assured me that the injury
+I had sustained was but too real. I gathered together my senses
+listened--and heard at a distance the shouts of the rioters, busy,
+doubtless, in their work of devastation. I made a second effort to rise,
+or at least to turn myself, for I lay with my face to the wall of
+the cottage, but I found that my limbs were secured, and my motions
+effectually prevented--not indeed by cords, but by linen or cloth
+bandages swathed around my ankles, and securing my arms to my sides.
+Aware of my utterly captive condition, I groaned betwixt bodily pain and
+mental distress,
+
+A voice by my bedside whispered, in a whining tone, ‘Whisht a-ye,
+hinnie--Whisht a-ye; haud your tongue, like a gude bairn--ye have cost
+us dear aneugh already. My hinnie’s clean gane now.’
+
+Knowing, as I thought, the phraseology of the wife of the itinerant
+musician, I asked her where her husband was, and whether he had been
+hurt.
+
+‘Broken,’ answered the dame, ‘all broken to pieces; fit for naught but
+to be made spunks of--the best blood that was in Scotland.’
+
+‘Broken?--blood?--is your husband wounded; has there been bloodshed
+broken limbs?’
+
+‘Broken limbs I wish,’ answered the beldam, ‘that my hinnie had broken
+the best bane in his body, before he had broken his fiddle, that was the
+best blood in Scotland--it was a Cremony, for aught that I ken.’
+
+‘Pshaw--only his fiddle?’ said I.
+
+‘I dinna ken what waur your honour could have wished him to do, unless
+he had broken his neck; and this is muckle the same to my hinnie Willie
+and me. Chaw, indeed! It is easy to say chaw, but wha is to gie us ony
+thing to chaw?--the bread-winner’s gane, and we may e’en sit down and
+starve.’
+
+‘No, no,’ I said, ‘I will pay you for twenty such fiddles.’
+
+‘Twenty such! is that a’ ye ken about it? the country hadna the like
+o’t. But if your honour were to pay us, as nae doubt wad be to your
+credit here and hereafter, where are ye to get the siller?’
+
+‘I have enough of money,’ said I, attempting to reach my hand towards my
+side-pocket; ‘unloose these bandages, and I will pay you on the spot.’
+
+This hint appeared to move her, and she was approaching the bedside, as
+I hoped, to liberate me from my bonds, when a nearer and more desperate
+shout was heard, as if the rioters were close by the hut.
+
+‘I daurna I daurna,’ said the poor woman, ‘they would murder me and my
+hinnie Willie baith, and they have misguided us aneugh already;--but if
+there is anything worldly I could do for your honour, leave out loosing
+ye?’
+
+What she said recalled me to my bodily suffering. Agitation, and the
+effects of the usage I had received, had produced a burning thirst. I
+asked for a drink of water.
+
+‘Heaven Almighty forbid that Epps Ainslie should gie ony sick gentleman
+cauld well-water, and him in a fever. Na, na, hinnie, let me alane, I’ll
+do better for ye than the like of that.’
+
+‘Give me what you will,’ I replied; ‘let it but be liquid and cool.’
+
+The woman gave me a large horn accordingly, filled with spirits and
+water, which, without minute inquiry concerning the nature of its
+contents, I drained at a draught. Either the spirits taken in such a
+manner acted more suddenly than usual on my brain, or else there was
+some drug mixed with the beverage. I remember little after drinking it
+off, only that the appearance of things around me became indistinct;
+that the woman’s form seemed to multiply itself, and to flit in various
+figures around me, bearing the same lineaments as she herself did. I
+remember also that the discordant noises and cries of those without the
+cottage seemed to die away in a hum like that with which a nurse hushes
+her babe. At length I fell into a deep sound sleep, or rather, a state
+of absolute insensibility.
+
+I have reason to think this species of trance lasted for many hours;
+indeed, for the whole subsequent day and part of the night. It was not
+uniformly so profound, for my recollection of it is chequered with many
+dreams, all of a painful nature, but too faint and too indistinct to be
+remembered. At length the moment of waking came, and my sensations were
+horrible.
+
+A deep sound, which, in the confusion of my senses, I identified with
+the cries of the rioters, was the first thing of which I was sensible;
+next, I became conscious that I was carried violently forward in some
+conveyance, with an unequal motion, which gave me much pain. My position
+was horizontal, and when I attempted to stretch my hands in order to
+find some mode of securing myself against this species of suffering, I
+found I was bound as before, and the horrible reality rushed on my
+mind that I was in the hands of those who had lately committed a great
+outrage on property, and were now about to kidnap, if not to murder me.
+I opened my eyes, it was to no purpose--all around me was dark, for
+a day had passed over during my captivity. A dispiriting sickness
+oppressed my head--my heart seemed on fire, while my feet and hands were
+chilled and benumbed with want of circulation. It was with the utmost
+difficulty that I at length, and gradually, recovered in a sufficient
+degree the power of observing external sounds and circumstances; and
+when I did so, they presented nothing consolatory.
+
+Groping with my hands, as far as the bandages would permit, and
+receiving the assistance of some occasional glances of the moonlight, I
+became aware that the carriage in which I was transported was one of the
+light carts of the country, called TUMBLERS, and that a little attention
+had been paid to my accommodation, as I was laid upon some sacks covered
+with matting, and filled with straw. Without these, my condition would
+have been still more intolerable, for the vehicle, sinking now on one
+side, and now on the other, sometimes sticking absolutely fast and
+requiring the utmost exertions of the animal which drew it to put it
+once more in motion, was subjected to jolts in all directions, which
+were very severe. At other times it rolled silently and smoothly over
+what seemed to be wet sand; and, as I heard the distant roar of the
+tide, I had little doubt that we were engaged in passing the formidable
+estuary which divides the two kingdoms.
+
+There seemed to be at least five or six people about the cart, some on
+foot, others on horseback; the former lent assistance whenever it was in
+danger of upsetting, or sticking fast in the quicksand; the others rode
+before and acted as guides, often changing the direction of the vehicle
+as the precarious state of the passage required.
+
+I addressed myself to the men around the cart, and endeavoured to move
+their compassion. I had harmed, I said, no one, and for no action in my
+life had deserved such cruel treatment, I had no concern whatever in
+the fishing station which had incurred their displeasure, and my
+acquaintance with Mr. Geddes was of a very late date. Lastly, and as my
+strongest argument, I endeavoured to excite their fears, by informing
+them that my rank in life would not permit me to be either murdered or
+secreted with impunity; and to interest their avarice, by the promises
+I made them of reward, if they would effect my deliverance. I only
+received a scornful laugh in reply to my threats; my promises might have
+done more, for the fellows were whispering together as if in hesitation,
+and I began to reiterate and increase my offers, when the voice of one
+of the horsemen, who had suddenly come up, enjoined silence to the
+men on foot, and, approaching the side of the cart, said to me, with
+a strong and determined voice, ‘Young man, there is no personal harm
+designed to you. If you remain silent and quiet, you may reckon on
+good treatment; but if you endeavour to tamper with these men in the
+execution of their duty, I will take such measures for silencing you, as
+you shall remember the longest day you have to live.’
+
+I thought I knew the voice which uttered these threats; but, in such
+a situation, my perceptions could not be supposed to be perfectly
+accurate. I was contented to reply, ‘Whoever you are that speak to me, I
+entreat the benefit of the meanest prisoner, who is not to be subjected,
+legally to greater hardship than is necessary for the restraint of his
+person. I entreat that these bonds, which hurt me so cruelly, may be
+slackened at least, if not removed altogether.’
+
+‘I will slacken the belts,’ said the former speaker; ‘nay, I will
+altogether remove them, and allow you to pursue your journey in a more
+convenient manner, provided you will give me your word of honour that
+you will not attempt an escape?’
+
+‘NEVER!’ I answered, with an energy of which despair alone could have
+rendered me capable--‘I will never submit to loss of freedom a moment
+longer than I am subjected to it by force.’
+
+‘Enough,’ he replied; ‘the sentiment is natural; but do not on your side
+complain that I, who am carrying on an important undertaking, use the
+only means in my power for ensuring its success.’
+
+I entreated to know what it was designed to do with me; but my
+conductor, in a voice of menacing authority, desired me to be silent on
+my peril; and my strength and spirits were too much exhausted to permit
+my continuing a dialogue so singular, even if I could have promised
+myself any good result by doing so.
+
+It is proper here to add, that, from my recollections at the time, and
+from what has since taken place, I have the strongest possible belief
+that the man with whom I held this expostulation was the singular person
+residing at Brokenburn, in Dumfriesshire, and called by the fishers of
+that hamlet, the Laird of the Solway Lochs. The cause for his inveterate
+persecution I cannot pretend even to guess at.
+
+In the meantime, the cart was dragged heavily and wearily on, until the
+nearer roar of the advancing tide excited the apprehension of another
+danger. I could not mistake the sound, which I had heard upon another
+occasion, when it was only the speed of a fleet horse which saved me
+from perishing in the quicksands. Thou, my dear Alan, canst not but
+remember the former circumstances; and now, wonderful contrast! the very
+man, to the best of my belief, who then saved me from peril, was
+the leader of the lawless band who had deprived me of my liberty. I
+conjectured that the danger grew imminent; for I heard some words and
+circumstances which made me aware that a rider hastily fastened his own
+horse to the shafts of the cart in order to assist the exhausted animal
+which drew it, and the vehicle was now pulled forward at a faster pace,
+which the horses were urged to maintain by blows and curses. The
+men, however, were inhabitants of the neighbourhood; and I had strong
+personal reason to believe that one of them, at least, was intimately
+acquainted with all the depths and shallows of the perilous paths in
+which we were engaged. But they were in imminent danger themselves; and
+if so, as from the whispering and exertions to push on with the cart
+was much to be apprehended, there was little doubt that I should be left
+behind as a useless encumbrance, and that, while I was in a condition
+which rendered every chance of escape impracticable. These were awful
+apprehensions; but it pleased Providence to increase them to a point
+which my brain was scarcely able to endure.
+
+As we approached very near to a black line, which, dimly visible as it
+was, I could make out to be the shore, we heard two or three sounds,
+which appeared to be the report of fire-arms. Immediately all was bustle
+among our party to get forward. Presently a fellow galloped up to us,
+crying out, ‘Ware hawk! ware hawk! the land-sharks are out from Burgh,
+and Allonby Tom will lose his cargo if you do not bear a hand.’
+
+Most of my company seemed to make hastily for the shore on receiving
+this intelligence. A driver was left with the cart; but at length, when,
+after repeated and hairbreadth escapes, it actually stuck fast in a
+slough or quicksand, the fellow, with an oath, cut the harness, and, as
+I presume, departed with the horses, whose feet I heard splashing over
+the wet sand and through the shallows, as he galloped off.
+
+The dropping sound of fire-arms was still continued, but lost almost
+entirely in the thunder of the advancing surge. By a desperate effort I
+raised myself in the cart, and attained a sitting posture, which served
+only to show me the extent of my danger. There lay my native land--my
+own England--the land where I was born, and to which my wishes, since
+my earliest age, had turned with all the prejudices of national
+feeling--there it lay, within a furlong of the place where I yet was;
+that furlong, which an infant would have raced over in a minute, was yet
+a barrier effectual to divide me for ever from England and from life. I
+soon not only heard the roar of this dreadful torrent, but saw, by
+the fitful moonlight, the foamy crests of the devouring waves, as they
+advanced with the speed and fury of a pack of hungry wolves.
+
+The consciousness that the slightest ray of hope, or power of
+struggling, was not left me, quite overcame the constancy which I had
+hitherto maintained. My eyes began to swim--my head grew giddy and mad
+with fear--I chattered and howled to the howling and roaring sea. One
+or two great waves already reached the cart, when the conductor of the
+party whom I have mentioned so often, was, as if by magic, at my side.
+He sprang from his horse into the vehicle, cut the ligatures which
+restrained me, and bade me get up and mount in the fiend’s name.
+
+Seeing I was incapable of obeying, he seized me as if I had been a
+child of six months old, threw me across the horse, sprang on behind,
+supporting with one hand, while he directed the animal with the other.
+In my helpless and painful posture, I was unconscious of the degree
+of danger which we incurred; but I believe at one time the horse was
+swimming, or nearly so; and that it was with difficulty that my stern
+and powerful assistant kept my head above water. I remember particularly
+the shock which I felt when the animal, endeavouring to gain the bank,
+reared, and very nearly fell back on his burden. The time during which
+I continued in this dreadful condition did not probably exceed two or
+three minutes, yet so strongly were they marked with horror and agony,
+that they seem to my recollection a much more considerable space of
+time.
+
+When I had been thus snatched from destruction, I had only power to say
+to my protector,--or oppressor,--for he merited either name at my hand,
+‘You do not, then, design to murder me?’
+
+He laughed as he replied, but it was a sort of laughter which I scarce
+desire to hear again,--‘Else you think I had let the waves do the work?
+But remember, the shepherd saves his sheep from the torrent--is it to
+preserve its life?--Be silent, however, with questions or entreaties.
+What I mean to do, thou canst no more discover or prevent, than a man,
+with his bare palm, can scoop dry the Solway.’
+
+I was too much exhausted to continue the argument; and, still numbed and
+torpid in all my limbs, permitted myself without reluctance to be placed
+on a horse brought for the purpose. My formidable conductor rode on the
+one side, and another person on the other, keeping me upright in the
+saddle. In this manner we travelled forward at a considerable rate,
+and by by-roads, with which my attendant seemed as familiar as with the
+perilous passages of the Solway.
+
+At length, after stumbling through a labyrinth of dark and deep lanes,
+and crossing more than one rough and barren heath, we found ourselves on
+the edge of a highroad, where a chaise and four awaited, as it appeared,
+our arrival. To my great relief, we now changed our mode of conveyance;
+for my dizziness and headache had returned in so strong a degree, that I
+should otherwise have been totally unable to keep my seat on horseback,
+even with the support which I received.
+
+My doubted and dangerous companion signed to me to enter the
+carriage--the man who had ridden on the left side of my horse stepped in
+after me, and drawing up the blinds of the vehicle, gave the signal for
+instant departure.
+
+I had obtained a glimpse of the countenance of my new companion, as by
+the aid of a dark lantern the drivers opened the carriage door, and
+I was wellnigh persuaded that I recognized in him the domestic of the
+leader of this party, whom I had seen at his house in Brokenburn on a
+former occasion. To ascertain the truth of my suspicion, I asked him
+whether his name was not Cristal Nixon.
+
+‘What is other folk’s names to you,’ he replied, gruffly, ‘who cannot
+tell your own father and mother?’
+
+‘You know them, perhaps!’ I exclaimed eagerly. ‘You know them! and with
+that secret is connected the treatment which I am now receiving? It must
+be so, for in my life have I never injured any one. Tell me the cause of
+my misfortunes, or rather, help me to my liberty, and I will reward you
+richly.’
+
+‘Aye, aye,’ replied my keeper; ‘but what use to give you liberty, who
+know nothing how to use it like a gentleman, but spend your time with
+Quakers and fiddlers, and such like raff! If I was your--hem, hem, hem!’
+
+Here Cristal stopped short, just on the point, as it appeared, when some
+information was likely to escape him. I urged him once more to be my
+friend, and promised him all the stock of money which I had about me,
+and it was not inconsiderable, if he would assist in my escape.
+
+He listened, as if to a proposition which had some interest, and
+replied, but in a voice rather softer than before, ‘Aye, but men do not
+catch old birds with chaff, my master. Where have you got the rhino you
+are so flush of?’
+
+‘I will give you earnest directly, and that in banknotes,’ said I; but
+thrusting my hand into my side-pocket, I found my pocket-book was gone.
+I would have persuaded myself that it was only the numbness of my hands
+which prevented my finding it; but Cristal Nixon, who bears in his
+countenance that cynicism which is especially entertained with human
+misery, no longer suppressed his laughter.
+
+‘Oh, ho! my young master,’ he said; ‘we have taken good enough care you
+have not kept the means of bribing poor folk’s fidelity. What, man, they
+have souls as well as other people, and to make them break trust is
+a deadly sin. And as for me, young gentleman, if you would fill Saint
+Mary’s Kirk with gold, Cristal Nixon would mind it no more than so many
+chucky-stones.’
+
+I would have persisted, were it but in hopes of his letting drop that
+which it concerned me to know, but he cut off further communication, by
+desiring me to lean back in the corner and go to sleep.
+
+‘Thou art cock-brained enough already,’ he added, ‘and we shall have thy
+young pate addled entirely, if you do not take some natural rest.’
+
+I did indeed require repose, if not slumber; the draught which I had
+taken continued to operate, and, satisfied in my own mind that no
+attempt on my life was designed, the fear of instant death no longer
+combated the torpor which crept over me--I slept, and slept soundly, but
+still without refreshment.
+
+When I awoke, I found myself extremely indisposed; images of the past,
+and anticipations of the future, floated confusedly through my brain.
+I perceived, however, that my situation was changed, greatly for the
+better. I was in a good bed, with the curtains drawn round it; I heard
+the lowered voice and cautious step of attendants, who seemed to respect
+my repose; it appeared as if I was in the hands either of friends, or of
+such as meant me no personal harm.
+
+I can give but an indistinct account of two or three broken and feverish
+days which succeeded, but if they were chequered with dreams and
+visions of terror, other and more agreeable objects were also sometimes
+presented. Alan Fairford will understand me when I say, I am convinced I
+saw G.M. during this interval of oblivion. I had medical attendance, and
+was bled more than once. I also remember a painful operation performed
+on my head, where I had received a severe blow on the night of the riot.
+My hair was cut short, and the bone of the skull examined, to discover
+if the cranium had received any injury.
+
+On seeing the physician, it would have been natural to have appealed
+to him on the subject of my confinement, and I remember more than once
+attempting to do so. But the fever lay like a spell upon my tongue, and
+when I would have implored the doctor’s assistance, I rambled from the
+subject, and spoke I know not what nonsense. Some power, which I
+was unable to resist, seemed to impel me into a different course of
+conversation from what I intended, and though conscious, in some degree,
+of the failure, I could not mend it; and resolved, therefore, to be
+patient, until my capacity of steady thought and expression was restored
+to me with my ordinary health, which had sustained a severe shock from
+the vicissitudes to which I had been exposed. [See Note 6.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+DARSIE LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+Two or three days, perhaps more, perhaps less, had been spent in bed,
+where I was carefully attended, and treated, I believe, with as much
+judgement as the case required, and I was at length allowed to quit
+my bed, though not the chamber. I was now more able to make some
+observation on the place of my confinement.
+
+The room, in appearance and furniture, resembled the best apartment in
+a farmer’s house; and the window, two stories high, looked into a
+backyard, or court, filled with domestic poultry. There were the usual
+domestic offices about this yard. I could distinguish the brewhouse and
+the barn, and I heard, from a more remote building, the lowing of the
+cattle, and other rural sounds, announcing a large and well-stocked
+farm. These were sights and sounds qualified to dispel any apprehension
+of immediate violence. Yet the building seemed ancient and strong, a
+part of the roof was battlemented, and the walls were of great thickness;
+lastly, I observed, with some unpleasant sensations, that the windows
+of my chamber had been lately secured with iron stanchions, and that
+the servants who brought me victuals, or visited my apartment to render
+other menial offices, always locked the door when they retired.
+
+The comfort and cleanliness of my chamber were of true English growth,
+and such as I had rarely seen on the other side of the Tweed; the very
+old wainscot, which composed the floor and the panelling of the room,
+was scrubbed with a degree of labour which the Scottish housewife rarely
+bestows on her most costly furniture.
+
+The whole apartments appropriated to my use consisted of the bedroom, a
+small parlour adjacent, within which was a still smaller closet having
+a narrow window which seemed anciently to have been used as a shot-hole,
+admitting, indeed, a very moderate portion of light and air, but without
+its being possible to see anything from it except the blue sky, and
+that only by mounting on a chair. There were appearances of a separate
+entrance into this cabinet, besides that which communicated with the
+parlour, but it had been recently built up, as I discovered by removing
+a piece of tapestry which covered the fresh mason-work. I found some
+of my clothes here, with linen and other articles, as well as my
+writing-case, containing pen, ink, and paper, which enables me, at my
+leisure (which, God knows, is undisturbed enough) to make this record of
+my confinement. It may be well believed, however, that I do not trust
+to the security of the bureau, but carry the written sheets about my
+person, so that I can only be deprived of them by actual violence. I
+also am cautious to write in the little cabinet only, so that I can
+hear any person approach me through the other apartments, and have time
+enough to put aside my journal before they come upon me.
+
+The servants, a stout country fellow and a very pretty milkmaid-looking
+lass, by whom I am attended, seem of the true Joan and Hedge school,
+thinking of little and desiring nothing beyond the very limited sphere
+of their own duties or enjoyments, and having no curiosity whatever
+about the affairs of others. Their behaviour to me in particular, is,
+at the same time, very kind and very provoking. My table is abundantly
+supplied, and they seem anxious to comply with my taste in that
+department. But whenever I make inquiries beyond ‘what’s for dinner’,
+the brute of a lad baffles me by his ANAN, and his DUNNA KNAW, and if
+hard pressed, turns his back on me composedly, and leaves the room. The
+girl, too, pretends to be as simple as he; but an arch grin, which
+she cannot always suppress, seems to acknowledge that she understands
+perfectly well the game which she is playing, and is determined to keep
+me in ignorance. Both of them, and the wench in particular, treat me
+as they would do a spoiled child, and never directly refuse me anything
+which I ask, taking care, at the same time, not to make their words good
+by effectually granting my request. Thus, if I desire to go out, I am
+promised by Dorcas that I shall walk in the park at night, and see the
+cows milked, just as she would propose such an amusement to a child. But
+she takes care never to keep her word, if it is in her power to do so.
+
+In the meantime, there has stolen on me insensibly an indifference to
+my freedom--a carelessness about my situation, for which I am unable to
+account, unless it be the consequence of weakness and loss of blood. I
+have read of men who, immured as I am, have surprised the world by the
+address with which they have successfully overcome the most formidable
+obstacles to their escape; and when I have heard such anecdotes, I
+have said to myself, that no one who is possessed only of a fragment
+of freestone, or a rusty nail to grind down rivets and to pick locks,
+having his full leisure to employ in the task, need continue the
+inhabitant of a prison. Here, however, I sit, day after day, without a
+single effort to effect my liberation.
+
+Yet my inactivity is not the result of despondency, but arises, in
+part at least, from feelings of a very different cast. My story, long
+a mysterious one, seems now upon the verge of some strange development;
+and I feel a solemn impression that I ought to wait the course of
+events, to struggle against which is opposing my feeble efforts to the
+high will of fate. Thou, my Alan, wilt treat as timidity this passive
+acquiescence, which has sunk down on me like a benumbing torpor; but if
+thou hast remembered by what visions my couch was haunted, and dost but
+think of the probability that I am in the vicinity, perhaps under the
+same roof with G.M., thou wilt acknowledge that other feelings than
+pusillanimity have tended in some degree to reconcile me to my fate.
+
+Still I own it is unmanly to submit with patience to this oppressive
+confinement. My heart rises against it, especially when I sit down to
+record my sufferings in this journal, and I am determined, as the first
+step to my deliverance, to have my letters sent to the post-house. ----
+
+I am disappointed. When the girl Dorcas, upon whom I had fixed for a
+messenger, heard me talk of sending a letter, she willingly offered her
+services, and received the crown which I gave her (for my purse had not
+taken flight with the more valuable contents of my pocket-book) with a
+smile which showed her whole set of white teeth.
+
+But when, with the purpose of gaining some intelligence respecting my
+present place of abode, I asked to which post-town she was to send or
+carry the letter, a stolid ‘ANAN’ showed me she was either ignorant of
+the nature of a post-office, or that, for the present, she chose to seem
+so.--‘Simpleton!’ I said, with some sharpness.
+
+‘O Lord, sir!’ answered the girl, turning pale, which they always do
+when I show any sparks of anger, ‘Don’t put yourself in a passion--I’ll
+put the letter in the post.
+
+‘What! and not know the name of the post-town?’ said I, out of patience.
+‘How on earth do you propose to manage that?’
+
+‘La you there, good master. What need you frighten a poor girl that is
+no schollard, bating what she learned at the Charity School of Saint
+Bees?’
+
+‘Is Saint Bees far from this place, Dorcas? Do you send your letters
+there?’ said I, in a manner as insinuating, and yet careless, as I could
+assume.
+
+‘Saint Bees! La, who but a madman--begging your honour’s pardon--it’s a
+matter of twenty years since fader lived at Saint Bees, which is twenty,
+or forty, or I dunna know not how many miles from this part, to the
+West, on the coast side; and I would not have left Saint Bees, but that
+fader’--
+
+‘Oh, the devil take your father!’ replied I.
+
+To which she answered, ‘Nay, but thof your honour be a little
+how-come-so, you shouldn’t damn folk’s faders; and I won’t stand to it,
+for one.’
+
+‘Oh, I beg you a thousand pardons--I wish your father no ill in the
+world--he was a very honest man in his way.’
+
+‘WAS an honest man!’ she exclaimed; for the Cumbrians are, it would
+seem, like their neighbours the Scotch, ticklish on the point of
+ancestry,--‘He IS a very honest man as ever led nag with halter on head
+to Staneshaw Bank Fair. Honest! He is a horse-couper.’
+
+‘Right, right,’ I replied; ‘I know it--I have heard of your father-as
+honest as any horse-couper of them all. Why, Dorcas, I mean to buy a
+horse of him.’
+
+‘Ah, your honour,’ sighed Dorcas, ‘he is the man to serve your honour
+well--if ever you should get round again--or thof you were a bit off the
+hooks, he would no more cheat you than’--
+
+‘Well, well, we will deal, my girl, you may depend on’t. But tell me
+now, were I to give you a letter, what would you do to get it forward?’
+
+‘Why, put it into Squire’s own bag that hangs in hall,’ answered poor
+Dorcas. ‘What else could I do? He sends it to Brampton, or to Carloisle,
+or where it pleases him, once a week, and that gate.’
+
+‘Ah!’ said I; ‘and I suppose your sweetheart John carries it?’
+
+‘Noa--disn’t now--and Jan is no sweetheart of mine, ever since he danced
+at his mother’s feast with Kitty Rutlege, and let me sit still; that a
+did.’
+
+‘It was most abominable in Jan, and what I could never have thought of
+him,’ I replied.
+
+‘Oh, but a did though--a let me sit still on my seat, a did.’
+
+‘Well, well, my pretty May, you will get a handsomer fellow than
+Jan--Jan’s not the fellow for you, I see that.’
+
+‘Noa, noa,’ answered the damsel; ‘but he is weel aneugh for a’ that,
+mon. But I carena a button for him; for there is the miller’s son, that
+suitored me last Appleby Fair, when I went wi’ oncle, is a gway canny
+lad as you will see in the sunshine.’
+
+‘Aye, a fine stout fellow. Do you think he would carry my letter to
+Carlisle?’
+
+‘To Carloisle! ‘Twould be all his life is worth; he maun wait on clap
+and hopper, as they say. Odd, his father would brain him if he went to
+Carloisle, bating to wrestling for the belt, or sic loike. But I ha’
+more bachelors than him; there is the schoolmaster, can write almaist as
+weel as tou canst, mon.’
+
+‘Then he is the very man to take charge of a letter; he knows the
+trouble of writing one.’
+
+‘Aye, marry does he, an tou comest to that, mon; only it takes him four
+hours to write as mony lines. Tan, it is a great round hand loike, that
+one can read easily, and not loike your honour’s, that are like midge’s
+taes. But for ganging to Carloisle, he’s dead foundered, man, as cripple
+as Eckie’s mear.’
+
+‘In the name of God,’ said I, ‘how is it that you propose to get my
+letter to the post?’
+
+‘Why, just to put it into Squire’s bag loike,’ reiterated Dorcas; ‘he
+sends it by Cristal Nixon to post, as you call it, when such is his
+pleasure.’
+
+Here I was, then, not much edified by having obtained a list of Dorcas’s
+bachelors; and by finding myself, with respect to any information
+which I desired, just exactly at the point where I set out. It was of
+consequence to me, however, to accustom, the girl to converse with me
+familiarly. If she did so, she could not always be on her guard,
+and something, I thought, might drop from her which I could turn to
+advantage.
+
+‘Does not the Squire usually look into his letter-bag, Dorcas?’ said I,
+with as much indifference as I could assume.
+
+‘That a does,’ said Dorcas; ‘and a threw out a letter of mine to Raff
+Miller, because a said’--
+
+‘Well, well, I won’t trouble him with mine,’ said I, ‘Dorcas; but,
+instead, I will write to himself, Dorcas. But how shall I address him?’
+
+‘Anan?’ was again Dorcas’s resource.
+
+‘I mean how is he called? What is his name?’
+
+‘Sure you honour should know best,’ said Dorcas.
+
+‘I know? The devil! You drive me beyond patience.’
+
+‘Noa, noa! donna your honour go beyond patience--donna ye now,’
+implored the wench. ‘And for his neame, they say he has mair nor ane
+in Westmoreland and on the Scottish side. But he is but seldom wi’
+us, excepting in the cocking season; and then we just call him Squoire
+loike; and so do my measter and dame.’
+
+‘And is he here at present?’ said I.
+
+‘Not he, not he; he is a buck-hoonting, as they tell me, somewhere up
+the Patterdale way; but he comes and gangs like a flap of a whirlwind,
+or sic loike.’
+
+I broke off the conversation, after forcing on Dorcas a little silver
+to buy ribbons, with which she was so much delighted that she exclaimed,
+‘God! Cristal Nixon may say his worst on thee; but thou art a civil
+gentleman for all him; and a quoit man wi’ woman folk loike.’
+
+There is no sense in being too quiet with women folk, so I added a kiss
+with my crown piece; and I cannot help thinking that I have secured
+a partisan in Dorcas. At least, she blushed, and pocketed her little
+compliment with one hand, while, with the other, she adjusted her
+cherry-coloured ribbons, a little disordered by the struggle it cost me
+to attain the honour of a salute.
+
+As she unlocked the door to leave the apartment, she turned back,
+and looking on me with a strong expression of compassion, added the
+remarkable words, ‘La--be’st mad or no, thou’se a mettled lad, after
+all.’
+
+There was something very ominous in the sound of these farewell words,
+which seemed to afford me a clue to the pretext under which I was
+detained in confinement, My demeanour was probably insane enough, while
+I was agitated at once by the frenzy incident to the fever, and the
+anxiety arising from my extraordinary situation. But is it possible they
+can now establish any cause for confining me arising out of the state of
+my mind?
+
+If this be really the pretext under which I am restrained from my
+liberty, nothing but the sedate correctness of my conduct can remove the
+prejudices which these circumstances may have excited in the minds of
+all who have approached me during my illness. I have heard--dreadful
+thought!--of men who, for various reasons, have been trepanned into
+the custody of the keepers of private madhouses, and whose brain,
+after years of misery, became at length unsettled, through irresistible
+sympathy with the wretched beings among whom they were classed. This
+shall not be my case, if, by strong internal resolution, it is in human
+nature to avoid the action of exterior and contagious sympathies.
+
+Meantime I sat down to compose and arrange my thoughts, for my purposed
+appeal to my jailer--so I must call him--whom I addressed in the
+following manner; having at length, and after making several copies,
+found language to qualify the sense of resentment which burned in
+the first, drafts of my letter, and endeavoured to assume a tone more
+conciliating. I mentioned the two occasions on which he had certainly
+saved my life, when at the utmost peril; and I added, that whatever was
+the purpose of the restraint, now practised on me, as I was given to
+understand, by his authority, it could not certainly be with any view
+to ultimately injuring me. He might, I said, have mistaken me for some
+other person; and I gave him what account I could of my situation and
+education, to correct such an error. I supposed it next possible, that
+he might think me too weak for travelling, and not capable of taking
+care of myself; and I begged to assure him, that I was restored to
+perfect health, and quite able to endure the fatigue of a journey.
+Lastly, I reminded him, in firm though measured terms, that the
+restraint which I sustained was an illegal one, and highly punishable
+by the laws which protect the liberties of the subject. I ended by
+demanding that he would take me before a magistrate; or, at least, that
+he would favour me with a personal interview and explain his meaning
+with regard to me.
+
+Perhaps this letter was expressed in a tone too humble for the
+situation of an injured man, and I am inclined to think so when I again
+recapitulate its tenor. But what could I do? I was in the power of one
+whose passions seem as violent as his means of gratifying them appear
+unbounded. I had reason, too, to believe (this to thee, Alan) that all
+his family did not approve of the violence of his conduct towards me; my
+object, in fine, was freedom, and who would not sacrifice much to attain
+it?
+
+I had no means of addressing my letter excepting ‘For the Squire’s
+own hand.’ He could be at no great distance, for in the course of
+twenty-four hours I received an answer. It was addressed to Darsie
+Latimer, and contained these words: ‘You have demanded an interview with
+me. You have required to be carried before a magistrate. Your first wish
+shall be granted--perhaps the second also. Meanwhile, be assured that
+you are a prisoner for the time, by competent authority, and that
+such authority is supported by adequate power. Beware, therefore, of
+struggling with a force sufficient to crush you, but abandon yourself to
+that train of events by which we are both swept along, and which it is
+impossible that either of us can resist.’
+
+These mysterious words were without signature of any kind, and left
+me nothing more important to do than to prepare myself for the meeting
+which they promised. For that purpose I must now break off, and make
+sure of the manuscript--so far as I can, in my present condition, be
+sure of anything--by concealing it within the lining of my coat, so as
+not to be found without strict search.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+The important interview expected at the conclusion of my last took place
+sooner than I had calculated; for the very day I received the letter,
+and just when my dinner was finished, the squire, or whatever he is
+called, entered the room so suddenly that I almost thought I beheld an
+apparition. The figure of this man is peculiarly noble and stately,
+and his voice has that deep fullness of accent which implies unresisted
+authority. I had risen involuntarily as he entered; we gazed on each
+other for a moment in silence, which was at length broken by my visitor.
+
+‘You have desired to see me,’ he said. ‘I am here; if you have aught
+to say let me hear it; my time is too brief to be consumed in childish
+dumb-show.’
+
+‘I would ask of you,’ said I, ‘by what authority I am detained in this
+place of confinement, and for what purpose?’
+
+‘I have told you already,’ said he, ‘that my authority is sufficient,
+and my power equal to it; this is all which it is necessary for you at
+present to know.’
+
+‘Every British subject has a right to know why he suffers restraint,’
+I replied; ‘nor can he be deprived of liberty without a legal warrant.
+Show me that by which you confine me thus.’
+
+‘You shall see more,’ he said; ‘you shall see the magistrate by whom it
+is granted, and that without a moment’s delay.’
+
+This sudden proposal fluttered and alarmed me; I felt, nevertheless,
+that I had the right cause, and resolved to plead it boldly, although
+I could well have desired a little further time for preparation. He
+turned, however, threw open the door of the apartment, and commanded me
+to follow him. I felt some inclination, when I crossed the threshold of
+my prison-chamber, to have turned and run for it; but I knew not where
+to find the stairs--had reason to think the outer doors would be secured
+and, to conclude, so soon as I had quitted the room to follow the proud
+step of my conductor, I observed that I was dogged by Cristal Nixon, who
+suddenly appeared within two paces of me, and with whose great personal
+strength, independent of the assistance he might have received from
+his master, I saw no chance of contending. I therefore followed,
+unresistingly and in silence; along one or two passages of much greater
+length than consisted with the ideas I had previously entertained of
+the size of the house. At length a door was flung open, and we entered
+a large, old-fashioned parlour, having coloured glass in the windows,
+oaken panelling on the wall, a huge grate, in which a large faggot
+or two smoked under an arched chimney-piece of stone which bore some
+armorial device, whilst the walls were adorned with the usual number
+of heroes in armour, with large wigs instead of helmets, and ladies in
+sacques, smelling to nosegays.
+
+Behind a long table, on which were several books, sat a smart
+underbred-looking man, wearing his own hair tied in a club, and who,
+from the quire of paper laid before him, and the pen which he handled
+at my entrance, seemed prepared to officiate as clerk. As I wish to
+describe these persons as accurately as possible, I may add, he wore a
+dark-coloured coat, corduroy breeches, and spatterdashes. At the
+upper end of the same table, in an ample easy-chair covered with black
+leather, reposed a fat personage, about fifty years old, who either was
+actually a country justice, or was well selected to represent such a
+character. His leathern breeches were faultless in make, his jockey
+boots spotless in the varnish, and a handsome and flourishing pair of
+boot-garters, as they are called, united the one part of his garments to
+the other; in fine, a richly-laced scarlet waistcoat and a purple coat
+set off the neat though corpulent figure of the little man, and threw an
+additional bloom upon his plethoric aspect. I suppose he had dined,
+for it was two hours past noon, and he was amusing himself, and aiding
+digestion, with a pipe of tobacco. There was an air of importance in his
+manner which corresponded to the rural dignity of his exterior, and a
+habit which he had of throwing out a number of interjectional sounds,
+uttered with a strange variety of intonation running from bass up to
+treble in a very extraordinary manner, or breaking off his sentences
+with a whiff of his pipe, seemed adopted to give an air of thought and
+mature deliberation to his opinions and decisions. Notwithstanding
+all this, Alan, it might be DOOTED, as our old Professor used to say,
+whether the Justice was anything more then an ass. Certainly, besides a
+great deference for the legal opinion of his clerk, which might be quite
+according to the order of things, he seemed to be wonderfully under the
+command of his brother squire, if squire either of them were, and indeed
+much more than was consistent with so much assumed consequence of his
+own.
+
+‘Ho--ha--aye--so--so--hum--humph--this is the young man, I
+suppose--hum--aye--seems sickly. Young gentleman, you may sit down.’
+
+I used the permission given, for I had been much more reduced by my
+illness than I was aware of, and felt myself really fatigued, even by
+the few paces I had walked, joined to the agitation I suffered.
+
+‘And your name, young man, is--humph--aye--ha--what is it?’
+
+‘Darsie Latimer.’
+
+‘Right--aye--humph--very right. Darsie Latimer is the very
+thing--ha--aye--where do you come from?’
+
+‘From Scotland, sir,’ I replied.
+
+‘A native of Scotland--a--humph--eh--how is it?’
+
+‘I am an Englishman by birth, sir.’
+
+‘Right--aye--yes, you are so. But pray, Mr. Darsie Latimer, have you
+always been called by that name, or have you any other?--Nick, write
+down his answers, Nick.’
+
+‘As far as I remember, I never bore any other,’ was my answer.
+
+‘How, no? well, I should not have thought so, Hey, neighbour, would
+you?’
+
+Here he looked towards the other squire, who had thrown himself into a
+chair; and, with his legs stretched out before him, and his arms folded
+on his bosom, seemed carelessly attending to what was going forward.
+He answered the appeal of the Justice by saying, that perhaps the young
+man’s memory did not go back to a very early period.
+
+‘Ah--eh--ha--you hear the gentleman. Pray, how far may your memory be
+pleased to run back to?--umph?’
+
+‘Perhaps, sir, to the age of three years, or a little further.’
+
+‘And will you presume to say, sir,’ said the squire, drawing himself
+suddenly erect in his seat, and exerting the strength of his powerful
+voice, ‘that you then bore your present name?’
+
+I was startled at the confidence with which this question was put, and
+in vain rummaged my memory for the means of replying. ‘At least,’ I
+said, ‘I always remember being called Darsie; children, at that early
+age, seldom get more than their Christian name.’
+
+‘Oh, I thought so,’ he replied, and again stretched himself on his seat,
+in the same lounging posture as before.
+
+‘So you were called Darsie in your infancy,’ said the Justice;
+‘and--hum--aye--when did you first take the name of Latimer?’
+
+‘I did not take it, sir; it was given to me.’
+
+‘I ask you,’ said the lord of the mansion, but with less severity in his
+voice than formerly, ‘whether you can remember that you were ever called
+Latimer, until you had that name given you in Scotland?’
+
+‘I will be candid: I cannot recollect an instance that I was so called
+when in England, but neither can I recollect when the name was first
+given me; and if anything is to be founded on these queries and my
+answers, I desire my early childhood may be taken into consideration.’
+
+‘Hum--aye--yes,’ said the Justice; ‘all that requires consideration
+shall be duly considered. Young man--eh--I beg to know the name of your
+father and mother?’
+
+This was galling a wound that has festered for years, and I did not
+endure the question so patiently as those which preceded it; but
+replied, ‘I demand, in my turn, to know if I am before an English
+Justice of the Peace?’
+
+‘His worship, Squire Foxley, of Foxley Hall, has been of the quorum
+these twenty years,’ said Master Nicholas.
+
+‘Then he ought to know, or you, sir, as his clerk, should inform him,’
+said I, ‘that I am the complainer in this case, and that my complaint
+ought to be heard before I am subjected to cross-examination.’
+
+‘Humph--hoy--what, aye--there is something in that, neighbour,’ said
+the poor Justice, who, blown about by every wind of doctrine, seemed
+desirous to attain the sanction of his brother squire.
+
+‘I wonder at you, Foxley,’ said his firm-minded acquaintance; ‘how can
+you render the young man justice unless you know who he is?’
+
+‘Ha--yes--egad, that’s true,’ said Mr. Justice Foxley; ‘and now--looking
+into the matter more closely--there is, eh, upon the whole--nothing
+at all in what he says--so, sir, you must tell your father’s name, and
+surname.’
+
+‘It is out of my power, sir; they are not known to me, since you must
+needs know so much of my private affairs.’
+
+The Justice collected a great AFFLATUS in his cheeks, which puffed them
+up like those of a Dutch cherub, while his eyes seemed flying out of his
+head, from the effort with which he retained his breath. He then blew
+it forth with,--‘Whew!--Hoom--poof--ha!--not know your parents,
+youngster?--Then I must commit you for a vagrant, I warrant you. OMNE
+IGNOTUM PRO TERRIBILI, as we used to say at Appleby school; that is,
+every one that is not known to the Justice; is a rogue and a vagabond.
+Ha!--aye, you may sneer, sir; but I question if you would have known the
+meaning of that Latin, unless I had told you.’
+
+I acknowledged myself obliged for a new edition of the adage, and an
+interpretation which I could never have reached alone and unassisted. I
+then proceeded to state my case with greater confidence. The Justice
+was an ass, that was clear; but if was scarcely possible he could be so
+utterly ignorant as not to know what was necessary in so plain a case as
+mine. I therefore informed him of the riot which had been committed on
+the Scottish side of the Solway Firth, explained how I came to be placed
+in my present situation, and requested of his worship to set me at
+liberty. I pleaded my cause with as much earnestness as I could, casting
+an eye from time to time upon the opposite party, who seemed entirely
+indifferent to all the animation with which I accused him.
+
+As for the Justice, when at length I had ceased, as really not
+knowing what more to say in a case so very plain, he replied,
+‘Ho--aye--aye--yes--wonderful! and so this is all the gratitude you show
+to this good gentleman for the great charge and trouble he hath had with
+respect to and concerning of you?’
+
+‘He saved my life, sir, I acknowledge, on one occasion certainly, and
+most probably on two; but his having done so gives him no right over my
+person. I am not, however, asking for any punishment or revenge; on the
+contrary, I am content to part friends with the gentleman, whose motives
+I am unwilling to suppose are bad, though his actions have been, towards
+me, unauthorized and violent.’
+
+This moderation, Alan, thou wilt comprehend, was not entirely dictated
+by my feelings towards the individual of whom I complained; there were
+other reasons, in which regard for him had little share. It seemed,
+however, as if the mildness with which I pleaded my cause had more
+effect upon him than anything I had yet said. We was moved to the point
+of being almost out of countenance; and took snuff repeatedly, as if to
+gain time to stifle some degree of emotion.
+
+But on Justice Foxley, on whom my eloquence was particularly designed to
+make impression, the result was much less favourable. He consulted in a
+whisper with Mr. Nicholas, his clerk--pshawed, hemmed, and elevated
+his eyebrows, as if in scorn of my supplication. At length, having
+apparently made up his mind, he leaned back in his chair, and smoked
+his pipe with great energy, with a look of defiance, designed to make me
+aware that all my reasoning was lost on him.
+
+At length, when I stopped, more from lack of breath than want of
+argument, he opened his oracular jaws, and made the following reply,
+interrupted by his usual interjectional ejaculations, and by long
+volumes of smoke:--‘Hem--aye--eh--poof. And, youngster, do you think
+Matthew Foxley, who has been one of the quorum for these twenty years,
+is to be come over with such trash as would hardly cheat an apple-woman?
+Poof--poof--eh! Why, man--eh--dost thou not know the charge is not a
+bailable matter--and that--hum--aye--the greatest man--poof--the Baron
+of Graystock himself, must stand committed? and yet you pretend to have
+been kidnapped by this gentleman, and robbed of property, and what not;
+and--eh--poof--you would persuade me all you want is to get away from
+him? I do believe--eh--that it IS all you want. Therefore, as you are
+a sort of a slip-string gentleman, and--aye--hum--a kind of idle
+apprentice, and something cock-brained withal, as the honest folks
+of the house tell me--why, you must e’en remain under custody of your
+guardian, till your coming of age, or my Lord Chancellor’s warrant,
+shall give you the management of your own affairs, which, if you can
+gather your brains again, you will even then not be--aye--hem--poof--in
+particular haste to assume.’
+
+The time occupied by his worship’s hums, and haws, and puffs of tobacco
+smoke, together with the slow and pompous manner in which he spoke, gave
+me a minute’s space to collect my ideas, dispersed as they were by the
+extraordinary purport of this annunciation.
+
+‘I cannot conceive, sir,’ I replied, ‘by what singular tenure this
+person claims my obedience as a guardian; it is a barefaced imposture. I
+never in my life saw him, until I came unhappily to this country, about
+four weeks since.’
+
+‘Aye, sir--we--eh--know, and are aware--that--poof--you do not like
+to hear some folk’s names; and that--eh--you understand me--there are
+things, and sounds, and matters, conversation about names, and suchlike,
+which put you off the hooks--which I have no humour to witness.
+Nevertheless, Mr. Darsie--or--poof--Mr. Darsie Latimer--or--poof,
+poof--eh--aye, Mr. Darsie without the Latimer--you have acknowledged
+as much to-day as assures me you will best be disposed of under the
+honourable care of my friend here--all your confessions--besides that,
+poof--eh--I know him to be a most responsible person--a--hay--aye--most
+responsible and honourable person--Can you deny this?’
+
+‘I know nothing of him,’ I repeated; ‘not even his name; and I have not,
+as I told you, seen him in the course of my whole life, till a few weeks
+since.’
+
+‘Will you swear to that?’ said the singular man, who seemed to await the
+result of this debate, secure as a rattle-snake is of the prey which
+has once felt its fascination. And while he said these words in deep
+undertone, he withdrew his chair a little behind that of the Justice, so
+as to be unseen by him or his clerk, who sat upon the same side; while
+he bent on me a frown so portentous, that no one who has witnessed the
+look can forget it during the whole of his life. The furrows of the
+brow above the eyes became livid and almost black, and were bent into
+a semicircular, or rather elliptical form, above the junction of the
+eyebrows. I had heard such a look described in an old tale of DIABLERIE,
+which it was my chance to be entertained with not long since; when
+this deep and gloomy contortion of the frontal muscles was not unaptly
+described as forming the representation of a small horseshoe.
+
+The tale, when told, awaked a dreadful vision of infancy, which
+the withering and blighting look now fixed on me again forced on
+my recollection, but with much more vivacity. Indeed, I was so much
+surprised, and, I must add, terrified, at the vague ideas which were
+awakened in my mind by this fearful sign, that I kept my eyes fixed on
+the face in which it was exhibited, as on a frightful vision; until,
+passing his handkerchief a moment across his countenance, this
+mysterious man relaxed at once the look which had for me something
+so appalling. ‘The young man will no longer deny that he has seen me
+before,’ said he to the Justice, in a tone of complacency; ‘and I trust
+he will now be reconciled to my temporary guardianship, which may end
+better for him than he expects.’
+
+‘Whatever I expect,’ I replied, summoning my scattered recollections
+together, ‘I see I am neither to expect justice nor protection from this
+gentleman, whose office it is to render both to the lieges. For you,
+sir, how strangely you have wrought yourself into the fate of an unhappy
+young man or what interest you can pretend in me, you yourself only can
+explain. That I have seen you before is certain; for none can forget the
+look with which you seem to have the power of blighting those upon whom
+you cast it.’
+
+The Justice seemed not very easy under this hint, ‘Ha!--aye,’ he said;
+‘it is time to be going, neighbour. I have a many miles to ride, and I
+care not to ride darkling in these parts. You and I, Mr. Nicholas, must
+be jogging.’
+
+The Justice fumbled with his gloves, in endeavouring to draw them on
+hastily, and Mr. Nicholas bustled to get his greatcoat and whip. Their
+landlord endeavoured to detain them, and spoke of supper and beds. Both,
+pouring forth many thanks for his invitation, seemed as if they would
+much rather not, and Mr. Justice Foxley was making a score of apologies,
+with at least a hundred cautionary hems and eh-ehs, when the girl Dorcas
+burst into the room, and announced a gentleman on justice business.
+
+‘What gentleman?--and whom does he want?’
+
+‘He is cuome post on his ten toes,’ said the wench; ‘and on justice
+business to his worship loike. I’se uphald him a gentleman, for he
+speaks as good Latin as the schule-measter; but, lack-a-day! he has
+gotten a queer mop of a wig.’
+
+The gentleman, thus announced and described, bounced into the room.
+But I have already written as much as fills a sheet of my paper, and my
+singular embarrassments press so hard on me that I have matter to fill
+another from what followed the intrusion of--my dear Alan--your crazy
+client--Poor Peter Peebles!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+Sheet 2.
+
+I have rarely in my life, till the last alarming days, known what it
+was to sustain a moment’s real sorrow. What I called such, was, I am
+now well convinced, only the weariness of mind which, having nothing
+actually present to complain of, turns upon itself and becomes anxious
+about the past and the future; those periods with which human life has
+so little connexion, that Scripture itself hath said, ‘Sufficient for
+the day is the evil thereof.’
+
+If, therefore, I have sometimes abused prosperity, by murmuring at
+my unknown birth and uncertain rank in society, I will make amends by
+bearing my present real adversity with patience and courage, and, if I
+can, even with gaiety. What can they--dare they-do to me? Foxley, I am
+persuaded, is a real Justice of Peace, and country gentleman of estate,
+though (wonderful to tell!) he is an ass notwithstanding; and
+his functionary in the drab coat must have a shrewd guess at the
+consequences of being accessory to an act of murder or kidnapping. Men
+invite not such witnesses to deeds of darkness. I have also--Alan, I
+have hopes, arising out of the family of the oppressor himself. I am
+encouraged to believe that G.M. is likely again to enter on the field.
+More I dare not here say; nor must I drop a hint which another eye than
+thine might be able to construe. Enough, my feelings are lighter than
+they have been; and, though fear and wonder are still around me, they
+are unable entirely to overcloud the horizon.
+
+Even when I saw the spectral form of the old scarecrow of the Parliament
+House rush into the apartment where I had undergone so singular an
+examination, I thought of thy connexion with him, and could almost have
+parodied Lear--
+
+  Death!--nothing could have thus subdued nature
+  To such a lowness, but his ‘learned lawyers.’
+
+He was e’en as we have seen him of yore, Alan, when, rather to keep thee
+company than to follow my own bent, I formerly frequented the halls of
+justice. The only addition to his dress, in the capacity of a traveller,
+was a pair of boots, that seemed as if they might have seen the field
+of Sheriffmoor; so large and heavy that, tied as they were to the
+creature’s wearied hams with large bunches of worsted tape of various
+colours, they looked as if he had been dragging them along, either for a
+wager or by way of penance.
+
+Regardless of the surprised looks of the party on whom he thus intruded
+himself, Peter blundered into the middle of the apartment, with his head
+charged like a ram’s in the act of butting, and saluted them thus:--
+
+‘Gude day to ye, gude day to your honours. Is’t here they sell the fugie
+warrants?’
+
+I observed that on his entrance, my friend--or enemy--drew himself
+back, and placed himself as if he would rather avoid attracting the
+observation of the new-comer. I did the same myself, as far as I was
+able; for I thought it likely that Mr. Peebles might recognize me, as
+indeed I was too frequently among the group of young juridical aspirants
+who used to amuse themselves by putting cases for Peter’s solution, and
+playing him worse tricks; yet I was uncertain whether I had better avail
+myself of our acquaintance to have the advantage, such as it might
+be, of his evidence before the magistrate, or whether to make him,
+if possible, bearer of a letter which might procure me more effectual
+assistance. I resolved, therefore, to be guided by circumstances, and
+to watch carefully that nothing might escape me. I drew back as far as
+I could, and even reconnoitred the door and passage, to consider whether
+absolute escape might not be practicable. But there paraded Cristal
+Nixon, whose little black eyes, sharp as those of a basilisk, seemed,
+the instant when they encountered mine, to penetrate my purpose.
+
+I sat down, as much out of sight of all parties as I could, and listened
+to the dialogue which followed--a dialogue how much more interesting to
+me than any I could have conceived, in which Peter Peebles was to be one
+of the dramatis personae!
+
+‘Is it here where ye sell the warrants--the fugies, ye ken?’ said Peter.
+
+‘Hey--eh--what!’ said Justice Foxley; ‘what the devil does the fellow
+mean?--What would you have a warrant for?’
+
+‘It is to apprehend a young lawyer that is IN MEDITATIONE FUGAE; for he
+has ta’en my memorial and pleaded my cause, and a good fee I gave
+him, and as muckle brandy as he could drink that day at his father’s
+house--he loes the brandy ower weel for sae youthful a creature.’
+
+‘And what has this drunken young dog of a lawyer done to you, that
+you are come to me--eh--ha? Has he robbed you? Not unlikely if he be a
+lawyer--eh--Nick--ha?’ said Justice Foxley.
+
+‘He has robbed me of himself, sir,’ answered Peter; ‘of his help,
+comfort, aid, maintenance, and assistance, whilk, as a counsel to a
+client, he is bound to yield me RATIONE OFFICII--that is it, ye see. He
+has pouched my fee, and drucken a mutchkin of brandy, and now he’s ower
+the march, and left my cause, half won half lost--as dead a heat as e’er
+was run ower the back-sands. Now, I was advised by some cunning laddies
+that are used to crack a bit law wi’ me in the House, that the best
+thing I could do was to take heart o’ grace and set out after him; so I
+have taken post on my ain shanks, forby a cast in a cart, or the like. I
+got wind of him in Dumfries, and now I have run him ower to the English
+side, and I want a fugie warrant against him.’
+
+How did my heart throb at this information, dearest Alan! Thou art near
+me then, and I well know with what kind purpose; thou hast abandoned all
+to fly to my assistance; and no wonder that, knowing thy friendship and
+faith, thy sound sagacity and persevering disposition, ‘my bosom’s
+lord should now sit lightly on his throne’; that gaiety should almost
+involuntarily hover on my pen; and that my heart should beat like that
+of a general, responsive to the drums of his advancing ally, without
+whose help the battle must have been lost.
+
+I did not suffer myself to be startled by this joyous surprise, but
+continued to bend my strictest attention to what followed among this
+singular party. That Poor Peter Peebles had been put on this wildgoose
+chase by some of his juvenile advisers in the Parliament House, he
+himself had intimated; but he spoke with much confidence, and the
+Justice, who seemed to have some secret apprehension of being put to
+trouble in the matter, and, as sometimes occurs on the English frontier,
+a jealousy lest the superior acuteness of their northern neighbours
+might overreach their own simplicity, turned to his clerk with a
+perplexed countenance.
+
+‘Eh--oh--Nick--d--n thee--Hast thou got nothing to say? This is more
+Scots law, I take it, and more Scotsmen.’ (Here he cast a side-glance at
+the owner of the mansion, and winked to his clerk.) ‘I would Solway were
+as deep as it is wide, and we had then some chance of keeping of them
+out.’
+
+Nicholas conversed an instant aside with the supplicant, and then
+reported:--
+
+‘The man wants a border-warrant, I think; but they are only granted for
+debt--now he wants one to catch a lawyer.’
+
+‘And what for no?’ answered Peter Peebles, doggedly; ‘what for no, I
+would be glad to ken? If a day’s labourer refuse to work, ye’ll grant a
+warrant to gar him do out his daurg--if a wench quean rin away from
+her hairst, ye’ll send her back to her heuck again--if sae mickle as a
+collier or a salter make a moonlight flitting, ye will cleek him by the
+back-spaul in a minute of time--and yet the damage canna amount to mair
+than a creelfu’ of coals, and a forpit or twa of saut; and here is a
+chield taks leg from his engagement, and damages me to the tune of sax
+thousand punds sterling; that is, three thousand that I should win, and
+three thousand mair that I am like to lose; and you that ca’ yourself a
+justice canna help a poor man to catch the rinaway? A bonny like justice
+I am like to get amang ye!’
+
+‘The fellow must be drunk,’ said the clerk.
+
+‘Black fasting from all but sin,’ replied the supplicant; ‘I havena had
+mair than a mouthful of cauld water since I passed the Border, and deil
+a ane of ye is like to say to me, “Dog, will ye drink?”’
+
+The Justice seemed moved by this appeal. ‘Hem---tush, man,’ replied he;
+‘thou speak’st to us as if thou wert in presence of one of thine own
+beggarly justices--get downstairs--get something to eat, man (with
+permission of my friend to make so free in his house), and a mouthful to
+drink, and I warrant we get ye such justice as will please ye.’
+
+‘I winna refuse your neighbourly offer,’ said Poor Peter Peebles, making
+his bow; ‘muckle grace be wi’ your honour, and wisdom to guide you in
+this extraordinary cause.’
+
+When I saw Peter Peebles about to retire from the room, I could not
+forbear an effort to obtain from him such evidence as might give me some
+credit with the Justice. I stepped forward, therefore, and, saluting
+him, asked him if he remembered me?
+
+After a stare or two, and a long pinch of snuff, recollection seemed
+suddenly to dawn on Peter Peebles. ‘Recollect ye!’ he said; ‘by my troth
+do I.---Haud him a grip, gentlemen!--constables, keep him fast! where
+that ill-deedie hempy is, ye are sure that Alan Fairford is not far off.
+Haud him fast, Master Constable; I charge ye wi’ him, for I am mista’en
+if he is not at the bottom of this rinaway business. He was aye getting
+the silly callant Alan awa wi’ gigs, and horse, and the like of that, to
+Roslin, and Prestonpans, and a’ the idle gates he could think of. He’s a
+rinaway apprentice, that ane.’
+
+‘Mr. Peebles,’ I said, ‘do not do me wrong. I am sure you can say no
+harm of me justly, but can satisfy these gentlemen, if you will, that I
+am a student of law in Edinburgh--Darsie Latimer by name.’
+
+‘Me satisfy! how can I satisfy the gentlemen,’ answered Peter, ‘that am
+sae far from being satisfied mysell? I ken naething about your name, and
+can only testify, NIHIL NOVIT IN CAUSA.’
+
+‘A pretty witness you have brought forward in your favour,’ said Mr.
+Foxley. ‘But--ha--aye---I’ll ask him a question or two. Pray, friend,
+will you take your oath to this youth being a runaway apprentice?’
+
+‘Sir,’ said Peter, ‘I will make oath to onything in reason; when a case
+comes to my oath it’s a won cause: But I am in some haste to prie your
+worship’s good cheer;’ for Peter had become much more respectful in
+his demeanour towards the Justice since he had heard some intimation of
+dinner.
+
+‘You shall have--eh--hum--aye--a bellyful, if it be possible to fill it.
+First let me know if this young man be really what he pretends. Nick,
+make his affidavit.’
+
+‘Ow, he is just a wud harum-scarum creature, that wad never take to his
+studies; daft, sir, clean daft.’
+
+‘Deft!’ said the Justice; ‘what d’ye mean by deft--eh?’
+
+‘Just Fifish,’ replied Peter; ‘wowf--a wee bit by the East Nook or sae;
+it’s a common case--the ae half of the warld thinks the tither daft. I
+have met with folk in my day that thought I was daft mysell; and, for my
+part, I think our Court of Session clean daft, that have had the great
+cause of Peebles against Plainstanes before them for this score of
+years, and have never been able to ding the bottom out of it yet.’
+
+‘I cannot make out a word of his cursed brogue,’ said the Cumbrian
+justice; ‘can you, neighbour--eh? What can he mean by DEFT?’
+
+‘He means MAD,’ said the party appealed to, thrown off his guard by
+impatience of this protracted discussion.
+
+‘Ye have it--ye have it,’ said Peter; ‘that is, not clean skivie, but--’
+
+Here he stopped, and fixed his eye on the person he addressed with an
+air of joyful recognition.--‘Aye, aye, Mr. Herries of Birrenswork, is
+this your ainsell in blood and bane? I thought ye had been hanged at
+Kennington Common, or Hairiebie, or some of these places, after the
+bonny ploy ye made in the Forty-five.’
+
+‘I believe you are mistaken, friend,’ said Herries, sternly, with whose
+name and designation I was thus made unexpectedly acquainted.
+
+‘The deil a bit,’ answered the undaunted Peter Peebles; I mind ye weel,
+for ye lodged in my house the great year of Forty-five, for a great
+year it was; the Grand Rebellion broke out, and my cause--the great
+cause--Peebles against Plainstanes, ET PER CONTRA--was called in the
+beginning of the winter session, and would have been heard, but that
+there was a surcease of justice, with your plaids, and your piping, and
+your nonsense.’
+
+‘I tell you, fellow,’ said Herries, yet more fiercely, ‘you have
+confused me with some of the other furniture of your crazy pate.’
+
+‘Speak like a gentleman, sir,’ answered Peebles; ‘these are not legal
+phrases, Mr. Herries of Birrenswork. Speak in form of law, or I sall bid
+ye gude day, sir. I have nae pleasure in speaking to proud folk, though
+I am willing to answer onything in a legal way; so if you are for
+a crack about auld langsyne, and the splores that you and Captain
+Redgimlet used to breed in my house, and the girded cask of brandy that
+ye drank and ne’er thought of paying for it (not that I minded it muckle
+in thae days, though I have felt a lack of it sin syne), why I will
+waste an hour on ye at ony time.--and where is Captain Redgimlet now?
+he was a wild chap, like yoursell, though they arena sae keen after you
+poor bodies for these some years bygane; the heading and hanging is weel
+ower now--awful job--awful job--will ye try my sneeshing?’
+
+He concluded his desultory speech by thrusting out his large bony paw,
+filled with a Scottish mull of huge dimensions, which Herries, who had
+been standing like one petrified by the assurance of this unexpected
+address, rejected with a contemptuous motion of his hand, which spilled
+some of the contents of the box.
+
+‘Aweel, aweel,’ said Peter Peebles, totally unabashed by the repulse,
+‘e’en as ye like, a wilful man maun hae his way; but,’ he added,
+stooping down and endeavouring to gather the spilled snuff from the
+polished floor, ‘I canna afford to lose my sneeshing for a’ that ye are
+gumple-foisted wi’ me.’
+
+My attention had been keenly awakened, during this extraordinary and
+unexpected scene. I watched, with as much attention as my own agitation
+permitted me to command, the effect produced on the parties concerned.
+It was evident that our friend, Peter Peebles, had unwarily let out
+something which altered the sentiments of Justice Foxley and his clerk
+towards Mr. Herries, with whom, until he was known and acknowledged
+under that name, they had appeared to be so intimate. They talked with
+each other aside, looked at a paper or two which the clerk selected
+from the contents of a huge black pocket-book, and seemed, under the
+influence of fear and uncertainty, totally at a loss what line of
+conduct to adopt.
+
+Herries made a different, and far more interesting figure. However
+little Peter Peebles might resemble the angel Ithuriel, the appearance
+of Herries, his high and scornful demeanour, vexed at what seemed
+detection yet fearless of the consequences, and regarding the whispering
+magistrate and his clerk with looks in which contempt predominated over
+anger or anxiety, bore, in my opinion, no slight resemblance to
+
+     the regal port
+  And faded splendour wan
+
+with which the poet has invested the detected King of the powers of the
+air.
+
+As he glanced round, with a look which he had endeavoured to compose to
+haughty indifference, his eye encountered mine, and, I thought, at
+the first glance sank beneath it. But he instantly rallied his natural
+spirit, and returned me one of those extraordinary looks, by which he
+could contort so strangely the wrinkles on his forehead. I started; but,
+angry at myself for my pusillanimity, I answered him by a look of the
+same kind, and catching the reflection of my countenance in a large
+antique mirror which stood before me, I started again at the real or
+imaginary resemblance which my countenance, at that moment, bore to that
+of Herries. Surely my fate is somehow strangely interwoven with that of
+this mysterious individual. I had no time at present to speculate upon
+the subject, for the subsequent conversation demanded all my attention.
+
+The Justice addressed Herries, after a pause of about five minutes, in
+which, all parties seemed at some loss how to proceed. He spoke with
+embarrassment, and his faltering voice, and the long intervals which
+divided his sentences, seemed to indicate fear of him whom he addressed.
+
+‘Neighbour,’ he said, ‘I could not have thought this; or, if I--eh--DID
+think--in a corner of my own mind as it were--that you, I say--that you
+might have unluckily engaged in--eh--the matter of the Forty-five--there
+was still time to have forgot all that.’
+
+‘And is it so singular that a man should have been out in the
+Forty-five?’ said Herries, with contemptuous composure;--‘your father, I
+think, Mr. Foxley, was out with Derwentwater in the Fifteen.’
+
+‘And lost half of his estate,’ answered Foxley, with more rapidity than
+usual; ‘and was very near--hem--being hanged into the boot. But this
+is--another guess job--for--eh--Fifteen is not Forty-five; and my father
+had a remission, and you, I take it, have none.’
+
+‘Perhaps I have,’ said Herries indifferently; ‘or if I have not, I am
+but in the case of half a dozen others whom government do not think
+worth looking after at this time of day, so they give no offence or
+disturbance.’
+
+‘But you have given both, sir,’ said Nicholas Faggot, the clerk, who,
+having some petty provincial situation, as I have since understood,
+deemed himself bound to be zealous for government, ‘Mr. Justice Foxley
+cannot be answerable for letting you pass free, now your name and
+surname have been spoken plainly out. There are warrants out against you
+from the Secretary of State’s office.’
+
+‘A proper allegation, Mr. Attorney! that, at the distance of so
+many years, the Secretary of State should trouble himself about the
+unfortunate relics of a ruined cause,’ answered Mr. Herries.
+
+‘But if it be so,’ said the clerk, who seemed to assume more confidence
+upon the composure of Herries’s demeanour; ‘and if cause has been given
+by the conduct of a gentleman himself, who hath been, it is
+alleged, raking up old matters, and mixing them with new subjects of
+disaffection--I say, if it be so, I should advise the party, in his
+wisdom, to surrender himself quietly into the lawful custody of the next
+Justice of Peace--Mr. Foxley, suppose--where, and by whom, the matter
+should be regularly inquired into. I am only putting a case,’ he added,
+watching with apprehension the effect which his words were likely to
+produce upon the party to whom they were addressed.
+
+‘And were I to receive such advice,’ said Herries, with the same
+composure as before--‘putting the case, as you say, Mr. Faggot--I
+should request to see the warrant which countenanced such a scandalous
+proceeding.’
+
+Mr. Nicholas, by way of answer, placed in his hand a paper, and seemed
+anxiously to expect the consequences which were to ensue. Mr. Herries
+looked it over with the same equanimity as before, and then continued,
+‘And were such a scrawl as this presented to me in my own house, I would
+throw it into the chimney, and Mr. Faggot upon the top of it.’
+
+Accordingly, seconding the word with the action, he flung the warrant
+into the fire with one hand, and fixed the other, with a stern and
+irresistible grip, on the breast of the attorney, who, totally unable to
+contend with him, in either personal strength or mental energy, trembled
+like a chicken in the raven’s clutch. He got off, however, for the
+fright; for Herries, having probably made him fully sensible of the
+strength of his grasp, released him, with a scornful laugh.
+
+‘Deforcement--spulzie-stouthrief--masterful rescue!’ exclaimed Peter
+Peebles, scandalized at the resistance offered to the law in the person
+of Nicholas Faggot. But his shrill exclamations were drowned in the
+thundering voice of Herries, who, calling upon Cristal Nixon, ordered
+him to take the bawling fool downstairs, fill his belly, and then give
+him a guinea, and thrust him out of doors. Under such injunctions, Peter
+easily suffered himself to be withdrawn from the scene.
+
+Herries then turned to the Justice, whose visage, wholly abandoned by
+the rubicund hue which so lately beamed upon it, hung out the same pale
+livery as that of his dismayed clerk. ‘Old friend and acquaintance,’
+he said, ‘you came here at my request on a friendly errand, to convince
+this silly young man of the right which I have over his person for the
+present. I trust you do not intend to make your visit the pretext of
+disquieting me about other matters? All the world knows that I have been
+living at large, in these northern counties, for some months, not to say
+years, and might have been apprehended at any time, had the necessities
+of the state required, or my own behaviour deserved it. But no English
+magistrate has been ungenerous enough to trouble a gentleman under
+misfortune, on account of political opinions and disputes which have
+been long ended by the success of the reigning powers. I trust, my good
+friend, you will not endanger yourself by taking any other view of the
+subject than you have done ever since we were acquainted?’
+
+The Justice answered with more readiness, as well as more spirit than
+usual, ‘Neighbour Ingoldsby--what you say--is--eh--in some sort
+true; and when you were coming and going at markets, horse-races,
+and cock-fights, fairs, hunts, and such-like--it was--eh--neither my
+business nor my wish to dispel--I say--to inquire into and dispel the
+mysteries which hung about you; for while you were a good companion
+in the field, and over a bottle now and then--I did not--eh--think
+it necessary to ask--into your private affairs. And if I thought
+you were--ahem--somewhat unfortunate in former undertakings, and
+enterprises, and connexions, which might cause you to live unsettledly
+and more private, I could have--eh--very little pleasure--to aggravate
+your case by interfering, or requiring explanations, which are often
+more easily asked than given. But when there are warrants and witnesses
+to names--and those names, christian and surname, belong to--eh--an
+attainted person--charged--I trust falsely--with--ahem-taking advantage
+of modern broils and heart-burnings to renew our civil disturbances, the
+case is altered; and I must--ahem--do my duty.’
+
+The Justice, got on his feet as he concluded this speech, and looked
+as bold as he could. I drew close beside him and his clerk, Mr. Faggot,
+thinking the moment favourable for my own liberation, and intimated
+to Mr. Foxley my determination to stand by him. But Mr. Herries only
+laughed at the menacing posture which we assumed. ‘My good neighbour,’
+said he, ‘you talk of a witness. Is yon crazy beggar a fit witness in an
+affair of this nature?’
+
+‘But you do not deny that you are Mr. Herries of Birrenswork, mentioned
+in the Secretary of State’s warrant?’ said Mr. Foxley.
+
+‘How can I deny or own anything about it?’ said Herries, with a sneer.
+‘There is no such warrant in existence now; its ashes, like the poor
+traitor whose doom it threatened, have been dispersed to the four winds
+of heaven. There is now no warrant in the world.’
+
+‘But you will not deny,’ said the Justice, ‘that you were the person
+named in it; and that--eh--your own act destroyed it?’
+
+‘I will neither deny my name nor my actions, Justice,’ replied Mr.
+Herries, ‘when called upon by competent authority to avow or defend
+them. But I will resist all impertinent attempts either to intrude into
+my private motives, or to control my person. I am quite well prepared to
+do so; and I trust that you, my good neighbour and brother sportsman,
+in your expostulation, and my friend Mr. Nicholas Faggot here, in his
+humble advice and petition that I should surrender myself, will consider
+yourselves as having amply discharged your duty to King George and
+government.’
+
+The cold and ironical tone in which he made this declaration; the look
+and attitude, so nobly expressive of absolute confidence in his own
+superior strength and energy, seemed to complete the indecision which
+had already shown itself on the side of those whom he addressed.
+
+The Justice looked to the clerk--the clerk to the Justice; the former
+HA’D, EH’D, without bringing forth an articulate syllable; the latter
+only said, ‘As the warrant is destroyed, Mr. Justice, I presume you do
+not mean to proceed with the arrest?’
+
+‘Hum--aye--why, no--Nicholas--it would not be quite advisable--and as
+the Forty-five was an old affair--and--hem--as my friend here will,
+I hope, see his error--that is, if he has not seen it already--and
+renounce the Pope, the Devil, and the Pretender--I mean no harm,
+neighbour--I think we--as we have no POSSE, or constables, or the
+like--should order our horses--and, in one word, look the matter over.’
+
+‘Judiciously resolved,’ said the person whom this decision affected;
+‘but before you go, I trust you will drink and be friends?’
+
+‘Why,’ said the Justice, rubbing his brow, ‘our business has
+been--hem--rather a thirsty one.’
+
+‘Cristal Nixon,’ said Mr. Herries, ‘let us have a cool tankard
+instantly, large enough to quench the thirst of the whole commission.’
+
+While Cristal was absent on this genial errand, there was a pause, of
+which I endeavoured to avail myself by bringing back the discourse to
+my own concerns. ‘Sir,’ I said to Justice Foxley, ‘I have no direct
+business with your late discussion with Mr. Herries, only just thus
+far--You leave me, a loyal subject of King George, an unwilling prisoner
+in the hands of a person whom you have reason to believe unfriendly to
+the king’s cause. I humbly submit that this is contrary to your duty
+as a magistrate, and that you ought to make Mr. Herries aware of the
+illegality of his proceedings, and take steps for my rescue, either upon
+the spot, or, at least, as soon as possible after you have left this
+case’--
+
+‘Young man,’ said Mr. Justice Foxley, ‘I would have you remember you are
+under the power, the lawful power--ahem--of your guardian.’
+
+‘He calls himself so, indeed,’ I replied; ‘but he has shown no evidence
+to establish so absurd a claim; and if he had, his circumstances, as an
+attainted traitor excepted from pardon, would void such a right if it
+existed. I do therefore desire you, Mr. Justice, and you, his clerk, to
+consider my situation, and afford me relief at your peril.’
+
+‘Here is a young fellow now,’ said the Justice, with much-embarrassed
+looks, ‘thinks that I carry the whole statute law of England in my head,
+and a POSSE COMITATUS to execute them in my pocket! Why, what good would
+my interference do?--but--hum--eh--I will speak to your guardian in your
+favour.’
+
+He took Mr. Herries aside, and seemed indeed to urge something upon him
+with much earnestness; and perhaps such a species of intercession was
+all which, in the circumstances, I was entitled to expect from him.
+
+They often looked at me as they spoke together; and as Cristal Nixon
+entered with a huge four-pottle tankard, filled with the beverage
+his master had demanded, Herries turned away from Mr. Foxley somewhat
+impatiently, saying with emphasis, ‘I give you my word of honour, that
+you have not the slightest reason to apprehend anything on his account.’
+He then took up the tankard, and saying aloud in Gaelic, ‘SLAINT AN
+REY,’ [The King’s health.] just tasted the liquor, and handed the
+tankard to Justice Foxley, who, to avoid the dilemma of pledging him to
+what might be the Pretender’s health, drank to Mr. Herries’s own, with
+much pointed solemnity, but in a draught far less moderate.
+
+The clerk imitated the example of his principal, and I was fain to
+follow their example, for anxiety and fear are at least as thirsty as
+sorrow is said to be. In a word, we exhausted the composition of ale,
+sherry, lemon-juice, nutmeg, and other good things, stranded upon the
+silver bottom of the tankard the huge toast, as well as the roasted
+orange, which had whilom floated jollily upon the brim, and rendered
+legible Dr. Byrom’s celebrated lines engraved thereon--
+
+  God bless the King!--God bless the Faith’s defender!
+  God bless--No harm in blessing--the Pretender.
+  Who that Pretender is, and who that King,--
+  God bless us all!--is quite another thing.
+
+I had time enough to study this effusion of the Jacobite muse, while the
+Justice was engaged in the somewhat tedious ceremony of taking leave.
+That of Mr. Faggot was less ceremonious; but I suspect something besides
+empty compliment passed betwixt him and Mr. Herries; for I remarked that
+the latter slipped a piece of paper into the hand of the former, which
+might perhaps be a little atonement for the rashness with which he had
+burnt the warrant, and imposed no gentle hand on the respectable minion
+of the law by whom it was exhibited; and I observed that he made this
+propitiation in such a manner as to be secret from the worthy clerk’s
+principal.
+
+When this was arranged, the party took leave of each other with much
+formality on the part of Squire Foxley, amongst whose adieus the
+following phrase was chiefly remarkable: ‘I presume you do not intend to
+stay long in these parts?’
+
+‘Not for the present, Justice, you may be sure; there are good reasons
+to the contrary. But I have no doubt of arranging my affairs so that we
+shall speedily have sport together again.’
+
+He went to wait upon the Justice to the courtyard; and, as he did
+so, commanded Cristal Nixon to see that I returned into my apartment.
+Knowing it would be to no purpose to resist or tamper with that stubborn
+functionary, I obeyed in silence, and was once more a prisoner in my
+former quarters.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+I spent more than an hour, after returning to the apartment which I may
+call my prison, in reducing to writing the singular circumstances which
+I had just witnessed. Methought I could now form some guess at the
+character of Mr. Herries, upon whose name and situation the late
+scene had thrown considerable light--one of those fanatical Jacobites,
+doubtless, whose arms, not twenty years since, had shaken the British
+throne, and some of whom, though their party daily diminished in
+numbers, energy, and power, retained still an inclination to renew the
+attempt they had found so desperate. He was indeed perfectly different
+from the sort of zealous Jacobites whom it had been my luck hitherto to
+meet with. Old ladies of family over their hyson, and grey-haired lairds
+over their punch, I had often heard utter a little harmless treason;
+while the former remembered having led down a dance with the Chevalier,
+and the latter recounted the feats they had performed at Preston,
+Clifton, and Falkirk.
+
+The disaffection of such persons was too unimportant to excite the
+attention of government. I had heard, however, that there still
+existed partisans of the Stuart family of a more daring and dangerous
+description; men who, furnished with gold from Rome, moved, secretly and
+in disguise, through the various classes of society, and endeavoured to
+keep alive the expiring zeal of their party.
+
+I had no difficulty in assigning an important post among this class of
+persons, whose agency and exertion are only doubted by those who look
+on the surface of things, to this Mr. Herries, whose mental energies, as
+well as his personal strength and activity, seemed to qualify him
+well to act so dangerous a part; and I knew that all along the Western
+Border, both in England and Scotland, there are so many nonjurors, that
+such a person may reside there with absolute safety, unless it becomes,
+in a very especial degree, the object of the government to secure his
+person; and which purpose, even then, might be disappointed by early
+intelligence, or, as in the case of Mr. Foxley, by the unwillingness
+of provincial magistrates to interfere in what is now considered an
+invidious pursuit of the unfortunate.
+
+There have, however, been rumours lately, as if the present state of the
+nation or at least of some discontented provinces, agitated by a
+variety of causes but particularly by the unpopularity of the present
+administration, may seem to this species of agitators a favourable
+period for recommencing their intrigues; while, on the other hand,
+government may not, at such a crisis, be inclined to look upon them
+with the contempt which a few years ago would have been their most
+appropriate punishment.
+
+That men should be found rash enough to throw away their services and
+lives in a desperate cause, is nothing new in history, which abounds
+with instances of similar devotion--that Mr. Herries is such an
+enthusiast is no less evident; but all this explains not his conduct
+towards me. Had he sought to make me a proselyte to his ruined cause,
+violence and compulsion were arguments very unlikely to prevail with any
+generous spirit. But even if such were his object, of what use to him
+could be the acquisition of a single reluctant partisan, who could bring
+only his own person to support any quarrel which he might adopt? He had
+claimed over me the rights of a guardian; he had more than hinted that
+I was in a state of mind which could not dispense with the authority of
+such a person. Was this man, so sternly desperate in his purpose--he
+who seemed willing to take on his own shoulders the entire support of
+a cause which had been ruinous to thousands--was he the person that had
+the power of deciding on my fate? Was it from him those dangers flowed,
+to secure me against which I had been educated under such circumstances
+of secrecy and precaution?
+
+And if this was so, of what nature was the claim which he asserted?--Was
+it that of propinquity? And did I share the blood, perhaps the features,
+of this singular being?--Strange as it may seem, a thrill of awe, which
+shot across my mind at that instant, was not unmingled with a wild and
+mysterious feeling of wonder, almost amounting to pleasure. I remembered
+the reflection of my own face in the mirror at one striking moment
+during the singular interview of the day, and I hastened to the outward
+apartment to consult a glass which hung there, whether it were possible
+for my countenance to be again contorted into the peculiar frown which
+so much resembled the terrific look of Herries. But I folded my brows
+in vain into a thousand complicated wrinkles, and I was obliged to
+conclude, either that the supposed mark on my brow was altogether
+imaginary, or that it could not be called forth by voluntary effort; or,
+in fine, what seemed most likely, that it was such a resemblance as the
+imagination traces in the embers of a wood fire, or among the varied
+veins of marble, distinct at one time, and obscure or invisible at
+another, according as the combination of lines strikes the eye or
+impresses the fancy.
+
+While I was moulding my visage like a mad player, the door suddenly
+opened, and the girl of the house entered. Angry and ashamed at being
+detected in my singular occupation, I turned round sharply, and, I
+suppose, chance produced the change on my features which I had been in
+vain labouring to call forth.
+
+The girl started back, with her ‘Don’t ya look so now--don’t ye, for
+love’s sake--you be as like the ould squoire as--But here a comes,’ she
+said, huddling away out of the room; ‘and if you want a third, there is
+none but ould Harry, as I know of, that can match ye for a brent broo!’
+
+As the girl muttered this exclamation, and hastened out of the room,
+Herries entered. He stopped on observing that I had looked again to the
+mirror, anxious to trace the look by which the wench had undoubtedly
+been terrified. He seemed to guess what was passing in my mind, for, as
+I turned towards him, he observed, ‘Doubt not that it is stamped on your
+forehead--the fatal mark of our race; though it is not now so apparent
+as it will become when age and sorrow, and the traces of stormy passions
+and of bitter penitence, shall have drawn their furrows on your brow.’
+
+‘Mysterious man,’ I replied, ‘I know not of what you speak; your
+language is as dark as your purposes!’
+
+‘Sit down, then,’ he said, ‘and listen; thus far, at least, must the
+veil of which you complain be raised. When withdrawn, it will only
+display guilt and sorrow--guilt followed by strange penalty, and sorrow
+which Providence has entailed upon the posterity of the mourners.’
+
+He paused a moment, and commenced his narrative, which he told with the
+air of one, who, remote as the events were which he recited, took
+still the deepest interest in them. The tone of his voice, which I have
+already described as rich and powerful, aided by its inflections the
+effects of his story, which I will endeavour to write down, as nearly as
+possible, in the very words which he used.
+
+‘It was not of late years that the English learned that their best
+chance of conquering their independent neighbours must be by introducing
+amongst them division and civil war. You need not be reminded of the
+state of thraldom to which Scotland was reduced by the unhappy wars
+betwixt the domestic factions of Bruce and Baliol, nor how, after
+Scotland had been emancipated from a foreign yoke by the conduct and
+valour of the immortal Bruce, the whole fruits of the triumphs of
+Bannockburn were lost in the dreadful defeats of Dupplin and Halidon;
+and Edward Baliol, the minion and feudatory of his namesake of England,
+seemed, for a brief season, in safe and uncontested possession of the
+throne so lately occupied by the greatest general and wisest prince in
+Europe. But the experience of Bruce had not died with him. There
+were many who had shared his martial labours, and all remembered the
+successful efforts by which, under circumstances as disadvantageous as
+those of his son, he had achieved the liberation of Scotland.
+
+‘The usurper, Edward Baliol, was feasting with a few of his favourite
+retainers in the castle of Annan, when he was suddenly surprised by a
+chosen band of insurgent patriots. Their chiefs were, Douglas, Randolph,
+the young Earl of Moray, and Sir Simon Fraser; and their success was so
+complete, that Baliol was obliged to fly for his life scarcely
+clothed, and on a horse which there was no leisure to saddle. It was of
+importance to seize his person, if possible, and his flight was closely
+pursued by a valiant knight of Norman descent, whose family had been
+long settled in the marches of Dumfriesshire. Their Norman appellation
+was Fitz-Aldin, but this knight, from the great slaughter which he had
+made of the Southron, and the reluctance which he had shown to admit
+them to quarter during the former war of that bloody period, had
+acquired the name of Redgauntlet, which he transmitted to his
+posterity’--
+
+‘Redgauntlet!’ I involuntarily repeated.
+
+‘Yes, Redgauntlet,’ said my alleged guardian, looking at me keenly;
+‘does that name recall any associations to your mind?’
+
+‘No,’ I replied, ‘except that I had lately heard it given to the hero of
+a supernatural legend.’
+
+‘There are many such current concerning the family,’ he answered; and
+then proceeded in his narrative.
+
+‘Alberick Redgauntlet, the first of his house so termed, was, as may be
+supposed from his name, of a stern and implacable disposition, which
+had been rendered more so by family discord. An only son, now a youth
+of eighteen, shared so much the haughty spirit of his father, that he
+became impatient of domestic control, resisted paternal authority, and
+finally fled from his father’s house, renounced his political opinions,
+and awakened his mortal displeasure by joining the adherents of Baliol.
+It was said that his father cursed, in his wrath, his degenerate
+offspring, and swore that if they met he should perish by his hand.
+Meantime, circumstances seemed to promise atonement for this great
+deprivation. The lady of Alberick Redgauntlet was again, after many
+years, in a situation which afforded her husband the hope of a more
+dutiful heir.
+
+‘But the delicacy and deep interest of his wife’s condition did not
+prevent Alberick from engaging in the undertaking of Douglas and Moray.
+He had been the most forward in the attack of the castle, and was now
+foremost in the pursuit of Baliol, eagerly engaged in dispersing or
+cutting down the few daring followers who endeavoured to protect the
+usurper in his flight.
+
+‘As these were successively routed or slain, the formidable Redgauntlet,
+the mortal enemy of the House of Baliol, was within two lances’ length
+of the fugitive Edward Baliol, in a narrow pass, when a youth, one of
+the last who attended the usurper in his flight, threw himself
+between them, received the shock of the pursuer, and was unhorsed and
+overthrown. The helmet rolled from his head, and the beams of the sun,
+then rising over the Solway, showed Redgauntlet the features of his
+disobedient son, in the livery, and wearing the cognizance, of the
+usurper.
+
+‘Redgauntlet beheld his son lying before his horse’s feet; but he also
+saw Baliol, the usurper of the Scottish crown, still, as it seemed,
+within his grasp, and separated from him only by the prostrate body of
+his overthrown adherent. Without pausing to inquire whether young Edward
+was wounded, he dashed his spurs into his horse, meaning to leap over
+him, but was unhappily frustrated in his purpose. The steed made indeed
+a bound forward, but was unable to clear the body of the youth, and
+with its hind foot struck him in the forehead, as he was in the act of
+rising. The blow was mortal. It is needless to add, that the pursuit was
+checked, and Baliol escaped.
+
+‘Redgauntlet, ferocious as he is described, was yet overwhelmed with the
+thoughts of the crime he had committed. When he returned to his castle,
+it was to encounter new domestic sorrows. His wife had been prematurely
+seized with the pangs of labour upon hearing the dreadful catastrophe
+which had taken place. The birth of an infant boy cost her her life.
+Redgauntlet sat by her corpse for more than twenty-four hours without
+changing either feature or posture, so far as his terrified domestics
+could observe. The Abbot of Dundrennan preached consolation to him in
+vain. Douglas, who came to visit in his affliction a patriot of such
+distinguished zeal, was more successful in rousing his attention. He
+caused the trumpets to sound an English point of war in the courtyard,
+and Redgauntlet at once sprang to his arms, and seemed restored to the
+recollection which had been lost in the extent of his misery.
+
+‘From that moment, whatever he might feel inwardly, he gave way to no
+outward emotion. Douglas caused his infant to be brought; but even the
+iron-hearted soldiers were struck with horror to observe that, by the
+mysterious law of nature, the cause of his mother’s death, and the
+evidence of his father’s guilt, was stamped on the innocent face of the
+babe, whose brow was distinctly marked by the miniature resemblance of a
+horseshoe. Redgauntlet himself pointed it out to Douglas, saying, with a
+ghastly smile, “It should have been bloody.”
+
+‘Moved, as he was, to compassion for his brother-in-arms, and steeled
+against all softer feelings by the habits of civil war, Douglas
+shuddered at this sight, and displayed a desire to leave the house which
+was doomed to be the scene of such horrors. As his parting advice, he
+exhorted Alberick Redgauntlet to make a pilgrimage to Saint Ninian’s of
+Whiteherne, then esteemed a shrine of great sanctity; and departed with
+a precipitation which might have aggravated, had that been possible,
+the forlorn state of his unhappy friend. But that seems to have been
+incapable of admitting any addition. Sir Alberick caused the bodies
+of his slaughtered son and the mother to be laid side by side in the
+ancient chapel of his house, after he had used the skill of a celebrated
+surgeon of that time to embalm them; and it was said that for many weeks
+he spent; some hours nightly in the vault where they reposed.
+
+‘At length he undertook the proposed pilgrimage to Whiteherne, where
+he confessed himself for the first time since his misfortune, and was
+shrived by an aged monk, who afterwards died in the odour of sanctity.
+It is said that it was then foretold to the Redgauntlet, that on account
+of his unshaken patriotism his family should continue to be powerful
+amid the changes of future times; but that, in detestation of his
+unrelenting cruelty to his own issue, Heaven had decreed that the valour
+of his race should always be fruitless, and that the cause which they
+espoused should never prosper.
+
+‘Submitting to such penance as was there imposed, Sir Alberick went,
+it is thought, on a pilgrimage either to Rome, or to the Holy Sepulchre
+itself. He was universally considered as dead; and it was not till
+thirteen years afterwards, that in the great battle of Durham, fought
+between David Bruce and Queen Philippa of England, a knight, bearing
+a horseshoe for his crest, appeared in the van of the Scottish army,
+distinguishing himself by his reckless and desperate valour; who being
+at length overpowered and slain, was finally discovered to be the brave
+and unhappy Sir Alberick Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘And has the fatal sign,’ said I, when Herries had ended his narrative,
+‘descended on all the posterity of this unhappy house?’
+
+‘It has been so handed down from antiquity, and is still believed,’ said
+Herries. ‘But perhaps there is, in the popular evidence, something of
+that fancy which creates what it sees. Certainly, as other families have
+peculiarities by which they are distinguished, this of Redgauntlet is
+marked in most individuals by a singular indenture of the forehead,
+supposed to be derived from the son of Alberick, their ancestor, and
+brother to the unfortunate Edward, who had perished in so piteous a
+manner. It is certain there seems to have been a fate upon the House of
+Redgauntlet, which has been on the losing side in almost all the civil
+broils which have divided the kingdom of Scotland from David Bruce’s
+days, till the late valiant and unsuccessful attempt of the Chevalier
+Charles Edward.’
+
+He concluded with a deep sigh, as one whom the subject had involved in a
+train of painful reflections.
+
+‘And am I then,’ I exclaimed, ‘descended from this unhappy race? Do you
+belong to it? And if so, why do I sustain restraint and hard usage at
+the hands of a relation?’
+
+‘Inquire no further for the present,’ he said. ‘The line of conduct
+which I am pursuing towards you is dictated, not by choice but by
+necessity. You were withdrawn from the bosom of your family and the
+care of your legal guardian, by the timidity and ignorance of a doting
+mother, who was incapable of estimating the arguments or feelings of
+those who prefer honour and principle to fortune, and even to life. The
+young hawk, accustomed only to the fostering care of its dam, must be
+tamed by darkness and sleeplessness, ere it is trusted on the wing for
+the purposes of the falconer.’
+
+I was appalled at this declaration, which seemed to threaten a long
+continuance, and a dangerous termination, of my captivity. I deemed it
+best, however, to show some spirit, and at the same time to mingle a
+tone of conciliation. ‘Mr. Herries,’ I said ‘(if I call you rightly by
+that name), let us speak upon this matter without the tone of mystery
+and fear in which you seem inclined to envelop it. I have been long,
+alas! deprived of the care of that affectionate mother to whom you
+allude--long under the charge of strangers--and compelled to form my
+own resolutions upon the reasoning of my own mind. Misfortune--early
+deprivation--has given me the privilege of acting for myself; and
+constraint shall not deprive me of an Englishman’s best privilege.’
+
+‘The true cant of the day,’ said Herries, in a tone of scorn. ‘The
+privilege of free action belongs to no mortal--we are tied down by
+the fetters of duty--our mortal path is limited by the regulations
+of honour--our most indifferent actions are but meshes of the web of
+destiny by which we are all surrounded.’
+
+He paced the room rapidly, and proceeded in a tone of enthusiasm
+which, joined to some other parts of his conduct, seems to intimate an
+over-excited imagination, were it not contradicted by the general tenor
+of his speech and conduct.
+
+‘Nothing,’ he said, in an earnest yet melancholy voice--‘nothing is the
+work of chance--nothing is the consequence of free-will--the liberty of
+which the Englishman boasts gives as little real freedom to its owner as
+the despotism, of an Eastern sultan permits to his slave. The usurper,
+William of Nassau, went forth to hunt, and thought, doubtless, that it
+was by an act of his own royal pleasure that the horse of his murdered
+victim was prepared for his kingly sport. But Heaven had other views;
+and before the sun was high, a stumble of that very animal over an
+obstacle so inconsiderable as a mole-hillock, cost the haughty rider
+his life and his usurped crown, Do you think an inclination of the rein
+could have avoided that trifling impediment? I tell you, it crossed his
+way as inevitably as all the long chain of Caucasus could have done.
+Yes, young man, in doing and suffering, we play but the part allotted by
+Destiny, the manager of this strange drama, stand bound to act no more
+than is prescribed, to say no more than is set down for us; and yet we
+mouth about free-will and freedom of thought and action, as if Richard
+must not die, or Richmond conquer, exactly where the Author has decreed
+it shall be so!’
+
+He continued to pace the room after this speech, with folded arms and
+downcast looks; and the sound of his steps and tone of his voice brought
+to my remembrance, that I had heard this singular person, when I met him
+on a former occasion, uttering such soliloquies in his solitary chamber.
+I observed that, like other Jacobites, in his inveteracy against the
+memory of King William, he had adopted the party opinion, that the
+monarch, on the day he had his fatal accident, rode upon a horse once
+the property of the unfortunate Sir John Friend, executed for high
+treason in 1698.
+
+It was not my business to aggravate, but, if possible, rather to soothe
+him in whose power I was so singularly placed. When I conceived that the
+keenness of his feelings had in some degree subsided, I answered him
+as follows:--‘I will not--indeed I feel myself incompetent to argue
+a question of such metaphysical subtlety, as that which involves the
+limits betwixt free-will and predestination. Let us hope we may live
+honestly and die hopefully, without being obliged to form a decided
+opinion upon a point so far beyond our comprehension.’
+
+‘Wisely resolved,’ he interrupted, with a sneer--‘there came a note from
+some Geneva, sermon.’
+
+‘But,’ I proceeded, ‘I call your attention to the fact that I, as well
+as you, am acted upon by impulses, the result either of my own free
+will, or the consequences of the part which is assigned to me by
+destiny. These may be--nay, at present they are--in direct contradiction
+to those by which you are actuated; and how shall we decide which
+shall have precedence?--YOU perhaps feel yourself destined to act as my
+jailer. I feel myself, on the contrary, destined to attempt and effect
+my escape. One of us must be wrong, but who can say which errs till the
+event has decided betwixt us?’
+
+‘I shall feel myself destined to have recourse to severe modes of
+restraint,’ said he, in the same tone of half jest, half earnest which I
+had used.
+
+‘In that case,’ I answered, ‘it will be my destiny to attempt everything
+for my freedom.’
+
+‘And it may be mine, young man,’ he replied, in a deep and stern tone,
+‘to take care that you should rather die than attain your purpose.’
+
+This was speaking out indeed, and I did not allow him to go unanswered.
+‘You threaten me in vain,’ said I; ‘the laws of my country will protect
+me; or whom they cannot protect, they will avenge.’
+
+I spoke this firmly, and he seemed for a moment silenced; and the scorn
+with which he at last answered me, had something of affectation in it.
+
+‘The laws!’ he said; ‘and what, stripling, do you know of the laws of
+your country? Could you learn jurisprudence under a base-born blotter
+of parchment, such as Saunders Fairford; or from the empty pedantic
+coxcomb, his son, who now, forsooth, writer himself advocate? When
+Scotland was herself, and had her own king and legislature, such
+plebeian cubs, instead of being called to the bar of her supreme courts,
+would scarce have been admitted to the honour of bearing a sheepskin
+process-bag.’
+
+Alan, I could not bear this, but answered indignantly, that he knew not
+the worth and honour from which he was detracting.
+
+‘I know as much of these Fairfords as I do of you,’ he replied.
+
+‘As much,’ said I, ‘and as little; for you can neither estimate their
+real worth nor mine. I know you saw them when last in Edinburgh.’
+
+‘Ha!’ he exclaimed, and turned on me an inquisitive look.
+
+‘It is true,’ said I; ‘you cannot deny it; and having thus shown you
+that I know something of your motions, let me warn you I have modes of
+communication with which you are not acquainted. Oblige me not to use
+them to your prejudice.’
+
+‘Prejudice me!’ he replied. ‘Young man, I smile at, and forgive your
+folly. Nay, I will tell you that of which you are not aware, namely,
+that it was from letters received from these Fairfords that I first
+suspected, what the result of my visit to them confirmed, that you were
+the person whom I had sought for years.’
+
+‘If you learned this,’ said I, ‘from the papers which were about my
+person on the night when I was under the necessity of becoming your
+guest at Brokenburn, I do not envy your indifference to the means of
+acquiring information. It was dishonourable to’--
+
+‘Peace, young man,’ said Herries, more calmly than I might have
+expected; ‘the word dishonour must not be mentioned as in conjunction
+with my name. Your pocket-book was in the pocket of your coat, and did
+not escape the curiosity of another, though it would have been sacred
+from mine, My servant, Cristal Nixon, brought me the intelligence after
+you were gone. I was displeased with the manner in which he had acquired
+his information; but it was not the less my duty to ascertain its truth,
+and for that purpose I went to Edinburgh. I was in hopes to persuade
+Mr. Fairford to have entered into my views; but I found him too much
+prejudiced to permit me to trust him. He is a wretched, yet a timid
+slave of the present government, under which our unhappy country is
+dishonourably enthralled; and it would have been altogether unfit and
+unsafe to have entrusted him with the secret either of the right which
+I possess to direct your actions, or of the manner in which I purpose to
+exercise it.’
+
+I was determined to take advantage of his communicative humour, and
+obtain, if possible, more light upon his purpose. He seemed most
+accessible to being piqued on the point of honour, and I resolved to
+avail myself, but with caution, of his sensibility upon that topic. ‘You
+say,’ I replied, ‘that you are not friendly to indirect practices, and
+disapprove of the means by which your domestic obtained information
+of my name and quality--Is it honourable to avail yourself of that
+knowledge which is dishonourably obtained?’
+
+‘It is boldly asked,’ he replied; ‘but, within certain necessary
+limits, I dislike not boldness of expostulation. You have, in this short
+conference, displayed more character and energy than I was prepared to
+expect. You will, I trust, resemble a forest plant, which has indeed,
+by some accident, been brought up in the greenhouse, and thus rendered
+delicate and effeminate, but which regains its native firmness and
+tenacity when exposed for a season to the winter air. I will answer
+your question plainly. In business, as in war, spies and informers are
+necessary evils, which all good men detest; but which yet all prudent
+men must use, unless they mean to fight and act blindfold. But nothing
+can justify the use of falsehood and treachery in our own person.’
+
+‘You said to the elder Mr. Fairford,’ continued I, with the same
+boldness, which I began to find was my best game, ‘that I was the son of
+Ralph Latimer of Langcote Hall? How do you reconcile this with your late
+assertion that my name is not Latimer?’
+
+He coloured as he replied, ‘The doting old fool lied; or perhaps mistook
+my meaning. I said, that gentleman might be your father. To say truth,
+I wished you to visit England, your native country; because, when you
+might do so, my rights over you would revive.’
+
+This speech fully led me to understand a caution which had been often
+impressed upon me, that, if I regarded my safety, I should not cross
+the southern Border; and I cursed my own folly, which kept me fluttering
+like a moth around the candle, until I was betrayed into the calamity
+with which I had dallied. ‘What are those rights,’ I said, ‘which you
+claim over me? To what end do you propose to turn them?’
+
+‘To a weighty one, you may be certain,’ answered Mr. Herries; ‘but I do
+not, at present, mean to communicate to you either its nature or extent.
+You may judge of its importance, when, in order entirely to possess
+myself of your person, I condescended to mix myself with the fellows who
+destroyed the fishing station of yon wretched Quaker. That I held him in
+contempt, and was displeased at the greedy devices with which he ruined
+a manly sport, is true enough; but, unless as it favoured my designs on
+you, he might have, for me, maintained his stake-nets till Solway should
+cease to ebb and flow.’
+
+‘Alas!’ I said, ‘it doubles my regret to have been the unwilling cause
+of misfortune to an honest and friendly man.’
+
+‘Do not grieve for that,’ said Herries; ‘honest Joshua is one of
+those who, by dint of long prayers, can possess themselves of widow’s
+houses--he will quickly repair his losses. When he sustains any mishap,
+he and the other canters set it down as a debt against Heaven, and, by
+way of set-off, practise rogueries without compunction, till the they
+make the balance even, or incline it to the winning side. Enough of this
+for the present.--I must immediately shift my quarters; for, although I
+do not fear the over-zeal of Mr. Justice Foxley or his clerk will
+lead them to any extreme measure, yet that mad scoundrel’s unhappy
+recognition of me may make it more serious for them to connive at me,
+and I must not put their patience to an over severe trial. You must
+prepare to attend me, either as a captive or a companion; if as the
+latter, you must give your parole of honour to attempt no escape. Should
+you be so ill advised as to break your word once pledged, be assured
+that I will blow your brains out without a moment’s scruple.’
+
+‘I am ignorant of your plans and purposes,’ I replied, ‘and cannot but
+hold them dangerous. I do not mean to aggravate my present situation by
+any unavailing resistance to the superior force which detains me; but
+I will not renounce the right of asserting my natural freedom should it
+favourable opportunity occur. I will, therefore, rather be your prisoner
+than your confederate.’
+
+‘That is spoken fairly,’ he said; ‘and yet not without the canny caution
+of one brought up in the Gude Town of Edinburgh. On my part, I will
+impose no unnecessary hardship upon you; but, on the contrary, your
+journey shall be made as easy as is consistent with your being kept
+safely. Do you feel strong enough to ride on horseback as yet, or would
+you prefer a carriage? The former mode of travelling is best adapted to
+the country through which we are to travel, but you are at liberty to
+choose between them.’
+
+I said, ‘I felt my strength gradually returning, and that I should much
+prefer travelling on horseback. A carriage,’ I added, ‘is so close’--
+
+‘And so easily guarded,’ replied Herries, with a look as if he would
+have penetrated my very thoughts,--‘that, doubtless, you think horseback
+better calculated for an escape.’
+
+‘My thoughts are my own,’ I answered; ‘and though you keep my person
+prisoner, these are beyond your control.’
+
+‘Oh, I can read the book,’ he said, ‘without opening the leaves. But I
+would recommend to you to make no rash attempt, and it will be my
+care to see that you have no power to make any that is likely to
+be effectual. Linen, and all other necessaries for one in your
+circumstances, are amply provided, Cristal Nixon will act as your
+valet,--I should rather, perhaps, say, your FEMME DE CHAMBRE. Your
+travelling dress you may perhaps consider as singular; but it is such
+as the circumstances require; and, if you object to use the articles
+prepared for your use, your mode of journeying will be as personally
+unpleasant as that which conducted you hither.--Adieu--We now know each
+other better than we did--it will not be my fault if the consequences of
+further intimacy be not a more favourable mutual opinion.’
+
+He then left me, with a civil good night, to my own reflections,
+and only turned back to say that we should proceed on our journey
+at daybreak next morning, at furthest; perhaps earlier, he said; but
+complimented me by supposing that, as I was a sportsman, I must always
+be ready for a sudden start.
+
+We are then at issue, this singular man and myself. His personal views
+are to a certain point explained. He has chosen an antiquated and
+desperate line of politics, and he claims, from some pretended tie of
+guardianship or relationship, which he does not deign to explain but
+which he seems to have been able to pass current on a silly country
+Justice and his knavish clerk, a right to direct and to control my
+motions. The danger which awaited me in England, and which I might have
+escaped had I remained in Scotland, was doubtless occasioned by the
+authority of this man. But what my poor mother might fear for me as a
+child--what my English friend, Samuel Griffiths, endeavoured to guard
+against during my youth and nonage, is now, it seems, come upon me;
+and, under a legal pretext, I am detained in what must be a most illegal
+manner, by a person, foe, whose own political immunities have been
+forfeited by his conduct. It matters not--my mind is made up neither
+persuasion nor threats shall force me into the desperate designs which
+this man meditates. Whether I am of the trifling consequence which my
+life hitherto seems to intimate, or whether I have (as would appear from
+my adversary’s conduct) such importance, by birth or fortune, as may
+make me a desirable acquisition to a political faction, my resolution
+is taken in either case. Those who read this journal, if it shall be
+perused by impartial eyes, shall judge of me truly; and if they consider
+me as a fool in encountering danger unnecessarily, they shall have no
+reason to believe me a coward or a turncoat, when I find myself engaged
+in it. I have been bred in sentiments of attachment to the family on the
+throne and in these sentiments I will live and die. I have, indeed, some
+idea that Mr. Herries has already discovered that I am made of different
+and more unmalleable metal than he had at first believed. There were
+letters from my dear Alan Fairford, giving a ludicrous account of my
+instability of temper, in the same pocket-book, which, according to the
+admission of my pretended guardian, fell under the investigation of
+his domestic during the night I passed at Brokenburn, where, as I now
+recollect, my wet clothes, with the contents of my pockets, were, with
+the thoughtlessness of a young traveller, committed too rashly to the
+care of a strange servant. And my kind friend and hospitable landlord,
+Mr. Alexander Fairford, may also, and with justice, have spoken of my
+levities to this man. But he shall find he has made a false estimate
+upon these plausible grounds, since--
+
+I must break off for the present.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION
+
+There is at length a halt--at length I have gained so much privacy as to
+enable me to continue my journal. It has become a sort of task of duty
+to me, without the discharge of which I do not feel that the business
+of the day is performed. True, no friendly eye may ever look upon these
+labours, which have amused the solitary hours of an unhappy prisoner.
+Yet, in the meanwhile, the exercise of the pen seems to act as a
+sedative upon my own agitated thoughts and tumultuous passions. I never
+lay it down but I rise stronger in resolution, more ardent in hope. A
+thousand vague fears, wild expectations, and indigested schemes,
+hurry through one’s thoughts in seasons of doubt and of danger. But by
+arresting them as they flit across the mind, by throwing them on paper,
+and even by that mechanical act compelling ourselves to consider them
+with scrupulous and minute attention, we may perhaps escape becoming the
+dupes of our own excited imagination; just as a young horse is cured of
+the vice of starting by being made to stand still and look for some time
+without any interruption at the cause of its terror.
+
+There remains but one risk, which is that of discovery. But besides the
+small characters, in which my residence in Mr. Fairford’s house enabled
+me to excel, for the purpose of transferring as many scroll sheets as
+possible to a huge sheet of stamped paper, I have, as I have elsewhere
+intimated, had hitherto the comfortable reflection that if the record
+of my misfortunes should fall into the hands of him by whom they are
+caused, they would, without harming any one, show him the real character
+and disposition of the person who has become his prisoner--perhaps his
+victim. Now, however, that other names, and other characters, are to be
+mingled with the register of my own sentiments, I must take additional
+care of these papers, and keep them in such a manner that, in case
+of the least hazard of detection, I may be able to destroy them at a
+moment’s notice. I shall not soon or easily forget the lesson I have
+been taught, by the prying disposition which Cristal Nixon, this man’s
+agent and confederate, manifested at Brokenburn, and which proved the
+original cause of my sufferings.
+
+My laying aside the last sheet of my journal hastily was occasioned by
+the unwonted sound of a violin, in the farmyard beneath my windows. It
+will not appear surprising to those who have made music their study,
+that, after listening to a few notes, I became at once assured that the
+musician was no other than the itinerant, formerly mentioned as present
+at the destruction of Joshua Geddes’s stake-nets, the superior delicacy
+and force of whose execution would enable me to swear to his bow amongst
+a whole orchestra. I had the less reason to doubt his identity, because
+he played twice over the beautiful Scottish air called Wandering Willie;
+and I could not help concluding that he did so for the purpose of
+intimating his own presence, since what the French called the nom de
+guerre of the performer was described by the tune.
+
+Hope will catch at the most feeble twig for support in extremity. I knew
+this man, though deprived of sight, to be bold, ingenious, and perfectly
+capable of acting as a guide. I believed I had won his goodwill,
+by having, in a frolic, assumed the character of his partner; and I
+remembered that in a wild, wandering, and disorderly course of life,
+men, as they become loosened from the ordinary bonds of civil society,
+hold those of comradeship more closely sacred; so that honour is
+sometimes found among thieves, and faith and attachment in such as the
+law has termed vagrants. The history of Richard Coeur de Lion and his
+minstrel, Blondel, rushed, at the same time, on my mind, though I
+could not even then suppress a smile at the dignity of the example when
+applied to a blind fiddler and myself. Still there was something in all
+this to awaken a hope that, if I could open a correspondence with
+this poor violer, he might be useful in extricating me from my present
+situation.
+
+His profession furnished me with some hope that this desired
+communication might be attained; since it is well known that, in
+Scotland, where there is so much national music, the words and airs
+of which are generally known, there is a kind of freemasonry amongst
+performers, by which they can, by the mere choice of a tune, express
+a great deal to the hearers. Personal allusions are often made in this
+manner, with much point and pleasantry; and nothing is more usual at
+public festivals, than that the air played to accompany a particular
+health or toast, is made the vehicle of compliment, of wit, and
+sometimes of satire. [Every one must remember instances of this festive
+custom, in which the adaptation of the tune to the toast was remarkably
+felicitous. Old Neil Gow, and his son Nathaniel, were peculiarly happy
+on such occasions.]
+
+While these things passed through my mind rapidly, I heard my friend
+beneath recommence, for the third time, the air from which his own
+name had been probably adopted, when he was interrupted by his rustic
+auditors.
+
+‘If thou canst play no other spring but that, mon, ho hadst best put up
+ho’s pipes and be jogging. Squoire will be back anon, or Master Nixon,
+and we’ll see who will pay poiper then.’
+
+Oho, thought I, if I have no sharper ears than those of my friends Jan
+and Dorcas to encounter, I may venture an experiment upon them; and, as
+most expressive of my state of captivity, I sang two or three lines of
+the 137th Psalm--
+
+  By Babel’s streams we sat and wept.
+
+The country people listened with attention, and when I ceased, I heard
+them whisper together in tones of commiseration, ‘Lack-a-day, poor soul!
+so pretty a man to be beside his wits!’
+
+‘An he be that gate,’ said Wandering Willie, in a tone calculated to
+reach my ears, ‘I ken naething will raise his spirits like a spring.’
+And he struck up, with great vigour and spirit, the lively Scottish air,
+the words of which instantly occurred to me--
+
+  Oh whistle and I’ll come t’ye, my lad,
+  Oh whistle and I’ll come t’ye, my lad;
+  Though father and mother and a’ should gae mad,
+  Oh whistle and I’ll come t’ye, my lad.
+
+I soon heard a clattering noise of feet in the courtyard, which I
+concluded to be Jan and Dorcas dancing a jig in their Cumberland wooden
+clogs. Under cover of this din, I endeavoured to answer Willie’s signal
+by whistling, as loud as I could---
+
+  Come back again and loe me
+  When a’ the lave are gane.
+
+He instantly threw the dancers out, by changing his air to
+
+  There’s my thumb, I’ll ne’er beguile thee.
+
+I no longer doubted that a communication betwixt us was happily
+established, and that, if I had an opportunity of speaking to the poor
+musician, I should find him willing to take my letter to the post,
+to invoke the assistance of some active magistrate, or of the
+commanding-officer of Carlisle Castle, or, in short, to do whatever
+else I could point out, in the compass of his power, to contribute to
+my liberation. But to obtain speech of him, I must have run the risk
+of alarming the suspicions of Dorcas, if not of her yet more stupid
+Corydon. My ally’s blindness prevented his receiving any communication
+by signs from the window--even if I could have ventured to make
+them, consistently with prudence--so that notwithstanding the mode of
+intercourse we had adopted was both circuitous and peculiarly liable to
+misapprehension, I saw nothing I could do better than to continue it,
+trusting my own and my correspondent’s acuteness in applying to the airs
+the meaning they were intended to convey. I thought of singing the words
+themselves of some significant song, but feared I might, by doing so,
+attract suspicion. I endeavoured, therefore, to intimate my speedy
+departure from my present place of residence, by whistling the
+well-known air with which festive parties in Scotland usually conclude
+the dance:--
+
+  Good night and joy be wi’ ye a’,
+  For here nae langer maun I stay;
+  There’s neither friend nor foe, of mine
+  But wishes that I were away.
+
+It appeared that Willie’s powers of intelligence were much more active
+than mine, and that, like a deaf person accustomed to be spoken to by
+signs, he comprehended, from the very first notes, the whole meaning I
+intended to convey; and he accompanied me in the air with his violin,
+in such a manner as at once to show he understood my meaning, and to
+prevent my whistling from being attended to.
+
+His reply was almost immediate, and was conveyed in the old martial air
+of ‘Hey, Johnnie lad, cock up your beaver.’ I ran over the words, and
+fixed on the following stanza, as most applicable to my circumstances:--
+
+  Cock up your beaver, and cock it fu’ sprush;
+  We’ll over the Border and give them a brush;
+  There’s somebody there we’ll teach better behaviour,
+  Hey, Johnnie lad, cock up your beaver.
+
+If these sounds alluded, as I hope they do, to the chance of assistance
+from my Scottish friends, I may indeed consider that a door is open to
+hope and freedom. I immediately replied with:--
+
+  My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
+  My heart’s in the Highlands, a-chasing the deer;
+  A-chasing the wild deer, and following the roe,
+  My heart’s in the Highlands wherever I go.
+
+  Farewell to the Highlands!  farewell to the North!
+  The birth-place of valour, the cradle of worth;
+  Wherever I wander, wherever I rove,
+  The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.
+
+Willie instantly played, with a degree of spirit which might have
+awakened hope in Despair herself, if Despair could be supposed to
+understand Scotch music, the fine old Jacobite air,
+
+  For a’ that, and a’ that,
+  And twice as much as a’ that.
+
+I next endeavoured to intimate my wish to send notice of my condition to
+my friends; and, despairing to find an air sufficiently expressive of my
+purpose, I ventured to sing a verse, which, in various forms, occurs so
+frequently in old ballads--
+
+  Whare will I get a bonny boy
+  That will win hose and shoon:
+  That will gae down to Durisdeer,
+  And bid my merry men come?
+
+He drowned the latter part of the verse by playing, with much emphasis,
+
+  Kind Robin loes me.
+
+Of this, though I ran over the verses of the song in my mind, I could
+make nothing; and before I could contrive any mode of intimating my
+uncertainty, a cry arose in the courtyard that Cristal Nixon was coming.
+My faithful Willie was obliged to retreat; but not before he had half
+played, half hummed, by way of farewell,
+
+  Leave thee--leave thee, lad--
+  I’ll never leave thee;
+  The stars shall gae withershins
+  Ere I will leave thee.
+
+I am thus, I think, secure of one trusty adherent in my misfortunes;
+and, however whimsical it may be to rely much on a man of his idle
+profession and deprived of sight withal, it is deeply impressed on
+my mind that his services may be both useful and necessary. There
+is another quarter from which I look for succour, and which I have
+indicated to thee, Alan, in more than one passage of my journal. Twice,
+at the early hour of daybreak, I have seen the individual alluded to in
+the court of the farm, and twice she made signs of recognition in
+answer to the gestures by which I endeavoured to make her comprehend my
+situation; but on both occasions she pressed her finger on her lips, as
+expressive of silence and secrecy.
+
+The manner in which G.M. entered upon the scene for the first time,
+seems to assure me of her goodwill, so far as her power may reach; and I
+have many reasons to believe it is considerable. Yet she seemed hurried
+and frightened during the very transitory moments of our interview, and
+I think was, upon the last occasion, startled by the entrance of some
+one into the farmyard, just as she was on the point of addressing me.
+You must not ask whether I am an early riser, since such objects are
+only to be seen at daybreak; and although I have never again seen her,
+yet I have reason to think she is not distant. It was but three
+nights ago, that, worn out by the uniformity of my confinement, I had
+manifested more symptoms of despondence than I had before exhibited,
+which I conceive may have attracted the attention of the domestics,
+through whom the circumstance might transpire. On the next morning, the
+following lines lay on my table; but how conveyed there, I cannot tell.
+The hand in which they were written is a beautiful Italian manuscript:--
+
+  As lords their labourers’ hire delay,
+  Fate quits our toil with hopes to come,
+  Which, if far short of present pay,
+  Still, owns a debt and names a sum.
+
+  Quit not the pledge, frail sufferer, then,
+  Although a distant date be given;
+  Despair is treason towards man,
+  And blasphemy to Heaven.
+
+That these lines were written with the friendly purpose of inducing me
+to keep up my spirits, I cannot doubt; and I trust the manner in which I
+shall conduct myself may show that the pledge is accepted.
+
+The dress is arrived in which it seems to be my self-elected guardian’s
+pleasure that I shall travel; and what does it prove to be?--A skirt, or
+upper-petticoat of camlet, like those worn by country ladies of moderate
+rank when on horseback, with such a riding-mask as they frequently use
+on journeys to preserve their eyes and complexion from the sun and dust,
+and sometimes, it is suspected, to enable then to play off a little
+coquetry. From the gayer mode of employing the mask, however, I suspect
+I shall be precluded; for instead of being only pasteboard, covered with
+black velvet, I observe with anxiety that mine is thickened with a plate
+of steel, which, like Quixote’s visor, serves to render it more strong
+and durable.
+
+This apparatus, together with a steel clasp for securing the mask behind
+me with a padlock, gave me fearful recollections of the unfortunate
+being, who, never being permitted to lay aside such a visor, acquired
+the well-known historical epithet of the Man in the Iron Mask. I
+hesitated a moment whether I should, so far submit to the acts of
+oppression designed against me as to assume this disguise, which was,
+of course, contrived to aid their purposes. But when I remembered Mr.
+Herries’s threat, that I should be kept close prisoner in a carriage,
+unless I assumed the dress which should be appointed for me; and I
+considered the comparative degree of freedom which I might purchase
+by wearing the mask and female dress as easily and advantageously
+purchased. Here, therefore, I must pause for the present, and await what
+the morning may bring forth.
+
+[To carry on the story from the documents before us, we think it proper
+here to drop the journal of the captive Darsie Latimer, and adopt,
+instead, a narrative of the proceedings of Alan Fairford in pursuit of
+his friend, which forms another series in this history.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+The reader ought, by this time, to have formed some idea of the
+character of Alan Fairford. He had a warmth of heart which the study
+of the law and of the world could not chill, and talents which they had
+rendered unusually acute. Deprived of the personal patronage enjoyed by
+most of his contemporaries, who assumed the gown under the protection of
+their aristocratic alliances and descents, he early saw that he should
+have that to achieve for himself which fell to them as a right of birth.
+He laboured hard in silence and solitude, and his labours were crowned
+with success. But Alan doted on his friend Darsie, even more than he
+loved his profession, and, as we have seen, threw everything aside when
+he thought Latimer in danger; forgetting fame and fortune, and hazarding
+even the serious displeasure of his father, to rescue him whom he loved
+with an elder brother’s affection. Darsie, though his parts were more
+quick and brilliant than those of his friend, seemed always to the
+latter a being under his peculiar charge, whom he was called upon
+to cherish and protect in cases where the youth’s own experience was
+unequal to the exigency; and now, when, the fate of Latimer seeming
+worse than doubtful, Alan’s whole prudence and energy were to be exerted
+in his behalf, an adventure which might have seemed perilous to most
+youths of his age had no terrors for him. He was well acquainted with
+the laws of his country, and knew how to appeal to them; and, besides
+his professional confidence, his natural disposition was steady, sedate,
+persevering, and undaunted. With these requisites he undertook a quest
+which, at that time, was not unattended with actual danger, and had much
+in it to appal a more timid disposition.
+
+Fairford’s first inquiry concerning his friend was of the chief
+magistrate of Dumfries, Provost Crosbie, who had sent the information
+of Darsie’s disappearance. On his first application, he thought he
+discerned in the honest dignitary a desire to get rid of the subject.
+The provost spoke of the riot at the fishing station as an ‘outbreak
+among those lawless loons the fishermen, which concerned the sheriff,’
+he said, ‘more than us poor town council bodies, that have enough to do
+to keep peace within burgh, amongst such a set of commoners as the town
+are plagued with.’
+
+‘But this is not all, Provost Crosbie,’ said Mr. Alan Fairford; ‘A young
+gentleman of rank and fortune has disappeared amongst their hands--you
+know him. My father gave him a letter to you--Mr. Darsie Latimer.’
+
+‘Lack-a-day, yes! lack-a-day, yes!’ said the provost; ‘Mr. Darsie
+Latimer--he dined at my house--I hope he is well?’
+
+‘I hope so too,’ said Alan, rather indignantly; ‘but I desire more
+certainty on that point. You yourself wrote my father that he had
+disappeared.’
+
+‘Troth, yes, and that is true,’ said the provost. ‘But did he not go
+back to his friends in Scotland? it was not natural to think he would
+stay here.’
+
+‘Not unless he is under restraint,’ said Fairford, surprised at the
+coolness with which the provost seemed to take up the matter.
+
+‘Rely on it, sir,’ said Mr. Crosbie, ‘that if he has not returned to his
+friends in Scotland, he must have gone to his friends in England.’
+
+‘I will rely on no such thing,’ said Alan; ‘if there is law or justice
+in Scotland, I will have the thing cleared to the very bottom.’
+
+‘Reasonable, reasonable,’ said the provost, ‘so far as is possible; but
+you know I have no power beyond the ports of the burgh.’
+
+‘But you are in the commission besides, Mr. Crosbie; a justice of peace
+for the county.’
+
+‘True, very true--that is,’ said the cautious magistrate, ‘I will not
+say but my name may stand on the list, but I cannot remember that I have
+ever qualified.’ [By taking the oaths to government.]
+
+‘Why, in that case,’ said young Fairford, ‘there are ill-natured people
+might doubt your attachment to the Protestant line, Mr. Crosbie.’
+
+‘God forbid, Mr. Fairford! I who have done and suffered in the
+Forty-five. I reckon the Highlandmen did me damage to the amount of
+100l. Scots, forby all they ate and drank--no, no, sir, I stand beyond
+challenge; but as for plaguing myself with county business, let them
+that aught the mare shoe the mare. The commissioners of supply would see
+my back broken before they would help me in the burgh’s work, and all
+the world kens the difference of the weight between public business in
+burgh and landward. What are their riots to me? have we not riots enough
+of our own?--But I must be getting ready, for the council meets this
+forenoon. I am blithe to see your father’s son on the causeway of our
+ancient burgh, Mr. Alan Fairford. Were you a twelve-month aulder, we
+would make a burgess of you, man. I hope you will come and dine with
+me before you go away. What think you of to-day at two o’clock--just a
+roasted chucky and a drappit egg?’
+
+Alan Fairford resolved that his friend’s hospitality should not, as it
+seemed the inviter intended, put a stop to his queries. ‘I must delay
+you for a moment,’ he said, ‘Mr. Crosbie; this is a serious affair; a
+young gentleman of high hopes, my own dearest friend, is missing--you
+cannot think it will be passed over slightly, if a man of your high
+character and known zeal for the government do not make some active
+inquiry. Mr. Crosbie, you are my father’s friend, and I respect you as
+such--but to others it will have a bad appearance.’
+
+The withers of the provost were not unwrung; he paced the room in much
+tribulation, repeating, ‘But what can I do, Mr. Fairford? I warrant
+your friend casts up again--he will come back again, like the ill
+shilling--he is not the sort of gear that tynes--a hellicat boy, running
+through the country with a blind fiddler and playing the fiddle to
+a parcel of blackguards, who can tell where the like of him may have
+scampered to?’
+
+‘There are persons apprehended, and in the jail of the town, as I
+understand from the sheriff-substitute,’ said Mr. Fairford; ‘you
+must call them before you, and inquire what they know of this young
+gentleman.’
+
+‘Aye, aye--the sheriff-depute did commit some poor creatures, I
+believe--wretched ignorant fishermen bodies, that had been quarrelling
+with Quaker Geddes and his stake-nets, whilk, under favour of your gown
+be it spoken, Mr. Fairford, are not over and above lawful, and the town
+clerk thinks that they may be lawfully removed VIA FACTI--but that is by
+the by. But, sir, the creatures were a’ dismissed for want of evidence;
+the Quaker would not swear to them, and what could the sheriff and me
+do but just let them loose? Come awa, cheer up, Master Alan, and take a
+walk till dinner-time--I must really go to the council.’
+
+‘Stop a moment, provost,’ said Alan; ‘I lodge a complaint before you as
+a magistrate, and you will find it serious to slight it over. You must
+have these men apprehended again.’
+
+‘Aye, aye--easy said; but catch them that can,’ answered the provost;
+‘they are ower the march by this time, or by the point of Cairn.--Lord
+help ye! they are a kind of amphibious deevils, neither land nor water
+beasts neither English nor Scots--neither county nor stewartry, as we
+say--they are dispersed like so much quicksilver. You may as well try to
+whistle a sealgh out of the Solway, as to get hold of one of them till
+all the fray is over.’
+
+‘Mr. Crosbie, this will not do,’ answered the young counsellor; ‘there
+is a person of more importance than such wretches as you describe
+concerned in this unhappy business--I must name to you a certain Mr.
+Herries.’
+
+He kept his eye on the provost as he uttered the name, which he did
+rather at a venture, and from the connexion which that gentleman, and
+his real or supposed niece, seemed to have with the fate of Darsie
+Latimer, than from any distinct cause of suspicion which he entertained.
+He thought the provost seemed embarrassed, though he showed much desire
+to assume an appearance of indifference, in which he partly succeeded.
+
+‘Herries!’ he said--‘What Herries?--There are many of that name--not
+so many as formerly, for the old stocks are wearing out; but there is
+Herries of Heathgill, and Herries of Auchintulloch, and Herries’--
+
+‘To save you further trouble, this person’s designation is Herries of
+Birrenswork.’
+
+‘Of Birrenswork?’ said Mr. Crosbie; ‘I have you now, Mr. Alan. Could you
+not as well have said, the Laird of Redgauntlet?’
+
+Fairford was too wary to testify any surprise at this identification of
+names, however unexpected. ‘I thought,’ said he, ‘he was more generally
+known by the name of Herries. I have seen and been in company with him
+under that name, I am sure.’
+
+‘Oh aye; in Edinburgh, belike. You know Redgauntlet was unfortunate a
+great while ago, and though he was maybe not deeper in the mire than
+other folk, yet, for some reason or other, he did not get so easily
+out.’
+
+‘He was attainted, I understand; and has no remission,’ said Fairford.
+
+The cautious provost only nodded, and said, ‘You may guess, therefore,
+why it is so convenient he should hold his mother’s name, which is also
+partly his own, when he is about Edinburgh. To bear his proper name
+might be accounted a kind of flying in the face of government, ye
+understand. But he has been long connived at--the story is an old
+story--and the gentleman has many excellent qualities, and is of a very
+ancient and honourable house--has cousins among the great folk--counts
+kin with the advocate and with the sheriff--hawks, you know, Mr. Alan,
+will not pike out hawks’ een--he is widely connected--my wife is a
+fourth cousin of Redgauntlet’s.’
+
+HINC ILLAE LACHRYMAE! thought Alan Fairford to himself; but the hint
+presently determined him to proceed by soft means and with caution. ‘I
+beg you to understand,’ said Fairford, ‘that in the investigation I am
+about to make, I design no harm to Mr. Herries, or Redgauntlet--call him
+what you will. All I wish is, to ascertain the safety of my friend. I
+know that he was rather foolish in once going upon a mere frolic, in
+disguise, to the neighbourhood of this same gentleman’s house. In his
+circumstances, Mr. Redgauntlet may have misinterpreted the motives, and
+considered Darsie Latimer as a spy. His influence, I believe, is great
+among the disorderly people you spoke of but now?’
+
+The provost answered with another sagacious shake of his head, that
+would have done honour to Lord Burleigh in the CRITIC.
+
+‘Well, then,’ continued Fairford,’ is it not possible that, in the
+mistaken belief that Mr. Latimer was a spy, he may, upon such suspicion,
+have caused him to be carried off and confined somewhere? Such things
+are done at elections, and on occasions less pressing than when men
+think their lives are in danger from an informer.’
+
+‘Mr. Fairford,’ said the provost, very earnestly, ‘I scarce think such
+a mistake possible; or if, by any extraordinary chance, it should have
+taken place, Redgauntlet, whom I cannot but know well, being as I have
+said my wife’s first cousin (fourth cousin, I should say) is altogether
+incapable of doing anything harsh to the young gentleman--he might send
+him ower to Ailsay for a night or two, or maybe land him on the north
+coast of Ireland, or in Islay, or some of the Hebrides; but depend upon
+it, he is incapable of harming a hair of his head.’
+
+‘I am determined not to trust to that, provost,’ answered Fairford
+firmly; ‘and I am a good deal surprised at your way of talking so
+lightly of such an aggression on the liberty of the subject. You are
+to consider, and Mr. Herries or Mr. Redgauntlet’s friends would do very
+well also to consider, how it would sound in the ears of an English
+Secretary of State, that an attainted traitor (for such is this
+gentleman) has not only ventured to take up his abode in this
+realm--against the king of which he has been in arms--but is suspected
+of having proceeded, by open force and violence, against the person
+of one of the lieges, a young man who is neither without friends nor
+property to secure his being righted.’
+
+The provost looked at the young counsellor with a face in which
+distrust, alarm, and vexation seemed mingled. ‘A fashious job,’ he said
+at last, ‘a fashious job; and it will be dangerous meddling with it.
+I should like ill to see your father’s son turn informer against an
+unfortunate gentleman.’
+
+‘Neither do I mean it,’ answered Alan, ‘provided that unfortunate
+gentleman and his friends give me a quiet opportunity of securing my
+friend’s safety. If I could speak with Mr. Redgauntlet, and hear his own
+explanation, I should probably be satisfied. If I am forced, to denounce
+him to government, it will be in his new capacity of a kidnapper. I may
+not be able, nor is it my business, to prevent his being recognized in
+his former character of an attainted person, excepted from the general
+pardon.’
+
+‘Master Fairford,’ said the provost, ‘would ye ruin the poor innocent
+gentleman on an idle suspicion?’
+
+‘Say no more of it, Mr. Crosbie; my line of conduct is
+determined--unless that suspicion is removed.’
+
+‘Weel, sir,’ said the provost, ‘since so it be, and since you say that
+you do not seek to harm Redgauntlet personally, I’ll ask a man to dine
+with us to-day that kens as much about his matters as most folk. You
+must think, Mr. Alan Fairford, though Redgauntlet be my wife’s near
+relative, and though, doubtless, I wish him weel, yet I am not the
+person who is like to be intrusted with his incomings and outgoings. I
+am not a man for that--I keep the kirk, and I abhor Popery--I have stood
+up for the House of Hanover, and for liberty and property--I carried
+arms, sir, against the Pretender, when three of the Highlandmen’s
+baggage-carts were stopped at Ecclefechan; and I had an especial loss of
+a hundred pounds’--
+
+‘Scots,’ interrupted Fairford. ‘You forget you told me all this before.’
+
+‘Scots or English, it was too much for me to lose,’ said the provost;
+so you see I am not a person to pack or peel with Jacobites, and such
+unfreemen as poor Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘Granted, granted, Mr. Crosbie; and what then?’ said Alan Fairford.
+
+‘Why, then, it follows, that if I am to help you at this pinch, if
+cannot be by and through my ain personal knowledge, but through some
+fitting agent or third person.’
+
+‘Granted again,’ said Fairford. ‘And pray who may this third person be?’
+
+‘Wha but Pate Maxwell of Summertrees--him they call Pate-in-Peril.’
+
+‘An old Forty-five man, of course?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Ye may swear that,’ replied the provost--‘as black a Jacobite as the
+auld leaven can make him; but a sonsy, merry companion, that none of us
+think it worth while to break wi’ for all his brags and his clavers.
+You would have thought, if he had had but his own way at Derby, he would
+have marched Charlie Stuart through between Wade and the Duke, as a
+thread goes through the needle’s ee, and seated him in Saint James’s
+before you could have said haud your hand. But though he is a windy body
+when he gets on his auld-warld stories, he has mair gumption in him than
+most people--knows business, Mr. Alan, being bred to the law; but never
+took the gown, because of the oaths, which kept more folk out then than
+they do now--the more’s the pity.’
+
+‘What! are you sorry, provost, that Jacobitism is upon the decline?’
+said Fairford.
+
+‘No, no,’ answered the provost--‘I am only sorry for folks losing the
+tenderness of conscience which they used to have. I have a son breeding
+to the bar, Mr. Fairford; and, no doubt, considering my services and
+sufferings, I might have looked for some bit postie to him; but if the
+muckle tykes come in--I mean a’ these Maxwells, and Johnstones, and
+great lairds, that the oaths used to keep out lang syne--the bits o’
+messan doggies, like my son, and maybe like your father’s son, Mr. Alan,
+will be sair put to the wall.’
+
+‘But to return to the subject, Mr. Crosbie,’ said Fairford, ‘do you
+really think it likely that this Mr. Maxwell will be of service in this
+matter?’
+
+‘It’s very like he may be, for he is the tongue of the trump to the
+whole squad of them,’ said the provost; ‘and Redgauntlet, though he will
+not stick at times to call him a fool, takes more of his counsel than
+any man’s else that I am aware of. If Fate can bring him to a communing,
+the business is done. He’s a sharp chield, Pate-in-Peril.’
+
+‘Pate-in-Peril!’ repeated Alan; ‘a very singular name.’
+
+‘Aye, and it was in as queer a way he got it; but I’ll say naething
+about that,’ said the provost, ‘for fear of forestalling his market;
+for ye are sure to hear it once at least, however oftener, before the
+punch-bowl gives place to the teapot.--And now, fare ye weel; for there
+is the council-bell clinking in earnest; and if I am not there before it
+jows in, Bailie Laurie will be trying some of his manoeuvres.’
+
+The provost, repeating his expectation of seeing Mr. Fairford at two
+o’clock, at length effected his escape from the young counsellor, and
+left him at a considerable loss how to proceed. The sheriff, it seems,
+had returned to Edinburgh, and he feared to find the visible repugnance
+of the provost to interfere with this Laird of Birrenswork, or
+Redgauntlet, much stronger amongst the country gentlemen, many of
+whom were Catholics as well as Jacobites, and most others unwilling to
+quarrel with kinsmen and friends, by prosecuting with severity political
+offences which had almost run a prescription.
+
+To collect all the information in his power, and not to have recourse
+to the higher authorities until he could give all the light of which
+the case was capable, seemed the wiser proceeding in a choice of
+difficulties. He had some conversation with the procurator-fiscal, who,
+as well as the provost, was an old correspondent of his father. Alan
+expressed to that officer a purpose of visiting Brokenburn, but was
+assured by him, that it would be a step attended with much danger to his
+own person, and altogether fruitless; that the individuals who had
+been ringleaders in the riot were long since safely sheltered in their
+various lurking-holes in the Isle of Man, Cumberland, and elsewhere; and
+that those who might remain would undoubtedly commit violence on any
+who visited their settlement with the purpose of inquiring into the late
+disturbances.
+
+There were not the same objections to his hastening to Mount Sharon,
+where he expected to find the latest news of his friend; and there
+was time enough to do so, before the hour appointed for the provost’s
+dinner. Upon the road, he congratulated himself on having obtained one
+point of almost certain information. The person who had in a manner
+forced himself upon his father’s hospitality, and had appeared desirous
+to induce Darsie Latimer to visit England, against whom, too, a sort of
+warning had been received from an individual connected with and residing
+in his own family, proved to be a promoter of the disturbance in which
+Darsie had disappeared.
+
+What could be the cause of such an attempt on the liberty of an
+inoffensive and amiable man? It was impossible it could be merely owing
+to Redgauntlet’s mistaking Darsie for a spy; for though that was the
+solution which Fairford had offered to the provost, he well knew that,
+in point of fact, he himself had been warned by his singular visitor of
+some danger to which his friend was exposed, before such suspicion could
+have been entertained; and the injunctions received by Latimer from his
+guardian, or him who acted as such, Mr. Griffiths of London, pointed to
+the same thing. He was rather glad, however, that he had not let Provost
+Crosbie into his secret further than was absolutely necessary; since it
+was plain that the connexion of his wife with the suspected party was
+likely to affect his impartiality as a magistrate.
+
+When Alan Fairford arrived at Mount Sharon, Rachel Geddes hastened to
+meet him, almost before the servant could open the door. She drew back
+in disappointment when she beheld a stranger, and said, to excuse her
+precipitation, that ‘she had thought it was her brother Joshua returned
+from Cumberland.’
+
+‘Mr. Geddes is then absent from home?’ said Fairford, much disappointed
+in his turn.
+
+‘He hath been gone since yesterday, friend,’ answered Rachel, once more
+composed to the quietude which characterizes her sect, but her pale
+cheek and red eye giving contradiction to her assumed equanimity.
+
+‘I am,’ said Fairford, hastily, ‘the particular friend of a young man
+not unknown to you, Miss Geddes--the friend of Darsie Latimer--and
+am come hither in the utmost anxiety, having understood from Provost
+Crosbie, that he had disappeared in the night when a destructive attack
+was made upon the fishing-station of Mr. Geddes.’
+
+‘Thou dost afflict me, friend, by thy inquiries,’ said Rachel, more
+affected than before; ‘for although the youth was like those of the
+worldly generation, wise in his own conceit, and lightly to be moved by
+the breath of vanity, yet Joshua loved him, and his heart clave to him
+as if he had been his own son. And when he himself escaped from the sons
+of Belial, which was not until they had tired themselves with reviling,
+and with idle reproach, and the jests of the scoffer, Joshua, my
+brother, returned to them once and again, to give ransom for the
+youth called Darsie Latimer, with offers of money and with promise of
+remission, but they would not hearken to him. Also, he went before the
+head judge, whom men call the sheriff, and would have told him of the
+youth’s peril; but he would in no way hearken to him unless he would
+swear unto the truth of his words, which thing he might not do without
+sin, seeing it is written, Swear not at all--also, that our conversation
+shall be yea or nay. Therefore, Joshua returned to me disconsolate,
+and said, “Sister Rachel, this youth hath run into peril for my sake;
+assuredly I shall not be guiltless if a hair of his head be harmed,
+seeing I have sinned in permitting him to go with me to the fishing
+station when such evil was to be feared. Therefore, I will take my
+horse, even Solomon, and ride swiftly into Cumberland, and I will make
+myself friends with Mammon of Unrighteousness, among the magistrates of
+the Gentiles, and among their mighty men; and it shall come to pass that
+Darsie Latimer shall be delivered, even if it were at the expense of
+half my substance.” And I said, “Nay, my brother, go not, for they
+will but scoff at and revile thee; but hire with thy silver one of the
+scribes, who are eager as hunters in pursuing their prey, and he shall
+free Darsie Latimer from the men of violence by his cunning, and thy
+soul shall be guiltless of evil towards the lad.” But he answered and
+said, “I will not be controlled in this matter.” And he is gone forth
+and hath not returned, and I fear me that he may never return; for
+though he be peaceful, as becometh one who holds all violence as offence
+against his own soul, yet neither the floods of water, nor the fear of
+the snare, nor the drawn sword of the adversary brandished in the path,
+will overcome his purpose. Wherefore the Solway may swallow him up, or
+the sword of the enemy may devour him--nevertheless, my hope is better
+in Him who directeth all things, and ruleth over the waves of the sea,
+and overruleth the devices of the wicked, and who can redeem us even as
+a bird from the fowler’s net.’
+
+This was all that Fairford could learn from Miss Geddes; but he heard
+with pleasure that the good Quaker, her brother, had many friends among
+those of his own profession in Cumberland, and without exposing himself
+to so much danger as his sister seemed to apprehend, he trusted he might
+be able to discover some traces of Darsie Latimer. He himself rode back
+to Dumfries, having left with Miss Geddes his direction in that
+place, and an earnest request that she would forward thither whatever
+information she might obtain from her brother.
+
+On Fairford’s return to Dumfries, he employed the brief interval which
+remained before dinner-time, in writing an account of what had befallen
+Latimer and of the present uncertainty of his condition, to Mr. Samuel
+Griffiths, through whose hands the remittances for his friend’s service
+had been regularly made, desiring he would instantly acquaint him with
+such parts of his history as might direct him in the search which he
+was about to institute through the border counties, and which he pledged
+himself not; to give up until he had obtained news of his friend, alive
+or dead, The young lawyer’s mind felt easier when he had dispatched this
+letter. He could not conceive any reason why his friend’s life should be
+aimed at; he knew Darsie had done nothing by which his liberty could
+be legally affected; and although, even of late years, there had been
+singular histories of men, and women also, who had been trepanned,
+and concealed in solitudes and distant islands in order to serve some
+temporary purpose, such violences had been chiefly practised by the rich
+on the poor, and by the strong on the feeble; whereas, in the present
+case, this Mr. Herries, or Redgauntlet, being amenable, for more reasons
+than one, to the censure of the law, must be the weakest in any struggle
+in which it could be appealed to. It is true, that his friendly anxiety
+whispered that the very cause which rendered this oppressor less
+formidable, might make him more desperate. Still, recalling his
+language, so strikingly that of the gentleman, and even of the man
+of honour, Alan Fairford concluded, that though, in his feudal pride,
+Redgauntlet might venture on the deeds of violence exercised by the
+aristocracy in other times, he could not be capable of any action of
+deliberate atrocity. And in these convictions he went to dine with
+Provost Crosbie, with a heart more at ease than might have been
+expected. [See Note 7.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+Five minutes had elapsed after the town clock struck two, before
+Alan Fairford, who had made a small detour to put his letter into the
+post-house, reached the mansion of Mr. Provost Crosbie, and was at once
+greeted by the voice of that civic dignitary, and the rural dignitary
+his visitor, as by the voices of men impatient for their dinner.
+
+‘Come away, Mr. Fairford--the Edinburgh time is later than ours,’ said
+the provost.
+
+And, ‘Come away, young gentleman,’ said the laird; ‘I remember your
+father weel at the Cross thirty years ago--I reckon you are as late in
+Edinburgh as at London, four o’clock hours--eh?’
+
+‘Not quite so degenerate,’ replied Fairford; ‘but certainly many
+Edinburgh people are so ill-advised as to postpone their dinner
+till three, that they may have full time to answer their London
+correspondents.’
+
+‘London correspondents!’ said Mr. Maxwell; ‘and pray what the devil have
+the people of Auld Reekie to do with London correspondents?’ [Not much
+in those days, for within my recollection the London post; was brought
+north in a small mail-cart; and men are yet as live who recollect when
+it came down with only one single letter for Edinburgh, addressed to the
+manager of the British Linen Company.]
+
+‘The tradesmen must have their goods,’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Can they not buy our own Scottish manufactures, and pick their
+customers pockets in a more patriotic manner?’
+
+‘Then the ladies must have fashions,’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Can they not busk the plaid over their heads, as their mothers did? A
+tartan screen, and once a year a new cockernony from Paris, should
+serve a countess. But ye have not many of them left, I think--Mareschal,
+Airley, Winton, Vemyss, Balmerino, all passed and gone--aye, aye, the
+countesses and ladies of quality will scarce take up too much of your
+ball-room floor with their quality hoops nowadays.’
+
+‘There is no want of crowding, however, sir,’ said Fairford; ‘they begin
+to talk of a new Assembly room.’
+
+‘A new Assembly room!’ said the old Jacobite laird--‘Umph--I mind
+quartering three hundred men in the old Assembly room [I remember
+hearing this identical answer given by an old Highland gentleman of the
+Forty-Five, when he heard of the opening of the New Assembly Rooms in
+George Street.]--But come, come--I’ll ask no more questions--the answers
+all smell of new lords new lands, and do but spoil my appetite, which
+were a pity, since here comes Mrs. Crosbie to say our mutton’s ready.’
+
+It was even so. Mrs. Crosbie had been absent, like Eve, ‘on hospitable
+cares intent,’ a duty which she did not conceive herself exempted from,
+either by the dignity of her husband’s rank in the municipality, or the
+splendour of her Brussels silk gown, or even by the more highly prized
+lustre of her birth; for she was born a Maxwell, and allied, as her
+husband often informed his friends, to several of the first families in
+the county. She had been handsome, and was still a portly, good-looking
+woman of her years; and though her peep into the kitchen had somewhat
+heightened her complexion, it was no more than a modest touch of rouge
+might have done.
+
+The provost was certainly proud of his lady, nay, some said he was
+afraid of her; for of the females of the Redgauntlet family there went a
+rumour, that, ally where they would, there was a grey mare as surely in
+the stables of their husbands, as there is a white horse in Wouvermans’
+pictures. The good dame, too, was supposed to have brought a spice of
+politics into Mr. Crosbie’s household along with her; and the provost’s
+enemies at the council-table of the burgh used to observe that he
+uttered there many a bold harangue against the Pretender, and in favour
+of King George and government, of which he dared not have pronounced
+a syllable in his own bedchamber; and that, in fact, his wife’s
+predominating influence had now and then occasioned his acting,
+or forbearing to act, in a manner very different from his general
+professions of zeal for Revolution principles. If this was in any
+respect true, it was certain, on the other hand, that Mrs. Crosbie, in
+all external points, seemed to acknowledge the ‘lawful sway and right
+supremacy’ of the head of the house, and if she did not in truth
+reverence her husband, she at least seemed to do so.
+
+This stately dame received Mr. Maxwell (a cousin of course) with
+cordiality, and Fairford with civility; answering at the same time with
+respect, to the magisterial complaints of the provost, that dinner was
+just coming up. ‘But since you changed poor Peter MacAlpin, that used
+to take care of the town-clock, my dear, it has never gone well a single
+day.’
+
+‘Peter MacAlpin, my dear,’ said the provost,’ made himself too busy for
+a person in office, and drunk healths and so forth, which it became no
+man to drink or to pledge, far less one that is in point of office a
+servant of the public, I understand that he lost the music bells in
+Edinburgh, for playing “Ower the Water to Charlie,” upon the tenth of
+June. He is a black sheep, and deserves no encouragement.’
+
+‘Not a bad tune though, after all,’ said Summertrees; and, turning to
+the window, he half hummed, half whistled, the air in question, then
+sang the last verse aloud:
+
+  ‘Oh I loe weel my Charlie’s name,
+    Though some there be that abhor him;
+   But oh to see the deil gang hame
+    Wi’ a’ the Whigs before him!
+   Over the water, and over the sea,
+    And over the water to Charlie;
+   Come weal, come woe, we’ll gather and go,
+    And live or die with Charlie.’
+
+Mrs. Crosbie smiled furtively on the laird, wearing an aspect at the
+same time of deep submission; while the provost, not choosing to hear
+his visitor’s ditty, took a turn through the room, in unquestioned
+dignity and independence of authority.
+
+‘Aweel, aweel, my dear,’ said the lady, with a quiet smile of
+submission, ‘ye ken these matters best, and you will do your
+pleasure--they are far above my hand--only, I doubt if ever the
+town-clock will go right, or your meals be got up so regular as I should
+wish, till Peter MacAlpin gets his office back again. The body’s auld,
+and can neither work nor want, but he is the only hand to set a clock.’
+
+It may be noticed in passing, that notwithstanding this prediction,
+which, probably, the fair Cassandra had the full means of accomplishing,
+it was not till the second council day thereafter that the misdemeanours
+of the Jacobite clock-keeper were passed over, and he was once more
+restored to his occupation of fixing the town’s time, and the provost’s
+dinner-hour.
+
+Upon the present occasion the dinner passed pleasantly away. Summertrees
+talked and jested with the easy indifference of a man who holds himself
+superior to his company. He was indeed an important person, as was
+testified by his portly appearance; his hat laced with POINT D’ESPAGNE;
+his coat and waistcoat once richly embroidered, though now almost
+threadbare; the splendour of his solitaire, and laced ruffles, though
+the first was sorely creased, and the other sullied; not to forget the
+length of his silver-hilted rapier. His wit, or rather humour, bordered
+on the sarcastic, and intimated a discontented man; and although he
+showed no displeasure when the provost attempted a repartee, yet it
+seemed that he permitted it upon mere sufferance, as a fencing-master,
+engaged with a pupil, will sometimes permit the tyro to hit him, solely
+by way of encouragement. The laird’s own jests, in the meanwhile, were
+eminently successful, not only with the provost and his lady, but with
+the red-cheeked and red-ribboned servant-maid who waited at table, and
+who could scarce perform her duty with propriety, so effectual were the
+explosions of Summertrees. Alan Fairford alone was unmoved among all
+this mirth; which was the less wonderful, that, besides the important
+subject which occupied his thoughts, most of the laird’s good things
+consisted in sly allusions to little parochial or family incidents,
+with which the Edinburgh visitor was totally unacquainted: so that the
+laughter of the party sounded in his ear like the idle crackling of
+thorns under the pot, with this difference, that they did not accompany
+or second any such useful operation as the boiling thereof.
+
+Fairford was glad when the cloth was withdrawn; and when Provost Crosbie
+(not without some points of advice from his lady touching the precise
+mixture of the ingredients) had accomplished the compounding of a noble
+bowl of punch, at which the old Jacobite’s eyes seemed to glisten, the
+glasses were pushed round it, filled, and withdrawn each by its owner,
+when the provost emphatically named the toast, ‘The King,’ with an
+important look to Fairford, which seemed to say, You can have no doubt
+whom I mean, and therefore there is no occasion to particularize the
+individual.
+
+Summertrees repeated the toast, with a sly wink to the lady, while
+Fairford drank his glass in silence.
+
+‘Well, young advocate,’ said the landed proprietor, ‘I am glad to see
+there is some shame, if there is little honesty, left in the Faculty.
+Some of your black gowns, nowadays, have as little of the one as of the
+other.’
+
+‘At least, sir,’ replied Mr. Fairford, ‘I am so much of a lawyer as not
+willingly to enter into disputes which I am not retained to support--it
+would be but throwing away both time and argument.’
+
+‘Come, come,’ said the lady, ‘we will have no argument in this house
+about Whig or Tory--the provost kens what he maun SAY, and I ken what he
+should THINK; and for a’ that has come and gane yet, there may be a time
+coming when honest men may say what they think, whether they be provosts
+or not.’
+
+‘D’ye hear that, provost?’ said Summertrees; ‘your wife’s a witch, man;
+you should nail a horseshoe on your chamber door--Ha, ha, ha!’
+
+This sally did not take quite so well as former efforts of the laird’s
+wit. The lady drew up, and the provost said, half aside, ‘The sooth
+bourd is nae bourd. [The true joke is no joke.] You will find the
+horseshoe hissing hot, Summertrees.’
+
+‘You can speak from experience, doubtless, provost,’ answered the
+laird; ‘but I crave pardon--I need not tell Mrs. Crosbie that I have all
+respect for the auld and honourable House of Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘And good reason ye have, that are sae sib to them,’ quoth the lady,
+‘and kend weel baith them that are here, and them that are gane.’
+
+‘In troth, and ye may say sae, madam,’ answered the laird; ‘for poor
+Harry Redgauntlet, that suffered at Carlisle, was hand and glove with
+me; and yet we parted on short leave-taking.’
+
+‘Aye, Summertrees,’ said the provost; ‘that was when you played
+Cheat-the-woodie, and gat the by-name of Pate-in-Peril. I wish you would
+tell the story to my young friend here. He likes weel to hear of a sharp
+trick, as most lawyers do.’
+
+‘I wonder at your want of circumspection, provost,’ said the
+laird,--much after the manner of a singer when declining to sing the
+song that is quivering upon his tongue’s very end. ‘Ye should mind there
+are some auld stories that cannot be ripped up again with entire safety
+to all concerned. TACE is Latin for a candle,’
+
+‘I hope,’ said the lady, ‘you are not afraid of anything being said out
+of this house to your prejudice, Summertrees? I have heard the story
+before; but the oftener I hear it, the more wonderful I think it.’
+
+‘Yes, madam; but it has been now a wonder of more than nine days, and it
+is time it should be ended,’ answered Maxwell.
+
+Fairford now thought it civil to say, ‘that he had often heard of Mr.
+Maxwell’s wonderful escape, and that nothing could be more agreeable to
+him than to hear the right version of it.’
+
+But Summertrees was obdurate, and refused to take up the time of the
+company with such ‘auld-warld nonsense.’
+
+‘Weel, weel,’ said the provost, ‘a wilful man maun hae his way. What do
+your folk in the country think about the disturbances that are beginning
+to spunk out in the colonies?’
+
+‘Excellent, sir, excellent. When things come to the worst; they will
+mend; and to the worst they are coming. But as to that nonsense ploy
+of mine, if ye insist on hearing the particulars,’--said the laird, who
+began to be sensible that the period of telling his story gracefully was
+gliding fast away.
+
+‘Nay,’ said the provost, ‘it was not for myself, but this young
+gentlemen.’
+
+‘Aweel, what for should I not pleasure the young gentlemen? I’ll
+just drink to honest folk at hame and abroad, and deil ane else. And
+then--but you have heard it before, Mrs. Crosbie?’
+
+‘Not so often as to think it tiresome, I assure ye,’ said the lady; and
+without further preliminaries, the laird addressed Alan Fairford.
+
+‘Ye have heard of a year they call the FORTY-FIVE, young gentleman;
+when the Southrons’ heads made their last acquaintance with Scottish
+claymores? There was a set of rampauging chields in the country then
+that they called rebels--I never could find out what for--Some men
+should have been wi’ them that never came, provost--Skye and the Bush
+aboon Traquair for that, ye ken.--Weel, the job was settled at last.
+Cloured crowns were plenty, and raxed necks came into fashion. I dinna
+mind very weel what I was doing, swaggering about the country with dirk
+and pistol at my belt for five or six months, or thereaway; but I had
+a weary waking out of a wild dream. When did I find myself on foot in a
+misty morning, with my hand, just for fear of going astray, linked into
+a handcuff, as they call it, with poor Harry Redgauntlet’s fastened into
+the other; and there we were, trudging along, with about a score more
+that had thrust their horns ower deep in the bog, just like ourselves,
+and a sergeant’s guard of redcoats, with twa file of dragoons, to
+keep all quiet, and give us heart to the road. Now, if this mode of
+travelling was not very pleasant, the object did not particularly
+recommend it; for, you understand, young man, that they did not trust
+these poor rebel bodies to be tried by juries of their ain kindly
+countrymen, though ane would have thought they would have found Whigs
+enough in Scotland to hang us all; but they behoved to trounce us away
+to be tried at Carlisle, where the folk had been so frightened, that
+had you brought a whole Highland clan at once into the court, they would
+have put their hands upon their een, and cried, “hang them a’,” just to
+be quit of them.’
+
+‘Aye, aye,’ said the provost, ‘that was a snell law, I grant ye.’
+
+‘Snell!’ said the wife, ‘snell! I wish they that passed it had the jury
+I would recommend them to!’
+
+‘I suppose the young lawyer thinks it all very right,’ said Summertrees,
+looking at Fairford--‘an OLD lawyer might have thought otherwise.
+However, the cudgel was to be found to beat the dog, and they chose
+a heavy one. Well, I kept my spirits better than my companion, poor
+fellow; for I had the luck to have neither wife nor child to think
+about, and Harry Redgauntlet had both one and t’other.--You have seen
+Harry, Mrs. Crosbie?’
+
+‘In troth have I,’ said she, with the sigh which we give to early
+recollections, of which the object is no more. ‘He was not so tall as
+his brother, and a gentler lad every way. After he married the great
+English fortune, folk called him less of a Scottishman than Edward.’
+
+‘Folk lee’d, then,’ said Summertrees; ‘poor Harry was none of your
+bold-speaking, ranting reivers, that talk about what they did yesterday,
+or what they will do to-morrow; it was when something was to do at the
+moment that you should have looked at Harry Redgauntlet. I saw him at
+Culloden, when all was lost, doing more than twenty of these bleezing
+braggarts, till the very soldiers that took him cried not to hurt
+him--for all somebody’s orders, provost--for he was the bravest fellow
+of them all. Weel, as I went by the side of Harry, and felt him raise my
+hand up in the mist of the morning, as if he wished to wipe his eye--for
+he had not that freedom without my leave--my very heart was like to
+break for him, poor fellow. In the meanwhile, I had been trying and
+trying to make my hand as fine as a lady’s, to see if I could slip it
+out of my iron wristband. You may think,’ he said, laying his broad bony
+hand on the table, ‘I had work enough with such a shoulder-of-mutton
+fist; but if you observe, the shackle-bones are of the largest, and so
+they were obliged to keep the handcuff wide; at length I got my hand
+slipped out, and slipped in again; and poor Harry was sae deep in his
+ain thoughts, I could not make him sensible what I was doing.’
+
+‘Why not?’ said Alan Fairford, for whom the tale began to have some
+interest.
+
+‘Because there was an unchancy beast of a dragoon riding close beside
+us on the other side; and if I had let him into my confidence as well as
+Harry, it would not have been long before a pistol-ball slapped through
+my bonnet.--Well, I had little for it but to do the best I could for
+myself; and, by my conscience, it was time, when the gallows was staring
+me in the face. We were to halt for breakfast at Moffat. Well did I know
+the moors we were marching over, having hunted and hawked on every acre
+of ground in very different times. So I waited, you see, till I was on
+the edge of Errickstane-brae--Ye ken the place they call the Marquis’s
+Beef-stand, because the Annandale loons used to put their stolen cattle
+in there?’
+
+Fairford intimated his ignorance,
+
+‘Ye must have seen it as ye came this way; it looks as if four hills
+were laying their heads together, to shut out daylight from the dark
+hollow space between them. A d--d deep, black, blackguard-looking
+abyss of a hole it is, and goes straight down from the roadside, as
+perpendicular as it can do, to be a heathery brae. At the bottom, there
+is a small bit of a brook, that you would think could hardly find, its
+way out from the hills that are so closely jammed round it.’
+
+‘A bad pass, indeed,’ said Alan.
+
+‘You may say that,’ continued the laird. ‘Bad as it was, sir, it was
+my only chance; and though my very flesh creeped when I thought what a
+rumble I was going to get, yet I kept my heart up all the same. And so,
+just when we came on the edge of this Beef-stand of the Johnstones, I
+slipped out my hand from the handcuff, cried to Harry Gauntlet, ‘Follow
+me!’--whisked under the belly of the dragoon horse--flung my plaid round
+me with the speed of lightning--threw myself on my side, for there was
+no keeping my feet, and down the brae hurled I, over heather and fern,
+and blackberries, like a barrel down Chalmer’s Close, in Auld Reekie.
+G--, sir, I never could help laughing when I think how the scoundrel
+redcoats must have been bumbazed; for the mist being, as I said, thick,
+they had little notion, I take it, that they were on the verge of such
+a dilemma. I was half way down--for rowing is faster wark than
+rinning--ere they could get at their arms; and then it was flash, flash,
+flash--rap, rap, rap--from the edge of the road; but my head was too
+jumbled to think anything either of that or the hard knocks I got among
+the stones. I kept my senses thegither, whilk has been thought wonderful
+by all that ever saw the place; and I helped myself with my hands as
+gallantly as I could, and to the bottom I came. There I lay for half
+a moment; but the thoughts of a gallows is worth all the salts and
+scent-bottles in the world for bringing a man to himself. Up I sprang,
+like a four-year-auld colt. All the hills were spinning round with me,
+like so many great big humming-tops. But there was nae time to think of
+that neither; more especially as the mist had risen a little with the
+firing. I could see the villains, like sae mony craws on the edge of
+the brae; and I reckon that they saw me; for some of the loons were
+beginning to crawl down the hill, but liker auld wives in their red
+cloaks, coming frae a field preaching, than such a souple lad as I was.
+Accordingly, they soon began to stop and load their pieces. Good-e’en to
+you, gentlemen, thought I, if that is to be the gate of it. If you have
+any further word with me, you maun come as far as Carriefraw-gauns. And
+so off I set, and never buck went faster ower the braes than I did; and
+I never stopped till I had put three waters, reasonably deep, as the
+season was rainy, half a dozen mountains, and a few thousand acres
+of the worst moss and ling in Scotland, betwixt me and my friends the
+redcoats.’
+
+‘It was that job which got you the name of Pate-in-Peril,’ said the
+provost, filling the glasses, and exclaiming with great emphasis,
+while his guest, much animated with the recollections which the
+exploit excited, looked round with an air of triumph for sympathy and
+applause,--‘Here is to your good health; and may you never put your neck
+in such a venture again.’ [The escape of a Jacobite gentleman while on
+the road to Carlisle to take his trial for his share in the affair of
+1745, took place at Errickstane-brae, in the singular manner ascribed to
+the Laird of Summertrees in the text. The author has seen in his youth
+the gentleman to whom the adventure actually happened. The distance of
+time makes some indistinctness of recollection, but it is believed the
+real name was MacEwen or MacMillan.]
+
+‘Humph!--I do not know,’ answered Summertrees. ‘I am not like to be
+tempted with another opportunity--[An old gentleman of the author’s name
+was engaged in the affair of 1715, and with some difficulty was saved
+from the gallows by the intercession of the Duchess of Buccleugh and
+Monmouth. Her Grace, who maintained a good deal of authority over her
+clan, sent for the object of her intercession, and warning him of the
+risk which he had run, and the trouble she had taken on his account,
+wound up her lecture by intimating that in case of such disloyalty
+again, he was not to expect her interest in his favour. ‘An it please
+your Grace,’ said the stout old Tory, ‘I fear I am too old to see
+another opportunity.’] Yet who knows?’ And then he made a deep pause.
+
+‘May I ask what became of your friend, sir?’ said Alan Fairford.
+
+‘Ah, poor Harry!’ said Summertrees. ‘I’ll tell you what, sir, it takes
+time to make up one’s mind to such a venture, as my friend the provost
+calls it; and I was told by Neil Maclean,--who was next file to us,
+but had the luck to escape the gallows by some sleight-of-hand trick
+or other,--that, upon my breaking off, poor Harry stood like one
+motionless, although all our brethren in captivity made as much tumult
+as they could, to distract the attention of the soldiers. And run he did
+at last; but he did not know the ground, and either from confusion, or
+because he judged the descent altogether perpendicular, he fled up
+the hill to the left, instead of going down at once, and so was easily
+pursued and taken. If he had followed my example, he would have found
+enough among the shepherds to hide him, and feed him, as they did me,
+on bearmeal scenes and braxy mutton, till better days came round again.’
+[BRAXY MUTTON.--The flesh of sheep that has died of disease, not by
+the hand of the butcher. In pastoral countries it is used as food with
+little scruple.]
+
+‘He suffered then for his share in the insurrection?’ said Alan.
+
+‘You may swear that,’ said Summertrees. ‘His blood was too red to be
+spared when that sort of paint was in request. He suffered, sir, as
+you call it--that is, he was murdered in cold blood, with many a pretty
+fellow besides. Well, we may have our day next--what is fristed is not
+forgiven--they think us all dead and buried--but’--Here he filled his
+glass, and muttering some indistinct denunciations, drank it off, and
+assumed his usual manner, which had been a little disturbed towards the
+end of the narrative.
+
+‘What became of Mr. Redgauntlet’s child?’ said Fairford.
+
+MISTER Redgauntlet! He was Sir Henry Redgauntlet, as his son, if the
+child now lives, will be Sir Arthur--I called him Harry from intimacy,
+and Redgauntlet, as the chief of his name--His proper style was Sir
+Henry Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘His son, therefore, is dead?’ said Alan Fairford. ‘It is a pity so
+brave a line should draw to a close.’
+
+‘He has left a brother,’ said Summertrees, ‘Edward Hugh Redgauntlet, who
+has now the representation of the family. And well it is; for though he
+be unfortunate in many respects, he will keep up the honour of the house
+better than a boy bred up amongst these bitter Whigs, the relations of
+his elder brother Sir Henry’s lady. Then they are on no good terms with
+the Redgauntlet line--bitter Whigs they are in every sense. It was a
+runaway match betwixt Sir Henry and his lady. Poor thing, they would not
+allow her to see him when in confinement--they had even the meanness to
+leave him without pecuniary assistance; and as all his own property was
+seized upon and plundered, he would have wanted common necessaries, but
+for the attachment of a fellow who was a famous fiddler--a blind man--I
+have seen him with Sir Henry myself, both before the affair broke out
+and while it was going on. I have heard that he fiddled in the streets
+of Carlisle, and carried what money he got to his master, while he was
+confined in the castle.’
+
+‘I do not believe a word of it,’ said Mrs. Crosbie, kindling with
+indignation. ‘A Redgauntlet would have died twenty times before he had
+touched a fiddler’s wages.’
+
+‘Hout fye--hout fye--all nonsense and pride,’ said the Laird of
+Summertrees. ‘Scornful dogs will eat dirty puddings, cousin Crosbie--ye
+little ken what some of your friends were obliged to do yon time for a
+sowp of brose, or a bit of bannock. G--d, I carried a cutler’s wheel for
+several weeks, partly for need, and partly for disguise--there I went
+bizz--bizz--whizz--zizz, at every auld wife’s door; and if ever you want
+your shears sharpened, Mrs. Crosbie, I am the lad to do it for you, if
+my wheel was but in order.’
+
+‘You, must ask my leave first,’ said the provost; ‘for I have been told
+you had some queer fashions of taking a kiss instead of a penny, if you
+liked your customer.’
+
+‘Come, come, provost,’ said the lady; rising, ‘if the maut gets abune
+the meal with you, it is time for me to take myself away--And you will
+come to my room, gentlemen, when you want a cup of tea.’
+
+Alan Fairford was not sorry for the lady’s departure. She seemed too
+much alive to the honour of the house of Redgauntlet, though only a
+fourth cousin, not to be alarmed by the inquiries which he proposed
+to make after the whereabout of its present head. Strange confused
+suspicions arose in his mind, from his imperfect recollection of the
+tale of Wandering Willie, and the idea forced itself upon him that his
+friend Darsie Latimer might be the son of the unfortunate Sir Henry. But
+before indulging in such speculations, the point was to discover what
+had actually become of him. If he were in the hands of his uncle, might
+there not exist some rivalry in fortune, or rank, which might induce so
+stern a man as Redgauntlet to use unfair measures towards a youth whom
+he would find himself unable to mould to his purpose? He considered
+these points in silence, during several revolutions of the glasses
+as they wheeled in galaxy round the bowl, waiting until the provost,
+agreeably to his own proposal, should mention the subject, for which he
+had expressly introduced him to Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees.
+
+Apparently the provost had forgot his promise, or at least was in no
+great haste to fulfil it. He debated with great earnestness upon the
+Stamp Act, which was then impending over the American colonies, and upon
+other political subjects of the day, but said not a word of Redgauntlet.
+Alan soon saw that the investigation he meditated must advance, if at
+all, on his own special motion, and determined to proceed accordingly.
+
+Acting upon this resolution, he took the first opportunity afforded by
+a pause in the discussion of colonial politics, to say, ‘I must remind
+you, Provost Crosbie, of your kind promise to procure some intelligence
+upon the subject I am so anxious about.’
+
+‘Gadso!’ said the provost, after a moment’s hesitation, ‘it is very
+true.--Mr. Maxwell, we wish to consult you on a piece of important
+business. You must know indeed I think you must have heard, that the
+fishermen at Brokenburn, and higher up the Solway, have made a raid upon
+Quaker Geddes’s stake-nets, and levelled all with the sands.’
+
+‘In troth I heard it, provost, and I was glad to hear the scoundrels had
+so much pluck left as to right themselves against a fashion which would
+make the upper heritors a sort of clocking-hens, to hatch the fish that
+folk below them were to catch and eat.’
+
+‘Well, sir,’ said Alan, ‘that is not the present point. But a young
+friend of mine was with Mr. Geddes at the time this violent procedure
+took place, and he has not since been heard of. Now, our friend, the
+provost, thinks that you may be able to advise’--
+
+Here he was interrupted by the provost and Summertrees speaking out
+both at once, the first endeavouring to disclaim all interest in the
+question, and the last to evade giving an answer.
+
+‘Me think!’ said the provost; ‘I never thought twice about it, Mr.
+Fairford; it was neither fish, nor flesh, nor salt herring of mine.’
+
+‘And I “able to advise”!’ said Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees; ‘what the
+devil can I advise you to do, excepting to send the bellman through the
+town to cry your lost sheep, as they do spaniel dogs or stray ponies?’
+
+‘With your pardon,’ said Alan, calmly, but resolutely, ‘I must ask a
+more serious answer.’
+
+‘Why, Mr. Advocate,’ answered Summertrees, ‘I thought it was your
+business to give advice to the lieges, and not to take it from poor
+stupid country gentlemen.’
+
+‘If not exactly advice, it is sometimes our duty to ask questions, Mr.
+Maxwell.’
+
+‘Aye, sir, when you have your bag-wig and your gown on, we must
+allow you the usual privilege of both gown and petticoat, to ask what
+questions you please. But when you are out of your canonicals, the case
+is altered. How come you, sir, to suppose that I have any business with
+this riotous proceeding, or should know more than you do what happened
+there? the question proceeds on an uncivil supposition.’
+
+‘I will explain,’ said Alan, determined to give Mr. Maxwell no
+opportunity of breaking off the conversation. ‘You are an intimate of
+Mr. Redgauntlet--he is accused of having been engaged in this affray,
+and of having placed under forcible restraint the person of my friend,
+Darsie Latimer, a young man of property and consequence, whose fate I am
+here for the express purpose of investigating. This is the plain
+state of the case; and all parties concerned,--your friend, in
+particular,--will have reason to be thankful for the temperate manner
+in which it is my purpose to conduct the matter, if I am treated with
+proportionate frankness.’
+
+‘You have misunderstood me,’ said Maxwell, with a tone changed to
+more composure; ‘I told you I was the friend of the late Sir Henry
+Redgauntlet, who was executed, in 1745, at Hairibie, near Carlisle, but
+I know no one who at present bears the name of Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘You know Mr. Herries of Birrenswork,’ said Alan, smiling, ‘to whom the
+name of Redgauntlet belongs?’
+
+Maxwell darted a keen reproachful look towards the provost, but
+instantly smoothed his brow, and changed his tone to that of confidence
+and candour.
+
+‘You must not be angry, Mr. Fairford, that the poor persecuted nonjurors
+are a little upon the QUI VIVE when such clever young men as you are
+making inquiries after us. I myself now, though I am quite out of the
+scrape, and may cock my hat at the Cross as I best like, sunshine or
+moonshine, have been yet so much accustomed to walk with the lap of my
+cloak cast over my face, that, faith, if a redcoat walk suddenly up
+to me, I wish for my wheel and whetstone again for a moment. Now
+Redgauntlet, poor fellow, is far worse off--he is, you may have heard,
+still under the lash of the law,--the mark of the beast is still on his
+forehead, poor gentleman,--and that makes us cautious--very cautious,
+which I am sure there is no occasion to be towards you, as no one of
+your appearance and manners would wish to trepan a gentleman under
+misfortune.’
+
+‘On the contrary, sir,’ said Fairford, ‘I wish to afford Mr.
+Redgauntlet’s friends an opportunity to get him out of the scrape, by
+procuring the instant liberation of my friend Darsie Latimer. I will
+engage that if he has sustained no greater bodily harm than a short
+confinement, the matter may be passed over quietly, without inquiry; but
+to attain this end, so desirable for the man who has committed a great
+and recent infraction of the laws, which he had before grievously
+offended, very speedy reparation of the wrong must be rendered.’
+
+Maxwell seemed lost in reflection, and exchanged a glance or two, not of
+the most comfortable or congratulatory kind, with his host the provost.
+Fairford rose and walked about the room, to allow them an opportunity
+of conversing together; for he was in hopes that the impression he
+had visibly made upon Summertrees was likely to ripen into something
+favourable to his purpose. They took the opportunity, and engaged in
+whispers to each other, eagerly and reproachfully on the part of the
+laird, while the provost answered in an embarrassed and apologetical
+tone. Some broken words of the conversation reached Fairford, whose
+presence they seemed to forget, as he stood at the bottom of the room,
+apparently intent upon examining the figures upon a fine Indian screen,
+a present to the provost from his brother, captain of a vessel in the
+Company’s service. What he overheard made it evident that his errand,
+and the obstinacy with which he pursued it, occasioned altercation
+between the whisperers.
+
+Maxwell at length let out the words, ‘A good fright; and so send him
+home with his tail scalded, like a dog that has come a-privateering on
+strange premises.’
+
+The provost’s negative was strongly interposed--‘Not to be thought
+of’--‘making bad worse’--‘my situation’--‘my utility’--‘you cannot
+conceive how obstinate--just like his father’.
+
+They then whispered more closely, and at length the provost raised his
+drooping crest, and spoke in a cheerful tone. ‘Come, sit down to your
+glass, Mr. Fairford; we have laid our heads thegither, and you shall see
+it will not be our fault if you are not quite pleased, and Mr.
+Darsie Latimer let loose to take his fiddle under his neck again. But
+Summertrees thinks it will require you to put yourself into some bodily
+risk, which maybe you may not be so keen of.’
+
+‘Gentlemen,’ said Fairford, ‘I will not certainly shun any risk by which
+my object may be accomplished; but I bind it on your consciences--on
+yours, Mr. Maxwell, as a man of honour and a gentleman; and on yours,
+provost, as a magistrate and a loyal subject, that you do not mislead me
+in this matter.’
+
+‘Nay, as for me,’ said Summertrees, ‘I will tell you the truth at
+once, and fairly own that I can certainly find you the means of seeing
+Redgauntlet, poor man; and that I will do, if you require it, and
+conjure him also to treat you as your errand requires; but poor
+Redgauntlet is much changed--indeed, to say truth, his temper never was
+the best in the world; however, I will warrant you from any very great
+danger.’
+
+‘I will warrant myself from such,’ said Fairford, ‘by carrying a proper
+force with me.’
+
+‘Indeed,’ said Summertrees, ‘you will, do no such thing; for, in the
+first place, do you think that we will deliver up the poor fellow into
+the hands of the Philistines, when, on the contrary, my only reason for
+furnishing you with the clue I am to put into your hands, is to settle
+the matter amicably on all sides? And secondly, his intelligence is so
+good, that were you coming near him with soldiers, or constables, or the
+like, I shall answer for it, you will never lay salt on his tail.’
+
+Fairford mused for a moment. He considered that to gain sight of this
+man, and knowledge of his friend’s condition, were advantages to be
+purchased at every personal risk; and he saw plainly, that were he to
+take the course most safe for himself, and call in the assistance of
+the law, it was clear he would either be deprived of the intelligence
+necessary to guide him, or that Redgauntlet would be apprised of his
+danger, and might probably leave the country, carrying his captive
+along with him. He therefore repeated, ‘I put myself on your honour, Mr.
+Maxwell; and I will go alone to visit your friend. I have little; doubt
+I shall find him amenable to reason; and that I shall receive from him a
+satisfactory account of Mr. Latimer.’
+
+‘I have little doubt that you will,’ said Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees;
+‘but still I think it will be only in the long run, and after having
+sustained some delay and inconvenience. My warrandice goes no further.’
+
+‘I will take it as it is given,’ said Alan Fairford. ‘But let me ask,
+would it not be better, since you value your friend’s safety so highly
+and surely would not willingly compromise mine, that the provost or you
+should go with me to this man, if he is within any reasonable distance,
+and try to make him hear reason?’
+
+‘Me!--I will not go my foot’s length,’ said the provost; and that, Mr.
+Alan, you may be well assured of. Mr. Redgauntlet is my wife’s fourth
+cousin, that is undeniable; but were he the last of her kin and mine
+both, it would ill befit my office to be communing with rebels.’
+
+‘Aye, or drinking with nonjurors,’ said Maxwell, filling his glass. ‘I
+would as soon expect; to have met Claverhouse at a field-preaching. And
+as for myself, Mr. Fairford, I cannot go, for just the opposite reason.
+It would be INFRA DIG. in the provost of this most flourishing and loyal
+town to associate with Redgauntlet; and for me it would be NOSCITUR A
+SOCIO. There would be post to London, with the tidings that two such
+Jacobites as Redgauntlet and I had met on a braeside--the Habeas Corpus
+would be suspended--Fame would sound a charge from Carlisle to the
+Land’s End--and who knows but the very wind of the rumour might blow my
+estate from between my fingers, and my body over Errickstane-brae again?
+No, no; bide a gliff--I will go into the provost’s closet, and write a
+letter to Redgauntlet, and direct you how to deliver it.’
+
+‘There is pen and ink in the office,’ said the provost, pointing to the
+door of an inner apartment, in which he had his walnut-tree desk and
+east-country cabinet.
+
+‘A pen that can write, I hope?’ said the old laird.
+
+‘It can write and spell baith in right hands,’ answered the provost, as
+the laird retired and shut the door behind him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+The room was no sooner deprived of Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees’s
+presence, than the provost looked very warily above, beneath, and around
+the apartment, hitched his chair towards that of his remaining guest,
+and began to speak In a whisper which could not have startled ‘the
+smallest mouse that creeps on floor.’
+
+‘Mr. Fairford,’ said he, ‘you are a good lad; and, what is more, you are
+my auld friend your father’s son. Your father has been agent for this
+burgh for years, and has a good deal to say with the council; so there
+have been a sort of obligations between him and me; it may have been now
+on this side and now on that; but obligations there have been. I am but
+a plain man, Mr. Fairford; but I hope you understand me?’
+
+‘I believe you mean me well, provost; and I am sure,’ replied Fairford,
+‘you can never better show your kindness than on this occasion.’
+
+‘That’s it--that’s the very point I would be at, Mr. Alan,’ replied the
+provost; ‘besides, I am, as becomes well my situation, a stanch friend
+to kirk and king, meaning this present establishment in church and
+state; and so, as I was saying, you may command my best--advice.’
+
+‘I hope for your assistance and co-operation also,’ said the youth.
+
+‘Certainly, certainly,’ said the wary magistrate. ‘Well, now, you see
+one may love the kirk, and yet not ride on the rigging of it; and one
+may love the king, and yet not be cramming him eternally down the throat
+of the unhappy folk that may chance to like another king better. I have
+friends and connexions among them, Mr. Fairford, as your father may have
+clients--they are flesh and blood like ourselves, these poor Jacobite
+bodies--sons of Adam and Eve, after all; and therefore--I hope you
+understand me?--I am a plain-spoken man.’
+
+‘I am afraid I do not quite understand you,’ said Fairford; ‘and if you
+have anything to say to me in private, my dear provost, you had better
+come quickly out with it, for the Laird of Summertrees must finish his
+letter in a minute or two.’
+
+‘Not a bit, man--Pate is a lang-headed fellow, but his pen does not
+clear the paper as his greyhound does the Tinwald-furs. I gave him
+a wipe about that, if you noticed; I can say anything to
+Pate-in-Peril--Indeed, he is my wife’s near kinsman.’
+
+‘But your advice, provost,’ said Alan, who perceived that, like a shy
+horse, the worthy magistrate always started off from his own purpose
+just when he seemed approaching to it.
+
+‘Weel, you shall have it in plain terms, for I am a plain man. Ye see,
+we will suppose that any friend like yourself were in the deepest hole
+of the Nith, sand making a sprattle for your life. Now, you see, such
+being the case, I have little chance of helping you, being a fat,
+short-armed man, and no swimmer, and what would be the use of my jumping
+in after you?’
+
+‘I understand you, I think,’ said Alan Fairford. ‘You think that Darsie
+Latimer is in danger of his life?’
+
+‘Me!--I think nothing about it, Mr. Alan; but if he were, as I trust he
+is not, he is nae drap’s blood akin to you, Mr. Alan.’
+
+‘But here your friend, Summertrees,’ said the young lawyer, ‘offers me a
+letter to this Redgauntlet of yours--What say you to that?’
+
+‘Me!’ ejaculated the provost, ‘me, Mr. Alan? I say neither buff nor
+stye to it--But ye dinna ken what it is to look a Redgauntlet in the
+face;--better try my wife, who is but a fourth cousin, before ye venture
+on the laird himself--just say something about the Revolution, and see
+what a look she can gie you.’
+
+I shall leave you to stand all the shots from that battery, provost.’
+replied Fairford. ‘But speak out like a man--Do you think Summertrees
+means fairly by me?’
+
+‘Fairly--he is just coming--fairly? I am a plain man, Mr. Fairford--but
+ye said FAIRLY?’
+
+‘I do so,’ replied Alan, ‘and it is of importance to me to know, and
+to you to tell me if such is the case; for if you do not, you may be an
+accomplice to murder before the fact, and that under circumstances which
+may bring it near to murder under trust.’
+
+‘Murder!--who spoke of murder?’ said the provost; no danger of that, Mr.
+Alan--only, if I were you--to speak my plain mind’--Here he approached
+his mouth to the ear of the young lawyer, and, after another acute pang
+of travail, was safely delivered of his advice in the following abrupt
+words:--‘Take a keek into Pate’s letter before ye deliver it.’
+
+Fairford started, looked the provost hard in the face, and was silent;
+while Mr. Crosbie, with the self-approbation of one who has at length
+brought himself to the discharge of a great duty, at the expense of a
+considerable sacrifice, nodded and winked to Alan, as if enforcing his
+advice; and then swallowing a large glass of punch, concluded, with
+the sigh of a man released from a heavy burden, ‘I am a plain man, Mr.
+Fairford.’
+
+‘A plain man?’ said Maxwell, who entered the room at that moment, with
+the letter in his hand,--‘Provost, I never heard you make use of the
+word but when you had some sly turn of your own to work out.’
+
+The provost looked silly enough, and the Laird of Summertrees directed
+a keen and suspicious glance upon Alan Fairford, who sustained it with
+professional intrepidity.--There was a moment’s pause.
+
+‘I was trying,’ said the provost, ‘to dissuade our young friend from his
+wildgoose expedition.’
+
+‘And I,’ said Fairford, ‘am determined to go through with it. Trusting
+myself to you, Mr. Maxwell, I conceive that I rely, as I before said, on
+the word of a gentleman.’
+
+‘I will warrant you,’ said Maxwell, ‘from all serious consequences--some
+inconveniences you must look to suffer.’
+
+‘To these I shall be resigned,’ said Fairford, ‘and stand prepared to
+run my risk.’
+
+‘Well then,’ said Summertrees, ‘you must go’--
+
+‘I will leave you to yourselves, gentlemen,’ said the provost, rising;
+‘when you have done with your crack, you will find me at my wife’s
+tea-table.’
+
+‘And a more accomplished old woman never drank catlap,’ said Maxwell,
+as he shut the door; ‘the last word has him, speak it who will--and yet
+because he is a whillywhaw body, and has a plausible tongue of his own,
+and is well enough connected, and especially because nobody could ever
+find out whether he is Whig or Tory, this is the third time they
+have made him provost!--But to the matter in hand. This letter, Mr.
+Fairford,’ putting a sealed one into his hand, ‘is addressed, you
+observe, to Mr. H--of B--, and contains your credentials for that
+gentlemen, who is also known by his family name of Redgauntlet, but
+less frequently addressed by it, because it is mentioned something
+invidiously in a certain Act of Parliament. I have little doubt he will
+assure you of your friend’s safety, and in a short time place him at
+freedom--that is, supposing him under present restraint. But the point
+is, to discover where he is--and, before you are made acquainted with
+this necessary part of the business, you must give me your assurance of
+honour that you will acquaint no one, either by word or letter, with the
+expedition which you now propose to yourself.’
+
+‘How, sir?’ answered Alan; ‘can you expect that I will not take the
+precaution of informing some person of the route I am about to take,
+that in case of accident it may be known where I am, and with what
+purpose I have gone thither?’
+
+‘And can you expect,’ answered Maxwell, in the same tone, ‘that I am to
+place my friend’s safety, not merely in your hands, but in those of any
+person you may choose to confide in, and who may use the knowledge to
+his destruction? Na--na--I have pledged my word for your safety, and you
+must give me yours to be private in the matter--giff-gaff, you know.’
+
+Alan Fairford could not help thinking that this obligation to secrecy
+gave a new and suspicious colouring to the whole transaction; but,
+considering that his friend’s release might depend upon his accepting
+the condition, he gave it in the terms proposed, and with the purpose of
+abiding by it.
+
+‘And now, sir,’ he said, ‘whither am I to proceed with this letter? Is
+Mr. Herries at Brokenburn?’
+
+‘He is not; I do not think he will come thither again until the business
+of the stake-nets be hushed up, nor would I advise him to do so--the
+Quakers, with all their demureness, can bear malice as long as other
+folk; and though I have not the prudence of Mr. Provost, who refuses to
+ken where his friends are concealed during adversity, lest, perchance,
+he should be asked to contribute to their relief, yet I do not think it
+necessary or prudent to inquire into Redgauntlet’s wanderings, poor man,
+but wish to remain at perfect freedom to answer, if asked at, that I
+ken nothing of the matter. You must, then, go to old Tom Trumbull’s at
+Annan,--Tam Turnpenny, as they call him,--and he is sure either to know
+where Redgauntlet is himself, or to find some one who can give a shrewd
+guess. But you must attend that old Turnpenny will answer no question on
+such a subject without you give him the passport, which at present you
+must do, by asking him the age of the moon; if he answers, “Not light
+enough to land a cargo,” you are to answer, “Then plague on Aberdeen
+Almanacks,” and upon that he will hold free intercourse with you.
+And now, I would advise you to lose no time, for the parole is often
+changed--and take care of yourself among these moonlight lads, for laws
+and lawyers do not stand very high in their favour.’
+
+‘I will set out this instant,’ said the young barrister; ‘I will but bid
+the provost and Mrs. Crosbie farewell, and then get on horseback so soon
+as the ostler of the George Inn can saddle him;--as for the smugglers,
+I am neither gauger nor supervisor, and, like the man who met the devil,
+if they have nothing to say to me, I have nothing to say to them.’
+
+‘You are a mettled young man,’ said Summertrees, evidently with
+increasing goodwill, on observing an alertness and contempt of
+danger, which perhaps he did not expect from Alan’s appearance and
+profession,--‘a very mettled young fellow indeed! and it is almost a
+pity’--Here he stopped abort.
+
+‘What is a pity?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘It is almost a pity that I cannot go with you myself, or at least send
+a trusty guide.’
+
+They walked together to the bedchamber of Mrs. Crosbie, for it was in
+that asylum that the ladies of the period dispensed their tea, when the
+parlour was occupied by the punch-bowl.
+
+‘You have been good bairns to-night, gentlemen,’ said Mrs. Crosbie; ‘I
+am afraid, Summertrees, that the provost has given you a bad browst; you
+are not used to quit the lee-side of the punch-bowl in such a hurry. I
+say nothing to you, Mr. Fairford, for you are too young a man yet for
+stoup and bicker; but I hope you will not tell the Edinburgh fine folk
+that the provost has scrimped you of your cogie, as the sang says?’
+
+‘I am much obliged for the provost’s kindness, and yours, madam,’
+replied Alan; ‘but the truth is, I have still a long ride before me this
+evening and the sooner I am on horse-back the better.’
+
+‘This evening?’ said the provost, anxiously; ‘had you not better take
+daylight with you to-morrow morning?’
+
+‘Mr. Fairford will ride as well in the cool of the evening,’ said
+Summertrees, taking the word out of Alan’s mouth.
+
+The provost said no more, nor did his wife ask any questions, nor
+testify any surprise at the suddenness of their guest’s departure.
+
+Having drunk tea, Alan Fairford took leave with the usual ceremony.
+The Laird of Summertrees seemed studious to prevent any further
+communication between him and the provost, and remained lounging on
+the landing-place of the stair while they made their adieus--heard the
+provost ask if Alan proposed a speedy return, and the latter reply that
+his stay was uncertain, and witnessed the parting shake of the hand,
+which, with a pressure more warm than usual, and a tremulous, ‘God bless
+and prosper you!’ Mr. Crosbie bestowed on his young friend. Maxwell even
+strolled with Fairford as far as the George, although resisting all
+his attempts at further inquiry into the affairs of Redgauntlet, and
+referring him to Tom Trumbull, alias Turnpenny, for the particulars
+which he might find it necessary to inquire into.
+
+At length Alan’s hack was produced--an animal long in neck, and high
+in bone, accoutred with a pair of saddle-bags containing the rider’s
+travelling wardrobe. Proudly surmounting his small stock of necessaries,
+and no way ashamed of a mode of travelling which a modern Mr.
+Silvertongue would consider as the last of degradations, Alan Fairford
+took leave of the old Jacobite, Pate-in-Peril, and set forward on the
+road to the loyal burgh of Annan. His reflections during his ride were
+none of the most pleasant. He could not disguise from himself that he
+was venturing rather too rashly into the power of outlawed and desperate
+persons; for with such only, a man in the situation of Redgauntlet could
+be supposed to associate. There were other grounds for apprehension,
+Several marks of intelligence betwixt Mrs. Crosbie and the Laird of
+Summertrees had not escaped Alan’s acute observation; and it was plain
+that the provost’s inclinations towards him, which he believed to be
+sincere and good, were not firm enough to withstand the influence of
+this league between his wife and friend. The provost’s adieus, like
+Macbeth’s amen, had stuck in his throat, and seemed to intimate that he
+apprehended more than he dared give utterance to.
+
+Laying all these matters together, Alan thought, with no little anxiety
+on the celebrated lines of Shakespeare,
+
+                                  -- A drop,
+  That in the ocean seeks another drop, &c.
+
+But pertinacity was a strong feature in the young lawyer’s character.
+He was, and always had been, totally unlike the ‘horse hot at hand,’ who
+tires before noon through his own over eager exertions in the beginning
+of the day. On the contrary, his first efforts seemed frequently
+inadequate to accomplishing his purpose, whatever that for the time
+might be; and it was only as the difficulties of the task increased,
+that his mind seemed to acquire the energy necessary to combat and
+subdue them. If, therefore, he went anxiously forward upon his uncertain
+and perilous expedition, the reader must acquit him of all idea, even
+in a passing thought, of the possibility of abandoning his search, and
+resigning Darsie Latimer to his destiny.
+
+A couple of hours’ riding brought him to the little town of Annan,
+situated on the shores of the Solway, between eight and nine o’clock.
+The sun had set, but the day was not yet ended; and when he had alighted
+and seen his horse properly cared for at the principal inn of the place,
+he was readily directed to Mr. Maxwell’s friend, old Tom Trumbull, with
+whom everybody seemed well acquainted. He endeavoured to fish out from
+the lad that acted as a guide, something of this man’s situation and
+profession; but the general expressions of ‘a very decent man’--‘a very
+honest body’--‘weel to pass in the world,’ and such like, were all that
+could be extracted from him; and while Fairford was following up the
+investigation with closer interrogatories, the lad put an end to them by
+knocking at the door of Mr. Trumbull, whose decent dwelling was a little
+distance from the town, and considerably nearer to the sea. It was one
+of a little row of houses running down to the waterside, and having
+gardens and other accommodations behind. There was heard within
+the uplifting of a Scottish psalm; and the boy saying, ‘They are at
+exercise, sir,’ gave intimation they might not be admitted till prayers
+were over.
+
+When, however, Fairford repeated the summons with the end of his whip,
+the singing ceased, and Mr. Trumbull himself, with his psalm-book in his
+hand, kept open by the insertion of his forefinger between the leaves,
+came to demand the meaning of this unseasonable interruption.
+
+Nothing could be more different than his whole appearance seemed to be
+from the confidant of a desperate man, and the associate of outlaws in
+their unlawful enterprises. He was a tall, thin, bony figure, with white
+hair combed straight down on each side of his face, and an iron-grey hue
+of complexion; where the lines, or rather, as Quin said of Macklin, the
+cordage, of his countenance were so sternly adapted to a devotional and
+even ascetic expression, that they left no room for any indication of
+reckless daring or sly dissimulation. In short, Trumbull appeared a
+perfect specimen of the rigid old Covenanter, who said only what he
+thought right, acted on no other principle but that of duty, and, if he
+committed errors, did so under the full impression that he was serving
+God rather than man.
+
+‘Do you want me, sir?’ he said to Fairford, whose guide had slunk to
+the rear, as if to escape the rebuke of the severe old man,--‘We were
+engaged, and it is the Saturday night.’
+
+Alan Fairford’s preconceptions were so much deranged by this man’s
+appearance and manner, that he stood for a moment bewildered, and would
+as soon have thought of giving a cant password to a clergyman descending
+from the pulpit, as to the respectable father of a family just
+interrupted in his prayers for and with the objects of his care. Hastily
+concluding Mr. Maxwell had passed some idle jest on him, or rather that
+he had mistaken the person to whom he was directed, he asked if he spoke
+to Mr. Trumbull.
+
+‘To Thomas Trumbull,’ answered the old man--‘What may be your business,
+sir?’ And he glanced his eye to the book he held in his hand, with a
+sigh like that of a saint desirous of dissolution.
+
+‘Do you know Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘I have heard of such a gentleman in the country-side, but have no
+acquaintance with him,’ answered Mr. Trumbull; ‘he is, as I have heard,
+a Papist; for the whore that sitteth on the seven hills ceaseth not yet
+to pour forth the cup of her abomination on these parts.’
+
+‘Yet he directed me hither, my good friend,’ said Alan. ‘Is there
+another of your name in this town of Annan?’
+
+‘None,’ replied Mr. Trumbull, ‘since my worthy father was removed; he
+was indeed a shining light.--I wish you good even, sir.’
+
+‘Stay one single instant,’ said Fairford; ‘this is a matter of life and
+death.’
+
+‘Not more than the casting the burden of our sins where they should be
+laid,’ said Thomas Trumbull, about to shut the door in the inquirer’s
+face.
+
+‘Do you know,’ said Alan Fairford, ‘the Laird of Redgauntlet?’
+
+‘Now Heaven defend me from treason and rebellion!’ exclaimed Trumbull.
+‘Young gentleman, you are importunate. I live here among my own people,
+and do not consort with Jacobites and mass-mongers.’
+
+He seemed about to shut the door, but did NOT shut it, a circumstance
+which did not escape Alan’s notice.
+
+‘Mr. Redgauntlet is sometimes,’ he said, ‘called Herries of Birrenswork;
+perhaps you may know him under that name.’
+
+‘Friend, you are uncivil,’ answered Mr. Trumbull; ‘honest men have
+enough to do to keep one name undefiled. I ken nothing about those who
+have two. Good even to you, friend.’
+
+He was now about to slam the door in his visitor’s face without
+further ceremony, when Alan, who had observed symptoms that the name
+of Redgauntlet did not seem altogether so indifferent to him as he
+pretended, arrested his purpose by saying, in a low voice, ‘At least you
+can tell me what age the moon is?’
+
+The old man started, as if from a trance, and before answering, surveyed
+the querist with a keen penetrating glance, which seemed to say, ‘Are
+you really in possession of this key to my confidence, or do you speak
+from mere accident?’
+
+To this keen look of scrutiny, Fairford replied by a smile of
+intelligence.
+
+The iron muscles of the old man’s face did not, however, relax, as he
+dropped, in a careless manner, the countersign, ‘Not light enough to
+land a cargo.’
+
+‘Then plague of all Aberdeen Almanacks!’
+
+‘And plague of all fools that waste time,’ said Thomas Trumbull, ‘Could
+you not have said as much at first? And standing wasting time, and
+encouraging; lookers-on, in the open street too? Come in by--in by.’
+
+He drew his visitor into the dark entrance of the house, and shut
+the door carefully; then putting his head into an apartment which the
+murmurs within announced to be filled with the family, he said aloud, ‘A
+work of necessity and mercy--Malachi, take the book--You will sing six
+double verses of the hundred and nineteen-and you may lecture out of the
+Lamentations. And, Malachi,’--this he said in an undertone,--‘see you
+give them a a creed of doctrine that will last them till I come back; or
+else these inconsiderate lads will be out of the house, and away to the
+publics, wasting their precious time, and, it may be, putting themselves
+in the way of missing the morning tide.’
+
+An inarticulate answer from within intimated Malachi’s acquiescence in
+the commands imposed; and, Mr. Trumbull, shutting the door, muttered
+something about fast bind, fast find, turned the key, and put it into
+his pocket; and then bidding his visitor have a care of his steps, and
+make no noise, he led him through the house, and out at a back-door,
+into a little garden. Here a plaited alley conducted them, without
+the possibility of their being seen by any neighbour, to a door in the
+garden-wall, which being opened, proved to be a private entrance into
+a three-stalled stable; in one of which was a horse, that whinnied on
+their entrance. ‘Hush, hush!’ cried the old man, and presently seconded
+his exhortations to silence by throwing a handful of corn into the
+manger, and the horse soon converted his acknowledgement of their
+presence into the usual sound of munching and grinding his provender.
+
+As the light was now failing fast, the old man, with much more alertness
+than might have been expected from the rigidity of his figure, closed
+the window-shutters in an instant, produced phosphorus and matches,
+and lighted a stable-lantern, which he placed on the corn-bin, and then
+addressed Fairford. ‘We are private here, young man; and as some time
+has been wasted already, you will be so kind as to tell me what is your
+errand. Is it about the way of business, or the other job?’
+
+‘My business with you, Mr. Trumbull, is to request you will find me the
+means of delivering this letter, from Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees to the
+Laird of Redgauntlet.’
+
+‘Humph--fashious job! Pate Maxwell will still be the auld man--always
+Pate-in-Peril--Craig-in-Peril, for what I know. Let me see the letter
+from him.’
+
+He examined it with much care, turning it up and down, and looking at
+the seal very attentively. ‘All’s right, I see; it has the private mark
+for haste and speed. I bless my Maker that I am no great man, or great
+man’s fellow; and so I think no more of these passages than just to help
+them forward in the way of business. You are an utter stranger in these
+parts, I warrant?’
+
+Fairford answered in the affirmative.
+
+‘Aye--I never saw them make a wiser choice--I must call some one to
+direct you what to do--Stay, we must go to him, I believe. You are well
+recommended to me, friend, and doubtless trusty; otherwise you may
+see more than I would like to show, or am in the use of showing in the
+common line of business.’
+
+Saying this, he placed his lantern on the ground, beside the post of one
+of the empty stalls, drew up a small spring bolt which secured it to
+the floor, and then forcing the post to one side, discovered a small
+trap-door. ‘Follow me,’ he said, and dived into the subterranean descent
+to which this secret aperture gave access.
+
+Fairford plunged after him, not without apprehensions of more kinds than
+one, but still resolved to prosecute the adventure.
+
+The descent, which was not above six feet, led to a very narrow passage,
+which seemed to have been constructed for the precise purpose of
+excluding every one who chanced to be an inch more in girth than was his
+conductor. A small vaulted room, of about eight feet square, received
+them at the end of this lane. Here Mr. Trumbull left Fairford alone, and
+returned for an instant, as he said, to shut his concealed trap-door.
+
+Fairford liked not his departure, as it left him in utter darkness;
+besides that his breathing was much affected by a strong and stifling
+smell of spirits, and other articles of a savour more powerful than
+agreeable to the lungs. He was very glad, therefore, when he heard the
+returning steps of Mr. Trumbull, who, when once more by his side, opened
+a strong though narrow door in the wall, and conveyed Fairford into
+an immense magazine of spirit-casks, and other articles of contraband
+trade.
+
+There was a small, light at the end of this range of well-stocked
+subterranean vaults, which, upon a low whistle, began to flicker and
+move towards them. An undefined figure, holding a dark lantern, with the
+light averted, approached them, whom Mr. Trumbull thus addressed:--‘Why
+were you not at worship, Job; and this Saturday at e’en?’
+
+‘Swanston was loading the JENNY, sir; and I stayed to serve out the
+article.’
+
+‘True--a work of necessity, and in the way of business. Does the JUMPING
+JENNY sail this tide?’
+
+‘Aye, aye, sir; she sails for’--
+
+‘I did not ask you WHERE she sailed for, Job,’ said the old gentleman,
+interrupting him. ‘I thank my Maker, I know nothing of their incomings
+or outgoings. I sell my article fairly and in the ordinary way of
+business; and I wash my hands of everything else. But what I wished to
+know is, whether the gentleman called the Laird of the Solway Lakes is
+on the other side of the Border even now?’
+
+‘Aye, aye,’ said Job, ‘the laird is something in my own line, you
+know--a little contraband or so, There is a statute for him--But no
+matter; he took the sands after the splore at the Quaker’s fish-traps
+yonder; for he has a leal heart, the laird, and is always true to the
+country-side. But avast--is all snug here?’
+
+So saying, he suddenly turned on Alan Fairford the light side of the
+lantern he carried, who, by the transient gleam which it threw in
+passing on the man who bore it, saw a huge figure, upwards of six
+feet high, with a rough hairy cap on his head, and a set of features
+corresponding to his bulky frame. He thought also he observed pistols at
+his belt.
+
+‘I will answer for this gentleman,’ said Mr. Trumbull; ‘he must be
+brought to speech of the laird.’
+
+‘That will be kittle steering,’ said the subordinate personage; ‘for I
+understood that the laird and his folk were no sooner on the other
+side than the land-sharks were on them, and some mounted lobsters from
+Carlisle; and so they were obliged to split and squander. There are new
+brooms out to sweep the country of them, they say; for the brush was a
+hard one; and they say there was a lad drowned;--he was not one of the
+laird’s gang, so there was the less matter.’
+
+‘Peace! prithee, peace, Job Rutledge,’ said honest, pacific Mr.
+Trumbull. ‘I wish thou couldst remember, man, that I desire to know
+nothing of your roars and splores, your brooms and brushes. I dwell here
+among my own people; and I sell my commodity to him who comes in the
+way of business; and so wash my hands of all consequences, as becomes
+a quiet subject and an honest man. I never take payment, save in ready
+money.’
+
+‘Aye, aye,’ muttered he with the lantern, ‘your worship, Mr. Trumbull,
+understands that in the way of business.’
+
+‘Well, I hope you will one day know, Job,’ answered Mr. Trumbull,--‘the
+comfort of a conscience void of offence, and that fears neither gauger
+nor collector, neither excise nor customs. The business is to pass this
+gentleman to Cumberland upon earnest business, and to procure him speech
+with the Laird of the Solway Lakes--I suppose that can be done? Now I
+think Nanty Ewart, if he sails with the brig this morning tide, is the
+man to set him forward.’
+
+‘Aye, aye, truly is he,’ said Job; ‘never man knew the Border, dale and
+fell, pasture and ploughland, better than Nanty; and he can always bring
+him to the laird, too, if you are sure the gentleman’s right. But indeed
+that’s his own look-out; for were he the best man in Scotland, and the
+chairman of the d--d Board to boot, and had fifty men at his back, he
+were as well not visit the laird for anything but good. As for Nanty, he
+is word and blow, a d--d deal fiercer than Cristie Nixon that they keep
+such a din about. I have seen them both tried, by’--
+
+Fairford now found himself called upon to say something; yet his
+feelings, upon finding himself thus completely in the power of a canting
+hypocrite, and of his retainer, who had so much the air of a determined
+ruffian, joined to the strong and abominable fume which they snuffed up
+with indifference, while it almost deprived him of respiration, combined
+to render utterance difficult. He stated, however, that he had no evil
+intentions towards the laird, as they called him, but was only the
+bearer of a letter to him on particular business, from Mr. Maxwell of
+Summertrees.
+
+‘Aye, aye,’ said Job, ‘that may be well enough; and if Mr. Trumbull is
+satisfied that the service is right, why, we will give you a cast in
+the JUMPING JENNY this tide, and Nanty Ewart will put you on a way of
+finding the laird, I warrant you.’
+
+‘I may for the present return, I presume, to the inn where I left my
+horse?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘With pardon,’ replied Mr. Trumbull, ‘you have been ower far ben with
+us for that; but Job will take you to a place where you may sleep
+rough till he calls you. I will bring you what little baggage you can
+need--for those who go on such errands must not be dainty. I will myself
+see after your horse, for a merciful man is merciful to his beast--a
+matter too often forgotten in our way of business.’
+
+‘Why, Master Trumbull,’ replied Job, ‘you know that when we are chased,
+it’s no time to shorten sail, and so the boys do ride whip and spur.’
+He stopped in his speech, observing the old man had vanished through
+the door by which he had entered--‘That’s always the way with old
+Turnpenny,’ he said to Fairford; ‘he cares for nothing of the trade but
+the profit--now, d--me, if I don’t think the fun of it is better worth
+while. But come along, my fine chap; I must stow you away in safety
+until it is time to go aboard.’
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+Fairford followed his gruff guide among a labyrinth of barrels and
+puncheons, on which he had more than once like to have broken his nose,
+and from thence into what, by the glimpse of the passing lantern upon a
+desk and writing materials, seemed to be a small office for the
+dispatch of business. Here there appeared no exit; but the smuggler, or
+smuggler’s ally, availing himself of a ladder, removed an old picture,
+which showed a door about seven feet from the ground, and Fairford,
+still following Job, was involved in another tortuous and dark passage,
+which involuntarily reminded him of Peter Peebles’s lawsuit. At the end
+of this labyrinth, when he had little guess where he had been conducted,
+and was, according to the French phrase, totally DESORIENTE, Job
+suddenly set down the lantern, and availing himself of the flame to
+light two candles which stood on the table, asked if Alan would choose
+anything to eat, recommending, at all events, a slug of brandy to
+keep out the night air. Fairford declined both, but inquired after his
+baggage.
+
+‘The old master will take care of that himself,’ said Job Rutledge; and
+drawing back in the direction in which he had entered, he vanished from
+the farther end of the apartment, by a mode which the candles, still
+shedding an imperfect light, gave Alan no means of ascertaining. Thus
+the adventurous young lawyer was left alone in the apartment to which he
+had been conducted by so singular a passage.
+
+In this condition, it was Alan’s first employment to survey, with some
+accuracy, the place where he was; and accordingly, having trimmed the
+lights, he walked slowly round the apartment, examining its appearance
+and dimensions. It seemed to be such a small dining-parlour as is
+usually found in the house of the better class of artisans, shopkeepers,
+and such persons, having a recess at the upper end, and the usual
+furniture of an ordinary description. He found a door, which he
+endeavoured to open, but it was locked on the outside. A corresponding
+door on the same side of the apartment admitted him into a closet, upon
+the front shelves of which were punch-bowls, glasses, tea-cups, and the
+like, while on one side was hung a horseman’s greatcoat of the coarsest
+materials, with two great horse-pistols peeping out of the pocket,
+and on the floor stood a pair of well-spattered jack-boots, the usual
+equipment of the time, at least for long journeys.
+
+Not greatly liking the contents of the closet, Alan Fairford shut the
+door, and resumed his scrutiny round the walls of the apartment, in
+order to discover the mode of Job Rutledge’s retreat. The secret passage
+was, however, too artificially concealed, and the young lawyer had
+nothing better to do than to meditate on the singularity of his present
+situation. He had long known that the excise laws had occasioned an
+active contraband trade betwixt Scotland and England, which then, as
+now, existed, and will continue to exist until the utter abolition of
+the wretched system which establishes an inequality of duties betwixt
+the different parts of the same kingdom; a system, be it said in
+passing, mightily resembling the conduct of a pugilist, who should tie
+up one arm that he might fight the better with the other. But Fairford
+was unprepared for the expensive and regular establishments by which the
+illicit traffic was carried on, and could not have conceived that the
+capital employed in it should have been adequate to the erection of
+these extensive buildings, with all their contrivances for secrecy of
+communication. He was musing on these circumstances, not without some
+anxiety for the progress of his own journey, when suddenly, as he
+lifted his eyes, he discovered old Mr. Trumbull at the upper end of the
+apartment, bearing in one hand a small bundle, in the other his dark
+lantern, the light of which, as he advanced, he directed full upon
+Fairford’s countenance.
+
+Though such an apparition was exactly what he expected, yet he did
+not see the grim, stern old man present himself thus suddenly without
+emotion; especially when he recollected, what to a youth of his pious
+education was peculiarly shocking, that the grizzled hypocrite was
+probably that instant arisen from his knees to Heaven, for the purpose
+of engaging in the mysterious transactions of a desperate and illegal
+trade.
+
+The old man, accustomed to judge with ready sharpness of the physiognomy
+of those with whom he had business, did not fail to remark something
+like agitation in Fairford’s demeanour. ‘Have ye taken the rue?’ said
+he. ‘Will ye take the sheaf from the mare, and give up the venture?’
+
+‘Never!’ said Fairford, firmly, stimulated at once by his natural
+spirit, and the recollection of his friend; ‘never, while I have life
+and strength to follow it out!’
+
+‘I have brought you,’ said Trumbull, ‘a clean shirt, and some stockings,
+which is all the baggage you can conveniently carry, and I will cause
+one of the lads lend you a horseman’s coat, for it is ill sailing or
+riding without one; and, touching your valise, it will be as safe in
+my poor house, were it full of the gold of Ophir, as if it were in the
+depth of the mine.’ ‘I have no doubt of it,’ said Fairford.
+
+‘And now,’ said Trumbull, again, ‘I pray you to tell me by what name I
+am to name you to Nanty (which is Antony) Ewart?’
+
+‘By the name of Alan Fairford,’ answered the young lawyer.
+
+‘But that,’ said Mr. Trumbull, in reply, ‘is your own proper name and
+surname.’
+
+‘And what other should I give?’ said the young man; ‘do you think I
+have any occasion for an alias? And, besides, Mr. Trumbull,’ added Alan,
+thinking a little raillery might intimate confidence of spirit, ‘you
+blessed yourself, but a little while since, that you had no acquaintance
+with those who defiled their names so far as to be obliged to change
+them.’
+
+‘True, very true,’ said Mr. Trumbull; ‘nevertheless, young man, my grey
+hairs stand unreproved in this matter; for, in my line of business, when
+I sit under my vine and my fig-tree, exchanging the strong waters of the
+north for the gold which is the price thereof, I have, I thank Heaven,
+no disguises to keep with any man, and wear my own name of Thomas
+Trumbull, without any chance that the same may be polluted. Whereas,
+thou, who art to journey in miry ways, and amongst a strange people,
+mayst do well to have two names, as thou hast two shirts, the one to
+keep the other clean.’
+
+Here he emitted a chuckling grunt, which lasted for two vibrations of
+the pendulum exactly, and was the only approach towards laughter in
+which old Turnpenny, as he was nicknamed, was ever known to indulge.
+
+‘You are witty, Mr. Trumbull,’ said Fairford; ‘but jests are no
+arguments--I shall keep my own name.’
+
+‘At your own pleasure,’ said the merchant; ‘there is but one name
+which,’ &c. &c, &c.
+
+We will not follow the hypocrite through the impious cant which he
+added, in order to close the subject.
+
+Alan followed him, in silent abhorrence, to the recess in which the
+beaufet was placed, and which was so artificially made as to conceal
+another of those traps with which the whole building abounded. This
+concealment admitted them to the same winding passage by which the young
+lawyer had been brought thither. The path which they now took amid
+these mazes, differed from the direction in which he had been guided
+by Rutledge. It led upwards, and terminated beneath a garret window.
+Trumbull opened it, and with more agility than his age promised,
+clambered out upon the leads. If Fairford’s journey had been hitherto in
+a stifled and subterranean atmosphere, it was now open, lofty, and airy
+enough; for he had to follow his guide over leads and slates, which
+the old smuggler traversed with the dexterity of a cat. It is true, his
+course was facilitated by knowing exactly where certain stepping-places
+and holdfasts were placed, of which Fairford could not so readily avail
+himself; but, after a difficult and somewhat perilous progress along
+the roofs of two or three houses, they at length descended by a skylight
+into a garret room, and from thence by the stairs into a public-house;
+for such it appeared, by the ringing of bells, whistling for waiters and
+attendance, bawling of ‘House, house, here!’ chorus of sea songs, and
+the like noises.
+
+Having descended to the second story, and entered a room there in which
+there was a light, old Mr. Trumbull rang the bell of the apartment
+thrice, with an interval betwixt each, during which he told deliberately
+the number twenty. Immediately after the third ringing the landlord
+appeared, with stealthy step, and an appearance of mystery on his buxom
+visage. He greeted Mr. Trumbull, who was his landlord as it proved, with
+great respect, and expressed some surprise at seeing him so late, as he
+termed it, ‘on Saturday e’en.’
+
+‘And I, Robin Hastie,’ said the landlord to the tenant, am more
+surprised than pleased, to hear sae muckle din in your house, Robie, so
+near the honourable Sabbath; and I must mind you that it is contravening
+the terms of your tack, whilk stipulates that you should shut your
+public on Saturday at nine o’clock, at latest.’
+
+‘Yes, sir,’ said Robin Hastie, no way alarmed at the gravity of the
+rebuke, ‘but you must take tent that I have admitted naebody but you,
+Mr. Trumbull (who by the way admitted yoursell), since nine o’clock for
+the most of the folk have been here for several hours about the lading,
+and so on, of the brig. It is not full tide yet, and I cannot put the
+men out into the street. If I did, they would go to some other public,
+and their souls would be nane the better, and my purse muckle the waur;
+for how am I to pay the rent if I do not sell the liquor?’
+
+‘Nay, then,’ said Thomas Trumbull, ‘if it is a work of necessity, and
+in the honest independent way of business, no doubt there is balm in
+Gilead. But prithee, Robin, wilt thou see if Nanty Ewart be, as is most
+likely, amongst these unhappy topers; and if so, let him step this way
+cannily, and speak to me and this young gentleman. And it’s dry talking,
+Robin--you must minister to us a bowl of punch--ye ken my gage.’
+
+‘From a mutchkin to a gallon, I ken your honour’s taste, Mr. Thomas
+Trumbull,’ said mine host; ‘and ye shall hang me over the signpost if
+there be a drap mair lemon or a curn less sugar than just suits you.
+There are three of you--you will be for the auld Scots peremptory
+pint-stoup for the success of the voyage?’ [The Scottish pint of liquid
+measure comprehends four English measures of the same denomination. The
+jest is well known of my poor countryman, who, driven to extremity by
+the raillery of the Southern, on the small denomination of the Scottish
+coin, at length answered, ‘Aye, aye! But the deil tak them that has the
+LEAST PINT-STOUP.’]
+
+‘Better pray for it than drink for it, Robin,’ said Mr. Trumbull. ‘Yours
+is a dangerous trade, Robin; it hurts mony a ane--baith host and guest.
+But ye will get the blue bowl, Robin--the blue bowl--that will sloken
+all their drouth, and prevent the sinful repetition of whipping for
+an eke of a Saturday at e’en. Aye, Robin, it is a pity of Nanty
+Ewart--Nanty likes the turning up of his little finger unco weel, and we
+maunna stint him, Robin, so as we leave him sense to steer by.’
+
+‘Nanty Ewart could steer through the Pentland Firth though he were as
+drunk as the Baltic Ocean,’ said Robin Hastie; and instantly tripping
+downstairs, he speedily returned with the materials for what he called
+his BROWST, which consisted of two English quarts of spirits, in a huge
+blue bowl, with all the ingredients for punch in the same formidable
+proportion. At the same time he introduced Mr. Antony or Nanty Ewart,
+whose person, although he was a good deal flustered with liquor,
+was different from what Fairford expected. His dress was what is
+emphatically termed the shabby genteel--a frock with tarnished lace--a
+small cocked hat, ornamented in a similar way--a scarlet waistcoat, with
+faded embroidery, breeches of the same, with silver knee-bands, and he
+wore a smart hanger and a pair of pistols in a sullied swordbelt.
+
+‘Here I come, patron,’ he said, shaking hands with Mr. Trumbull. ‘Well,
+I see you have got some grog aboard.’
+
+‘It is not my custom, Mr. Ewart,’ said the old gentleman, ‘as you well
+know, to become a chamberer or carouser thus late on Saturday at e’en;
+but I wanted to recommend to your attention a young friend of ours,
+that is going upon a something particular journey, with a letter to our
+friend the Laird from Pate-in-Peril, as they call him.’
+
+‘Aye--indeed?--he must be in high trust for so young a gentleman. I wish
+you joy, sir,’ bowing to Fairford. ‘By’r lady, as Shakespeare says, you
+are bringing up a neck for a fair end. Come, patron, we will drink to
+Mr. What-shall-call-um. What is his name? Did you tell me? And have I
+forgot it already.’
+
+‘Mr. Alan Fairford,’ said Trumbull.
+
+‘Aye, Mr. Alan Fairford--a good name for a fair trader--Mr. Alan
+Fairford; and may he be long withheld from the topmost round of
+ambition, which I take to be the highest round of a certain ladder.’
+
+While he spoke, he seized the punch-ladle, and began to fill the
+glasses. But Mr. Trumbull arrested his hand, until he had, as he
+expressed himself, sanctified the liquor by a long grace; during the
+pronunciation of which he shut indeed his eyes, but his nostrils became
+dilated, as if he were snuffing up the fragrant beverage with peculiar
+complacency.
+
+When the grace was at length over, the three friends sat down to their
+beverage, and invited Alan Fairford to partake. Anxious about his
+situation, and disgusted as he was with his company, he craved, and with
+difficulty obtained permission, under the allegation of being fatigued,
+heated, and the like, to stretch himself on a couch which was in
+the apartment, and attempted at least to procure some rest before
+high-water, when the vessel was to sail.
+
+He was at length permitted to use his freedom, and stretched himself on
+the couch, having his eyes for some time fixed on the jovial party he
+had left, and straining his ears to catch if possible a little of their
+conversation. This he soon found was to no purpose for what did actually
+reach his ears was disguised so completely by the use of cant words and
+the thieves-latin called slang, that even when he caught the words, he
+found himself as far as ever from the sense of their conversation. At
+length he fell asleep.
+
+It was after Alan had slumbered for three or four hours, that he was
+wakened by voices bidding him rise up and prepare to be jogging. He
+started up accordingly, and found himself in presence of the same party
+of boon companions; who had just dispatched their huge bowl of punch. To
+Alan’s surprise, the liquor had made but little innovation on the
+brains of men who were accustomed to drink at all hours, and in the most
+inordinate quantities. The landlord indeed spoke a little thick, and the
+texts of Mr. Thomas Trumbull stumbled on his tongue; but Nanty was one
+of those topers, who, becoming early what bon vivants term flustered,
+remain whole nights and days at the same point of intoxication; and,
+in fact, as they are seldom entirely sober, can be as rarely seen
+absolutely drunk. Indeed, Fairford, had he not known how Ewart had been
+engaged whilst he himself was asleep, would almost have sworn when he
+awoke, that the man was more sober than when he first entered the room.
+
+He was confirmed in this opinion when they descended below, where two or
+three sailors and ruffian-looking fellows awaited their commands. Ewart
+took the whole direction upon himself, gave his orders with briefness
+and precision, and looked to their being executed with the silence and
+celerity which that peculiar crisis required. All were now dismissed
+for the brig, which lay, as Fairford was given to understand, a little
+farther down the river, which is navigable for vessels of light burden
+till almost within a mile of the town.
+
+When they issued from the inn, the landlord bid them goodbye. Old
+Trumbull walked a little way with them, but the air had probably
+considerable effect on the state of his brain; for after reminding
+Alan Fairford that the next day was the honourable Sabbath, he became
+extremely excursive in an attempt to exhort him to keep it holy. At
+length, being perhaps sensible that he was becoming unintelligible, he
+thrust a volume into Fairford’s hand--hiccuping at the same time--‘Good
+book--good book--fine hymn-book--fit for the honourable Sabbath, whilk
+awaits us to-morrow morning.’ Here the iron tongue of time told
+five from the town steeple of Annan, to the further confusion of Mr.
+Trumbull’s already disordered ideas. ‘Aye? Is Sunday come and gone
+already? Heaven be praised! Only it is a marvel the afternoon is sae
+dark for the time of the year--Sabbath has slipped ower quietly, but we
+have reason to bless oursells it has not been altogether misemployed.
+I heard little of the preaching--a cauld moralist, I doubt, served that
+out--but, eh--the prayer--I mind it as if I had said the words mysell.’
+Here he repeated one or two petitions, which were probably a part of his
+family devotions, before he was summoned forth to what he called the
+way of business. ‘I never remember a Sabbath pass so cannily off in my
+life.’ Then he recollected himself a little, and said to Alan, ‘You
+may read that book, Mr. Fairford, to-morrow, all the same, though it be
+Monday; for, you see, it was Saturday when we were thegither, and now
+it’s Sunday and it’s dark night--so the Sabbath has slipped clean away
+through our fingers like water through a sieve, which abideth not; and
+we have to begin again to-morrow morning, in the weariful, base, mean,
+earthly employments, whilk are unworthy of an immortal spirit--always
+excepting the way of business.’
+
+Three of the fellows were now returning to the town, and, at Ewart’s
+command, they cut short the patriarch’s exhortation, by leading him back
+to his own residence. The rest of the party then proceeded to the brig,
+which only waited their arrival to get under weigh and drop down the
+river. Nanty Ewart betook himself to steering the brig, and the very
+touch of the helm seemed to dispel the remaining influence of the liquor
+which he had drunk, since, through a troublesome and intricate channel,
+he was able to direct the course of his little vessel with the most
+perfect accuracy and safety.
+
+Alan Fairford, for some time, availed himself of the clearness of the
+summer morning to gaze on the dimly seen shores betwixt which they
+glided, becoming less and less distinct as they receded from each other,
+until at length, having adjusted his little bundle by way of pillow, and
+wrapped around him the greatcoat with which old Trumbull had equipped
+him, he stretched himself on the deck, to try to recover the slumber out
+of which he had been awakened. Sleep had scarce begun to settle on
+his eyes, ere he found something stirring about his person. With ready
+presence of mind he recollected his situation, and resolved to show no
+alarm until the purpose of this became obvious; but he was soon relieved
+from his anxiety, by finding it was only the result of Nanty’s attention
+to his comfort, who was wrapping around him, as softly as he could, a
+great boatcloak, in order to defend him from the morning air.
+
+‘Thou art but a cockerel,’ he muttered, ‘but ‘twere pity thou wert
+knocked off the perch before seeing a little more of the sweet and sour
+of this world--though, faith, if thou hast the usual luck of it, the
+best way were to leave thee to the chance of a seasoning fever.’
+
+These words, and the awkward courtesy with which the skipper of the
+little brig tucked the sea-coat round Fairford, gave him a confidence of
+safety which he had not yet thoroughly possessed. He stretched himself
+in more security on the hard planks, and was speedily asleep, though his
+slumbers were feverish and unrefreshing.
+
+It has been elsewhere intimated that Alan Fairford inherited from his
+mother a delicate constitution, with a tendency to consumption; and,
+being an only child, with such a cause for apprehension, care, to the
+verge of effeminacy, was taken to preserve him from damp beds, wet
+feet, and those various emergencies to which the Caledonian boys of much
+higher birth, but more active habits, are generally accustomed. In man,
+the spirit sustains the constitutional weakness, as in the winged
+tribes the feathers bear aloft the body. But there is a bound to these
+supporting qualities; and as the pinions of the bird must at length grow
+weary, so the VIS ANIMI of the human struggler becomes broken down by
+continued fatigue.
+
+When the voyager was awakened by the light of the sun now riding high
+in heaven, he found himself under the influence of an almost intolerable
+headache, with heat, thirst, shooting across the back and loins, and
+other symptoms intimating violent cold, accompanied with fever. The
+manner in which he had passed the preceding day and night, though
+perhaps it might have been of little consequence to most young men, was
+to him, delicate in constitution and nurture, attended with bad and even
+perilous consequences. He felt this was the case, yet would fain have
+combated the symptoms of indisposition, which, indeed, he imputed
+chiefly to sea-sickness. He sat up on deck, and looked on the scene
+around, as the little vessel, having borne down the Solway Firth, was
+beginning, with a favourable northerly breeze, to bear away to the
+southward, crossing the entrance of the Wampool river, and preparing to
+double the most northerly point of Cumberland.
+
+But Fairford felt annoyed with deadly sickness, as well as by pain of
+a distressing and oppressive character; and neither Criffel, rising in
+majesty on the one hand, nor the distant yet more picturesque outline of
+Skiddaw and Glaramara upon the other, could attract his attention in
+the manner in which it was usually fixed by beautiful scenery, and
+especially that which had in it something new as well as striking. Yet
+it was not in Alan Fairford’s nature to give way to despondence, even
+when seconded by pain. He had recourse, in the first place, to his
+pocket; but instead of the little Sallust he had brought with him, that
+the perusal of a classical author might help to pass away a heavy hour,
+he pulled out the supposed hymn-book with which he had been presented
+a few hours before, by that temperate and scrupulous person, Mr. Thomas
+Trumbull, ALIAS Turnpenny. The volume was bound in sable, and its
+exterior might have become a psalter. But what was Alan’s astonishment
+to read on the title page the following words:--‘Merry Thoughts for
+Merry Men; or Mother Midnight’s Miscellany for the Small Hours;’ and
+turning over the leaves, he was disgusted with profligate tales, and
+more profligate songs, ornamented with figures corresponding in infamy
+with the letterpress.
+
+‘Good God!’ he thought, ‘and did this hoary reprobate summon his family
+together, and, with such a disgraceful pledge of infamy in his bosom,
+venture to approach the throne of his Creator? It must be so; the book
+is bound after the manner of those dedicated to devotional subjects,
+and doubtless the wretch, in his intoxication, confounded the books
+he carried with him, as he did the days of the week.’ Seized with the
+disgust with which the young and generous usually regard the vices of
+advanced life, Alan, having turned the leaves of the book over in hasty
+disdain, flung it from him, as far as he could, into the sea. He then
+had recourse to the Sallust, which he had at first sought for in vain.
+As he opened the book, Nanty Ewart, who had been looking over his
+shoulder, made his own opinion heard.
+
+‘I think now, brother, if you are so much scandalized at a little piece
+of sculduddery, which, after all, does nobody any harm, you had better
+have given it to me than have flung it into the Solway.’
+
+‘I hope, sir,’ answered Fairford, civilly, ‘you are in the habit of
+reading better books.’
+
+‘Faith,’ answered Nanty, ‘with help of a little Geneva text, I could
+read my Sallust as well as you can;’ and snatching the book from Alan’s
+hand, he began to read, in the Scottish accent:--“‘IGITUR EX DIVITIIS
+JUVENTUTEM LUXURIA ATQUE AVARITIA CUM SUPERBILI INVASERE: RAPERE,
+CONSUMERE; SUA PARVI PENDERE, ALIENA CUPERE; PUDOREM, AMICITIAM,
+PUDICITIAM, DIVINA ATQUE HUMANA PROMISCUA, NIHIL PENSI NEQUE MODERATI
+HABERE.” [The translation of the passage is thus given by Sir Henry
+Steuart of Allanton:--‘The youth, taught to look up to riches as the
+sovereign good, became apt pupils in the school of Luxury. Rapacity and
+profusion went hand in hand. Careless of their own fortunes, and eager
+to possess those of others, shame and remorse, modesty and moderation,
+every principle gave way.’--WORKS OF SALLUST, WITH ORIGINAL ESSAYS, vol.
+ii. p.17.]--There is a slap in the face now, for an honest fellow that
+has been buccaneering! Never could keep a groat of what he got, or hold
+his fingers from what belonged to another, said you? Fie, fie, friend
+Crispus, thy morals are as crabbed and austere as thy style--the one has
+as little mercy as the other has grace. By my soul, it is unhandsome
+to make personal reflections on an old acquaintance, who seeks a little
+civil intercourse with you after nigh twenty years’ separation. On my
+soul, Master Sallust deserves to float on the Solway better than Mother
+Midnight herself.’
+
+‘Perhaps, in some respects, he may merit better usage at our hands,’
+said Alan; ‘for if he has described vice plainly, it seems to have been
+for the purpose of rendering it generally abhorred.’
+
+‘Well,’ said the seaman, ‘I have heard of the Sortes Virgilianae, and
+I dare say the Sortes Sallustianae are as true every tittle. I have
+consulted honest Crispus on my own account, and have had a cuff for
+my pains. But now see, I open the book on your behalf, and behold
+what occurs first to my eye!--Lo you there--“CATILINA ... OMNIUM
+FLAGITIOSORUM ATQUE FACINOROSORUM CIRCUM SE HABEBAT.” And then
+again--“ETIAM SI QUIS A CULPA VACUUS IN AMICITIAM EJUS INCIDIDERAT
+QUOTIDIANO USU PAR SIMILISQUE CAETERIS EFFICIEBATUR.” [After enumerating
+the evil qualities of Catiline’s associates, the author adds, ‘If it
+happened that any as yet uncontaminated by vice were fatally drawn into
+his friendship, the effects of intercourse and snares artfully
+spread, subdued every scruple, and early assimilated them to their
+conductors.’--Ibidem, p. 19.] That is what I call plain speaking on the
+part of the old Roman, Mr. Fairford. By the way, that is a capital name
+for a lawyer.
+
+‘Lawyer as I am,’ said Fairford, ‘I do not understand your innuendo.’
+
+‘Nay, then,’ said Ewart, ‘I can try it another way, as well as the
+hypocritical old rascal Turnpenny himself could do. I would have you to
+know that I am well acquainted with my Bible-book, as well as with my
+friend Sallust.’ He then, in a snuffling and canting tone, began to
+repeat the Scriptural text--‘“DAVID THEREFORE DEPARTED THENCE, AND WENT
+TO THE CAVE OF ADULLAM. AND EVERY ONE THAT WAS IN DISTRESS, AND EVERY
+ONE THAT WAS IN DEBT, AND EVERY ONE THAT WAS DISCONTENTED, GATHERED
+THEMSELVES TOGETHER UNTO HIM, AND HE BECAME A CAPTAIN OVER THEM.” What
+think you of that?’ he said, suddenly changing his manner. ‘Have I
+touched you now, sir?’
+
+‘You are as far off as ever,’ replied Fairford.
+
+‘What the devil! and you a repeating frigate between Summertrees and the
+laird! Tell that to the marines--the sailors won’t believe it. But you
+are right to be cautious, since you can’t say who are right, who not.
+But you look ill; it’s but the cold morning air. Will you have a can
+of flip, or a jorum of hot rumbo? or will you splice the mainbrace’
+(showing a spirit-flask). ‘Will you have a quid--or a pipe--or a
+cigar?--a pinch of snuff, at least, to clear your brains and sharpen
+your apprehension?’
+
+Fairford rejected all these friendly propositions.
+
+‘Why, then,’ continued Ewart, ‘if you will do nothing for the free
+trade, I must patronize it myself.’
+
+So saying, he took a large glass of brandy.
+
+‘A hair of the dog that bit me,’ he continued,--‘of the dog that will
+worry me one day soon; and yet, and be d--d to me for an idiot, I must
+always have hint at my throat. But, says the old catch’--Here he sang,
+and sang well--
+
+  ‘Let’s drink--let’s drink--while life we have;
+   We’ll find but cold drinking, cold drinking in the grave.
+
+All this,’ he continued, ‘is no charm against the headache. I wish I
+had anything that could do you good. Faith, and we have tea and coffee
+aboard! I’ll open a chest or a bag, and let you have some in an instant.
+You are at the age to like such catlap better than better stuff.’
+
+Fairford thanked him, and accepted his offer of tea.
+
+Nanty Ewart was soon heard calling about, ‘Break open yon chest--take
+out your capful, you bastard of a powder-monkey; we may want it again.
+No sugar? all used up for grog, say you? knock another loaf to pieces,
+can’t ye? and get the kettle boiling, ye hell’s baby, in no time at
+all!’
+
+By dint of these energetic proceedings he was in a short time able to
+return to the place where his passenger lay sick and exhausted, with a
+cup, or rather a canful, of tea; for everything was on a large scale
+on board of the JUMPING JENNY. Alan drank it eagerly, and with so much
+appearance of being refreshed that Nanty Ewart swore he would have
+some too, and only laced it, as his phrase went, with a single glass of
+brandy. [See Note 8.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+We left Alan Fairford on the deck of the little smuggling brig, in that
+disconsolate situation, when sickness and nausea, attack a heated and
+fevered frame, and an anxious mind. His share of sea-sickness, however,
+was not so great as to engross his sensations entirely, or altogether
+to divert his attention from what was passing around. If he could not
+delight in the swiftness and agility with which the ‘little frigate’
+walked the waves, or amuse himself by noticing the beauty of the
+sea-views around him, where the distant Skiddaw raised his brow, as if
+in defiance of the clouded eminence of Criffel, which lorded it over the
+Scottish side of the estuary, he had spirits and composure enough to pay
+particular attention to the master of the vessel, on whose character his
+own safety in all probability was dependent.
+
+Nanty Ewart had now given the helm to one of his people, a bald-pated,
+grizzled old fellow, whose whole life had been spent in evading
+the revenue laws, with now and then the relaxation of a few months’
+imprisonment, for deforcing officers, resisting seizures, and the like
+offences.
+
+Nanty himself sat down by Fairford, helped him to his tea, with such
+other refreshments as he could think of, and seemed in his way sincerely
+desirous to make his situation as comfortable as things admitted.
+Fairford had thus an opportunity to study his countenance and manners
+more closely.
+
+It was plain, Ewart, though a good seaman, had not been bred upon that
+element. He was a reasonably good scholar, and seemed fond of showing it
+by recurring to the subject of Sallust and Juvenal; while, on the other
+hand, sea-phrases seldom chequered his conversation. He had been in
+person what is called a smart little man; but the tropical sun had burnt
+his originally fair complexion to a dusty red; and the bile which was
+diffused through his system, had stained it with a yellowish black--what
+ought to have been the white part of his eyes, in particular, had a hue
+as deep as the topaz. He was very thin, or rather emaciated, and his
+countenance, though still indicating alertness and activity, showed a
+constitution exhausted with excessive use of his favourite stimulus.
+
+‘I see you look at me hard,’ said he to Fairford. ‘Had you been an
+officer of the d--d customs, my terriers’ backs would have been up. He
+opened his breast, and showed Alan a pair of pistols disposed between
+his waistcoat and jacket, placing his finger at the same time upon the
+cock of one of them. ‘But come, you are an honest fellow, though you’re
+a close one. I dare say you think me a queer customer; but I can tell
+you, they that see the ship leave harbour know little of the seas she
+is to sail through. My father, honest old gentleman, never would have
+thought to see me master of the JUMPING JENNY.’
+
+Fairford said, it seemed very clear indeed that Mr. Ewart’s education
+was far superior to the line he at present occupied.
+
+‘Oh, Criffel to Solway Moss!’ said the other. Why, man, I should have
+been an expounder of the word, with a wig like a snow-wreath, and a
+stipend like--like--like a hundred pounds a year, I suppose. I can spend
+thrice as much as that, though, being such as I am. Here he sang a scrap
+of an old Northumbrian ditty, mimicking the burr of the natives of that
+county:--
+
+  ‘Willy Foster’s gone to sea,
+   Siller buckles at his knee,
+   He’ll come back and marry me--
+              Canny Willy Foster.’
+
+‘I have no doubt,’ said Fairford, ‘your present occupation is more
+lucrative; ‘but I should have thought the Church might have been more’--
+
+He stopped, recollecting that it was not his business to say anything
+disagreeable.
+
+‘More respectable, you mean, I suppose?’ said Ewart, with a sneer, and
+squirting the tobacco-juice through his front teeth; then was silent for
+a moment, and proceeded in a tone of candour which some internal touch
+of conscience dictated. ‘And so it would, Mr. Fairford--and happier,
+too, by a thousand degrees--though I have had my pleasures too. But
+there was my father (God bless the old man!) a true chip of the old
+Presbyterian block, walked his parish like a captain on the quarterdeck,
+and was always ready to do good to rich and poor--Off went the laird’s
+hat to the minister, as fast as the poor man’s bonnet. When the eye saw
+him--Pshaw! what have I to do with that now?--Yes, he was, as Virgil
+hath it, “VIR SAPIENTIA ET PIETATE GRAVIS.” But he might have been the
+wiser man, had he kept me at home, when he sent me at nineteen to study
+Divinity at the head of the highest stair in the Covenant Close. It
+was a cursed mistake in the old gentleman. What though Mrs. Cantrips of
+Kittlebasket (for she wrote herself no less) was our cousin five
+times removed, and took me on that account to board and lodging at six
+shillings instead of seven shillings a week? it was a d--d bad saving,
+as the case proved. Yet her very dignity might have kept me in order;
+for she never read a chapter excepting out of a Cambridge Bible, printed
+by Daniel, and bound in embroidered velvet. I think I see it at this
+moment! And on Sundays, when we had a quart of twopenny ale, instead
+of butter-milk, to our porridge, it was always served up in a silver
+posset-dish. Also she used silver-mounted spectacles, whereas even my
+father’s were cased in mere horn. These things had their impression at
+first, but we get used to grandeur by degrees. Well, sir!--Gad, I can
+scarce get on with my story--it sticks in my throat--must take a trifle
+to wash it down. Well, this dame had a daughter--Jess Cantrips, a
+black-eyed, bouncing wench--and, as the devil would have it, there was
+the d--d five-story stair--her foot was never from it, whether I went
+out or came home from the Divinity Hall. I would have eschewed her,
+sir--I would, on my soul; for I was as innocent a lad as ever came from
+Lammermuir; but there was no possibility of escape, retreat, or flight,
+unless I could have got a pair of wings, or made use of a ladder seven
+stories high, to scale the window of my attic. It signifies little
+talking--you may suppose how all this was to end--I would have married
+the girl, and taken my chance--I would, by Heaven! for she was a pretty
+girl, and a good girl, till she and I met; but you know the old song,
+“Kirk would not let us be.” A gentleman, in my case, would have settled
+the matter with the kirk-treasurer for a small sum of money; but the
+poor stibbler, the penniless dominie, having married his cousin of
+Kittlebasket, must next have proclaimed her frailty to the whole parish,
+by mounting the throne of Presbyterian penance, and proving, as Othello
+says, “his love a whore,” in face of the whole congregation.
+
+‘In this extremity I dared not stay where I was, and so thought to go
+home to my father. But first I got Jack Radaway, a lad from the same
+parish, and who lived in the same infernal stair, to make some inquiries
+how the old gentleman had taken the matter. I soon, by way of answer,
+learned, to the great increase of my comfortable reflections, that the
+good old man made as much clamour as if such a thing as a man’s eating
+his wedding dinner without saying grace had never happened since Adam’s
+time. He did nothing for six days but cry out, “Ichabod, Ichabod, the
+glory is departed from my house!” and on the seventh he preached a
+sermon, in which he enlarged on this incident as illustrative of one of
+the great occasions for humiliation, and causes of national defection. I
+hope the course he took comforted himself--I am sure it made me ashamed
+to show my nose at home. So I went down to Leith, and, exchanging my
+hoddin grey coat of my mother’s spinning for such a jacket as this, I
+entered my name at the rendezvous as an able-bodied landsman, and
+sailed with the tender round to Plymouth, where they were fitting out
+a squadron for the West Indies. There I was put aboard the FEARNOUGHT,
+Captain Daredevil--among whose crew I soon learned to fear Satan (the
+terror of my early youth) as little as the toughest Jack on board. I had
+some qualms at first, but I took the remedy’ (tapping the case-bottle)
+‘which I recommend to you, being as good for sickness of the soul as for
+sickness of the stomach--What, you won’t?--very well, I must, then--here
+is to ye.’
+
+‘You would, I am afraid, find your education of little use in your new
+condition?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Pardon me, sir,’ resumed the captain of the JUMPING JENNY; ‘my handful
+of Latin, and small pinch of Greek, were as useless as old junk, to be
+sure; but my reading, writing and accompting, stood me in good stead,
+and brought me forward; I might have been schoolmaster--aye, and master,
+in time; but that valiant liquor, rum, made a conquest of me rather too
+often, and so, make what sail I could, I always went to leeward. We were
+four years broiling in that blasted climate, and I came back at last
+with a little prize-money. I always had thoughts of putting things to
+rights in the Covenant Close, and reconciling myself to my father. I
+found out Jack Hadaway, who was TUPTOWING away with a dozen of wretched
+boys, and a fine string of stories he had ready to regale my ears
+withal. My father had lectured on what he called “my falling away,” for
+seven Sabbaths, when, just as his parishioners began to hope that the
+course was at an end, he was found dead in his bed on the eighth Sunday
+morning. Jack Hadaway assured me, that if I wished to atone for my
+errors, by undergoing the fate of the first martyr, I had only to go
+to my native village, where the very stones of the street would rise
+up against me as my father’s murderer. Here was a pretty item--well, my
+tongue clove to my mouth for an hour, and was only able at last to
+utter the name of Mrs. Cantrips. Oh, this was a new theme for my Job’s
+comforter. My sudden departure--my father’s no less sudden death--had
+prevented the payment of the arrears of my board and lodging--the
+landlord was a haberdasher, with a heart as rotten as the muslin
+wares he dealt in. Without respect to her age or gentle kin, my Lady
+Kittlebasket was ejected from her airy habitation--her porridge-pot,
+silver posset-dish, silver-mounted spectacles, and Daniel’s Cambridge
+Bible, sold, at the Cross of Edinburgh, to the caddie who would bid
+highest for them, and she herself driven to the workhouse, where she got
+in with difficulty, but was easily enough lifted out, at the end of the
+month, as dead as her friends could desire. Merry tidings this to me,
+who had been the d----d’ (he paused a moment) ‘ORIGO MALI--Gad, I think
+my confession would sound better in Latin than in English!
+
+‘But the best jest was behind--I had just power to stammer out something
+about Jess--by my faith he HAD an answer! I had taught Jess one trade,
+and, like a prudent girl, she had found out another for herself;
+unluckily, they were both contraband, and Jess Cantrips, daughter of the
+Lady Kittlebasket, had the honour to be transported to the plantations,
+for street-walking and pocket-picking, about six months before I touched
+shore.’
+
+He changed the bitter tone of affected pleasantry into an attempt to
+laugh, then drew his swarthy hand across his swarthy eyes, and said in a
+more natural accent, ‘Poor Jess!’
+
+There was a pause--until Fairford, pitying the poor man’s state of mind,
+and believing he saw something in him that, but for early error and
+subsequent profligacy, might have been excellent and noble, helped on
+the conversation by asking, in a tone of commiseration, how he had been
+able to endure such a load of calamity.
+
+‘Why, very well,’ answered the seaman; ‘exceedingly well--like a tight
+ship in a brisk gale. Let me recollect. I remember thanking Jack, very
+composedly, for the interesting and agreeable communication; I then
+pulled out my canvas pouch, with my hoard of moidores, and taking out
+two pieces, I bid Jack keep the rest till I came back, as I was for a
+cruise about Auld Reekie. The poor devil looked anxiously, but I shook
+him by the hand, and ran downstairs, in such confusion of mind, that
+notwithstanding what I had heard, I expected to meet Jess at every
+turning.
+
+It was market-day, and the usual number of rogues and fools were
+assembled at the Cross. I observed everybody looked strange on me, and I
+thought some laughed. I fancy I had been making queer faces enough, and
+perhaps talking to myself, When I saw myself used in this manner, I held
+out my clenched fists straight before me, stooped my head, and, like a
+ram when he makes his race, darted off right down the street, scattering
+groups of weatherbeaten lairds and periwigged burgesses, and bearing
+down all before me. I heard the cry of “Seize the madman!” echoed, in
+Celtic sounds, from the City Guard, with “Ceaze ta matman!”--but pursuit
+and opposition were in vain. I pursued my career; the smell of the sea,
+I suppose, led me to Leith, where, soon after, I found myself walking
+very quietly on the shore, admiring the tough round and sound cordage
+of the vessels, and thinking how a loop, with a man at the end of one of
+them, would look, by way of tassel.
+
+‘I was opposite to the rendezvous, formerly my place of refuge--in
+I bolted--found one or two old acquaintances, made half a dozen
+new ones--drank for two days--was put aboard the tender--off to
+Portsmouth--then landed at the Haslar hospital in a fine hissing-hot
+fever. Never mind--I got better--nothing can kill me--the West Indies
+were my lot again, for since I did not go where I deserved in the
+next world, I had something as like such quarters as can be had in
+this--black devils for inhabitants--flames and earthquakes, and so
+forth, for your element. Well, brother, something or other I did or
+said--I can’t tell what--How the devil should I, when I was as drunk
+as David’s sow, you know? But I was punished, my lad--made to kiss the
+wench that never speaks but when she scolds, and that’s the gunner’s
+daughter, comrade. Yes, the minister’s son of no matter where--has the
+cat’s scratch on his back! This roused me, and when we were ashore with
+the boat, I gave three inches of the dirk, after a stout tussle, to the
+fellow I blamed most, and took the bush for it. There were plenty of
+wild lads then along shore--and, I don’t care who knows--I went on the
+account, look you--sailed under the black flag and marrow-bones--was a
+good friend to the sea, and an enemy to all that sailed on it.’
+
+Fairford, though uneasy in his mind at finding himself, a lawyer, so
+close to a character so lawless, thought it best, nevertheless, to put a
+good face on the matter, and asked Mr. Ewart, with as much unconcern as
+he could assume, ‘whether he was fortunate as a rover?’
+
+‘No, no--d--n it, no,’ replied Nanty; ‘the devil a crumb of butter was
+ever churned that would stick upon my bread. There was no order among
+us--he that was captain to-day, was swabber to-morrow; and as for
+plunder--they say old Avery, and one or two close hunks, made money; but
+in my time, all went as it came; and reason good, for if a fellow had
+saved five dollars, his throat would have been cut in his hammock. And
+then it was a cruel, bloody work.--Pah,--we’ll say no more about it.
+I broke with them at last, for what they did on board of a bit of a
+snow--no matter what it was bad enough, since it frightened me--I took
+French leave, and came in upon the proclamation, so I am free of all
+that business. And here I sit, the skipper of the JUMPING JENNY--a
+nutshell of a thing, but goes through the water like a dolphin. If it
+were not for yon hypocritical scoundrel at Annan, who has the best end
+of the profit, and takes none of the risk, I should be well enough--as
+well as I want to be. Here is no lack of my best friend,’--touching his
+case-bottle;--‘but, to tell you a secret, he and I have got so used to
+each other, I begin to think he is like a professed joker, that makes
+your sides sore with laughing if you see him but now and then; but if
+you take up house with him, he can only make your head stupid. But I
+warrant the old fellow is doing the best he can for me, after all.’
+
+‘And what may that be?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘He is KILLING me,’ replied Nanty Ewart; ‘and I am only sorry he is so
+long about it.’
+
+So saying he jumped on his feet, and, tripping up and down the deck,
+gave his orders with his usual clearness and decision, notwithstanding
+the considerable quantity of spirits which he had contrived to swallow
+while recounting his history.
+
+Although far from feeling well, Fairford endeavoured to rouse himself
+and walk to the head of the brig, to enjoy the beautiful prospect, as
+well as to take some note of the course which the vessel held. To his
+great surprise, instead of standing across to the opposite shore
+from which she had departed, the brig was going down the Firth, and
+apparently steering into the Irish Sea. He called to Nanty Ewart, and
+expressed his surprise at the course they were pursuing, and asked
+why they did not stand straight across the Firth for some port in
+Cumberland.
+
+‘Why, this is what I call a reasonable question, now,’ answered Nanty;
+‘as if a ship could go as straight to its port as a horse to the stable,
+or a free-trader could sail the Solway as securely as a King’s cutter!
+Why, I’ll tell ye, brother--if I do not see a smoke on Bowness, that
+is the village upon the headland yonder, I must stand out to sea for
+twenty-four hours at least, for we must keep the weather-gage if there
+are hawks abroad.’
+
+‘And if you do see the signal of safety, Master Ewart, what is to be
+done then?’
+
+‘Why then, and in that case, I must keep off till night, and then run
+you, with the kegs and the rest of the lumber, ashore at Skinburness,’
+
+‘And then I am to meet with this same laird whom I have the letter for?’
+continued Fairford.
+
+‘That,’ said Ewart, ‘is thereafter as it may be; the ship has its
+course--the fair trader has his port--but it is not easy to say where
+the laird may be found. But he will be within twenty miles of us, off or
+on--and it will be my business to guide you to him.’
+
+Fairford could not withstand the passing impulse of terror which crossed
+him, when thus reminded that he was so absolutely in the power of a man,
+who, by his own account, had been a pirate, and who was at present, in
+all probability, an outlaw as well as a contraband trader. Nanty Ewart
+guessed the cause of his involuntary shuddering.
+
+‘What the devil should I gain,’ he said, ‘by passing so poor a card as
+you are? Have I not had ace of trumps in my hand, and did I not play it
+fairly? Aye, I say the JUMPING JENNY can run in other ware as well as
+kegs. Put SIGMA and TAU to Ewart, and see how that will spell--D’ye take
+me now?’
+
+‘No indeed,’ said Fairford; ‘I am utterly ignorant of what you allude
+to.’
+
+‘Now, by Jove!’ said Nanty Ewart, ‘thou art either the deepest or the
+shallowest fellow I ever met with--or you are not right after all. I
+wonder where Summertrees could pick up such a tender along-shore. Will
+you let me see his letter?’
+
+Fairford did not hesitate to gratify his wish, which, he was aware, he
+could not easily resist. The master of the JUMPING JENNY looked at
+the direction very attentively, then turned the letter to and fro, and
+examined each flourish of the pen, as if he were judging of a piece
+of ornamented manuscript; then handled it back to Fairford, without a
+single word of remark.
+
+‘Am I right now?’ said the young lawyer.
+
+‘Why, for that matter,’ answered Nanty, ‘the letter is right, sure
+enough; but whether you are right or not, is your own business rather
+than mine.’ And, striking upon a flint with the back of a knife, he
+kindled a cigar as thick as his finger, and began to smoke away with
+great perseverance.
+
+Alan Fairford continued to regard him with a melancholy feeling, divided
+betwixt the interest he took in the unhappy man, and a not unnatural
+apprehension for the issue of his own adventure.
+
+Ewart, notwithstanding the stupefying nature of his pastime, seemed
+to guess what was working in his passenger’s mind; for, after they had
+remained some time engaged in silently observing each other, he suddenly
+dashed his cigar on the deck, and said to him, ‘Well then, if you are
+sorry for me, I am sorry for you. D--n me, if I have cared a button for
+man or mother’s son, since two years since when I had another peep of
+Jack Hadaway. ‘The fellow was got as fat as a Norway whale--married to a
+great Dutch-built quean that had brought him six children. I believe
+he did not know me, and thought I was come to rob his house; however, I
+made up a poor face, and told him who I was. Poor Jack would have given
+me shelter and clothes, and began to tell me of the moidores that were
+in bank, when I wanted them. Egad, he changed his note when I told him
+what my life had been, and only wanted to pay me my cash and get rid
+of me. I never saw so terrified a visage. I burst out a-laughing in his
+face, told him it was all a humbug, and that the moidores were all his
+own, henceforth and for ever, and so ran off. I caused one of our people
+send him a bag of tea and a keg of brandy, before I left--poor Jack!
+I think you are the second person these ten years, that has cared a
+tobacco-stopper for Nanty Ewart.’
+
+‘Perhaps, Mr. Ewart,’ said Fairford, ‘you live chiefly with men too
+deeply interested for their own immediate safety, to think much upon the
+distress of others?’
+
+‘And with whom do you yourself consort, I pray?’ replied Nanty, smartly.
+‘Why, with plotters, that can make no plot to better purpose than their
+own hanging; and incendiaries, that are snapping the flint upon wet
+tinder. You’ll as soon raise the dead as raise the Highlands--you’ll as
+soon get a grunt from a dead sow as any comfort from Wales or Cheshire.
+You think because the pot is boiling, that no scum but yours can come
+uppermost--I know better, by--. All these rackets and riots that you
+think are trending your way have no relation at all to your interest;
+and the best way to make the whole kingdom friends again at once, would
+be the alarm of such an undertaking as these mad old fellows are trying
+to launch into.
+
+‘I really am not in such secrets as you seem to allude to,’ said
+Fairford; and, determined at the same time to avail himself as far as
+possible of Nanty’s communicative disposition, he added, with a smile,’
+And if I were, I should not hold it prudent to make them much the
+subject of conversation. But I am sure, so sensible a man as Summertrees
+and the laird may correspond together without offence to the state.’
+
+‘I take you, friend--I take you,’ said Nanty Ewart, upon whom, at
+length, the liquor and tobacco-smoke began to make considerable
+innovation. ‘As to what gentlemen may or may not correspond about, why
+we may pretermit the question, as the old professor used to say at the
+Hall; and as to Summertrees, I will say nothing, knowing him to be an
+old fox. But I say that this fellow the laird is a firebrand in the
+country; that he is stirring up all the honest fellows who should be
+drinking their brandy quietly, by telling them stories about their
+ancestors and the Forty-five; and that he is trying to turn all waters
+into his own mill-dam, and to set his sails to all winds. And because
+the London people are roaring about for some pinches of their own,
+he thinks to win them to his turn with a wet finger. And he gets
+encouragement from some, because they want a spell of money from him;
+and from others, because they fought for the cause once and are ashamed
+to go back; and others, because they have nothing to lose; and others,
+because they are discontented fools. But if he has brought you, or any
+one, I say not whom, into this scrape, with the hope of doing any good,
+he’s a d--d decoy-duck, and that’s all I can say for him; and you are
+geese, which is worse than being decoy-ducks, or lame-ducks either.
+And so here is to the prosperity of King George the Third, and the true
+Presbyterian religion, and confusion to the Pope, the Devil, and the
+Pretender! I’ll tell you what, Mr. Fairbairn, I am but tenth owner of
+this bit of a craft, the JUMPING JENNY--but tenth owner and must sail
+her by my owners’ directions. But if I were whole owner, I would not
+have the brig be made a ferry-boat for your Jacobitical, old-fashioned
+Popish riff-raff, Mr. Fairport--I would not, by my soul; they should
+walk the plank, by the gods, as I have seen better men do when I sailed
+under the What-d’ye-callum colours. But being contraband goods, and on
+board my vessel, and I with my sailing orders in my hand, why, I am to
+forward them as directed--I say, John Roberts, keep her up a bit with
+the helm.--and so, Mr. Fairweather, what I do is--as the d--d villain
+Turnpenny says--all in the way of business.’
+
+He had been speaking with difficulty for the last five minutes, and
+now at length dropped on the deck, fairly silenced by the quantity of
+spirits which he had swallowed, but without having showed any glimpse of
+the gaiety, or even of the extravagance, of intoxication.
+
+The old sailor stepped forward and flung a sea-cloak over the
+slumberer’s shoulders, and added, looking at Fairford, ‘Pity of him he
+should have this fault; for without it, he would have been as clever a
+fellow as ever trod a plank with ox leather.’
+
+‘And what are we to do now?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Stand off and on, to be sure, till we see the signal, and then obey
+orders.’
+
+So saying, the old man turned to his duty, and left the passenger to
+amuse himself with his own meditations. Presently afterward a light
+column of smoke was seen rising from the little headland.
+
+‘I can tell you what we are to do now, master,’ said the sailor. ‘We’ll
+stand out to sea, and then run in again with the evening tide, and
+make Skinburness; or, if there’s not light, we can run into the
+Wampool river, and put you ashore about Kirkbride or Leaths, with the
+long-boat.’
+
+Fairford, unwell before, felt this destination condemned him to an agony
+of many hours, which his disordered stomach and aching head were ill
+able to endure. There was no remedy, however, but patience, and the
+recollection that he was suffering in the cause of friendship. As the
+sun rose high, he became worse; his sense of smell appeared to acquire
+a morbid degree of acuteness, for the mere purpose of inhaling and
+distinguishing all the various odours with which he was surrounded, from
+that of pitch to all the complicated smells of the hold. His heart, too,
+throbbed under the heat, and he felt as if in full progress towards a
+high fever.
+
+The seamen, who were civil and attentive considering their calling,
+observed his distress, and one contrived to make an awning out of an
+old sail, while another compounded some lemonade, the only liquor which
+their passenger could be prevailed upon to touch. After drinking it off,
+he obtained, but could not be said to enjoy, a few hours of troubled
+slumber.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+Alan Fairford’s spirit was more ready to encounter labour than his frame
+was adequate to support it. In spite of his exertions, when he awoke,
+after five or six hours’ slumber, he found that he was so much disabled
+by dizziness in his head and pains in his limbs, that he could not raise
+himself without assistance. He heard with some pleasure that they were
+now running right for the Wampool river, and that he would be put on
+shore in a very short time. The vessel accordingly lay to, and presently
+showed a weft in her ensign, which was hastily answered by signals from
+on shore. Men and horses were seen to come down the broken path which
+leads to the shore; the latter all properly tackled for carrying their
+loading. Twenty fishing barks were pushed afloat at once, and crowded
+round the brig with much clamour, laughter, cursing, and jesting. Amidst
+all this apparent confusion there was the essential regularity. Nanty
+Ewart again walked his quarter-deck as if he had never tasted spirits
+in his life, issued the necessary orders with precision, and saw them
+executed with punctuality. In half an hour the loading of the brig was
+in a great measure disposed in the boats; in a quarter of an hour more,
+it was landed on the beach, and another interval of about the same
+duration was sufficient to distribute it on the various strings of
+packhorses which waited for that purpose, and which instantly dispersed,
+each on its own proper adventure. More mystery was observed in loading
+the ship’s boat with a quantity of small barrels, which seemed to
+contain ammunition. This was not done until the commercial customers
+had been dismissed; and it was not until this was performed that Ewart
+proposed to Alan, as he lay stunned with pain and noise, to accompany
+him ashore.
+
+It was with difficulty that Fairford could get over the side of the
+vessel, and he could not seat himself on the stern of the boat without
+assistance from the captain and his people. Nanty Ewart, who saw nothing
+in this worse than an ordinary fit of sea-sickness, applied the usual
+topics of consolation. He assured his passenger that he would be quite
+well by and by, when he had been half an hour on terra firma, and
+that he hoped to drink a can and smoke a pipe with him at Father
+Crackenthorp’s, for all that he felt a little out of the way for riding
+the wooden horse.
+
+‘Who is Father Crackenthorp?’ said Fairford, though scarcely able to
+articulate the question.
+
+‘As honest a fellow as is of a thousand,’ answered Nanty.
+
+‘Ah, how much good brandy he and I have made little of in our day! By my
+soul, Mr. Fairbird, he is the prince of skinkers, and the father of
+the free trade--not a stingy hypocritical devil like old Turnpenny
+Skinflint, that drinks drunk on other folk’s cost, and thinks it sin
+when he has to pay for it--but a real hearty old cock;--the sharks have
+been at and about him this many a day, but Father Crackenthorp knows how
+to trim his sails--never a warrant but he hears of it before the ink’s
+dry. He is BONUS SOCIUS with headborough and constable. The king’s
+exchequer could not bribe a man to inform against him. If any such
+rascal were to cast up, why, he would miss his ears next morning, or
+be sent to seek them in the Solway. He is a statesman, [A small landed
+proprietor.] though he keeps a public; but, indeed, that is only for
+convenience and to excuse his having cellarage and folk about him; his
+wife’s a canny woman--and his daughter Doll too. Gad, you’ll be in port
+there till you get round again; and I’ll keep my word with you, and
+bring you to speech of the laird.
+
+Gad, the only trouble I shall have is to get you out of the house;
+for Doll is a rare wench, and my dame a funny old one, and Father
+Crackenthorp the rarest companion! He’ll drink you a bottle of rum or
+brandy without starting, but never wet his lips with the nasty Scottish
+stuff that the canting old scoundrel Turnpenny has brought into fashion.
+He is a gentleman, every inch of him, old Crackenthorp; in his own way,
+that is; and besides, he has a share in the JUMPING JENNY, and many a
+moonlight outfit besides. He can give Doll a pretty penny, if he likes
+the tight fellow that would turn in with her for life.’
+
+In the midst of this prolonged panegyric on Father Crackenthorp, the
+boat touched the beach, the rowers backed their oars to keep her afloat,
+whilst the other fellows lumped into the surf, and, with the most rapid
+dexterity, began to hand the barrels ashore.
+
+‘Up with them higher on the beach, my hearties,’ exclaimed Nanty
+Ewart--‘High and dry--high and dry--this gear will not stand wetting.
+Now, out with our spare hand here--high and dry with him too.
+What’s that?--the galloping of horse! Oh, I hear the jingle of the
+packsaddles--they are our own folk.’
+
+By this time all the boat’s load was ashore, consisting of the little
+barrels; and the boat’s crew, standing to their arms, ranged themselves
+in front, waiting the advance of the horses which came clattering along
+the beach. A man, overgrown with corpulence, who might be distinguished
+in the moonlight panting with his own exertions, appeared at the head
+of the cavalcade, which consisted of horses linked together, and
+accommodated with packsaddles, and chains for securing the kegs which
+made a dreadful clattering.
+
+‘How now, Father Crackenthorp?’ said Ewart--‘Why this hurry with your
+horses? We mean to stay a night with you, and taste your old brandy, and
+my dame’s homebrewed. The signal is up, man, and all is right.’
+
+‘All is wrong, Captain Nanty,’ cried the man to whom he spoke; ‘and you
+are the lad that is like to find it so, unless you bundle off--there are
+new brooms bought at Carlisle yesterday to sweep the country of you and
+the like of you--so you were better be jogging inland.
+
+‘How many rogues are the officers? If not more than ten, I will make
+fight.’
+
+‘The devil you will!’ answered Crackenthorp. ‘You were better not, for
+they have the bloody-backed dragoons from Carlisle with them.’
+
+‘Nay, then,’ said Nanty, ‘we must make sail. Come, Master Fairlord,
+you must mount and ride. He does not hear me--he has fainted, I
+believe--What the devil shall I do? Father Crackenthorp, I must leave
+this young fellow with you till the gale blows out--hark ye--goes
+between the laird and the t’other old one; he can neither ride nor
+walk--I must send him up to you.’
+
+‘Send him up to the gallows!’ said Crackenthorp; ‘there is Quartermaster
+Thwacker, with twenty men, up yonder; an he had not some kindness for
+Doll, I had never got hither for a start--but you must get off, or they
+will be here to seek us, for his orders are woundy particular; and these
+kegs contain worse than whisky--a hanging matter, I take it.’
+
+‘I wish they were at the bottom of Wampool river, with them they belong
+to,’ said Nanty Ewart. ‘But they are part of cargo; and what to do with
+the poor young fellow--’
+
+‘Why, many a better fellow has roughed it on the grass with a cloak o’er
+him,’ said Crackenthorp. ‘If he hath a fever, nothing is so cooling as
+the night air.’
+
+‘Yes, he would be cold enough in the morning, no doubt; but it’s a kind
+heart and shall not cool so soon if I can help it,’ answered the captain
+of the JUMPING JENNY.
+
+‘Well, captain, an ye will risk your own neck for another man’s, why not
+take him to the old girls at Fairladies?’
+
+‘What, the Miss Arthurets! The Papist jades! But never mind; it will
+do--I have known them take in a whole sloop’s crew that were stranded on
+the sands.’
+
+‘You may run some risk, though, by turning up to Fairladies; for I tell
+you they are all up through the country.’
+
+‘Never mind--I may chance to put some of them down again,’ said Nanty,
+cheerfully. ‘Come, lads, bustle to your tackle. Are you all loaded?’
+
+‘Aye, aye, captain; we will be ready in a jiffy,’ answered the gang.
+
+‘D--n your captains! Have you a mind to have me hanged if I am taken?
+All’s hail-fellow, here.’
+
+‘A sup at parting,’ said Father Crackenthorp, extending a flask to Nanty
+Ewart.
+
+‘Not the twentieth part of a drop,’ said Nanty. ‘No Dutch courage for
+me--my heart is always high enough when there’s a chance of fighting;
+besides, if I live drunk, I should like to die sober. Here, old
+Jephson--you are the best-natured brute amongst them--get the lad
+between us on a quiet horse, and we will keep him upright, I warrant.’
+
+As they raised Fairford from the ground, he groaned heavily, and asked
+faintly where they were taking him to.
+
+‘To a place where you will be as snug and quiet as a mouse in his hole,’
+said Nanty, ‘if so be that we can get you there safely. Good-bye, Father
+Crackenthorp--poison the quartermaster, if you can.’
+
+The loaded horses then sprang forward at a hard trot, following each
+other in a line, and every second horse being mounted by a stout fellow
+in a smock frock, which served to conceal the arms with which most of
+these desperate men were provided. Ewart followed in the rear of the
+line, and, with the occasional assistance of old Jephson, kept his young
+charge erect in the saddle. He groaned heavily from time to time; and
+Ewart, more moved with compassion for his situation than might have been
+expected from his own habits, endeavoured to amuse him and comfort him,
+by some account of the place to which they were conveying him--his words
+of consolation being, however, frequently interrupted by the necessity
+of calling to his people, and many of them being lost amongst the
+rattling of the barrels, and clinking of the tackle and small chains by
+which they are secured on such occasions.
+
+‘And you see, brother, you will be in safe quarters at Fairladies--good
+old scrambling house--good old maids enough, if they were not
+Papists,--Hollo, you Jack Lowther; keep the line, can’t ye, and shut
+your rattle-trap, you broth of a--? And so, being of a good family, and
+having enough, the old lasses have turned a kind of saints, and nuns,
+and so forth. The place they live in was some sort of nun-shop long ago,
+as they have them still in Flanders; so folk call them the Vestals of
+Fairladies--that may be, or may not be; and I care not whether it be or
+no.--Blinkinsop, hold your tongue, and be d--d!--And so, betwixt great
+alms and good dinners, they are well thought of by rich and poor, and
+their trucking with Papists is looked over. There are plenty of priests,
+and stout young scholars, and such-like, about the house it’s a hive of
+them. More shame that government send dragoons out after-a few honest
+fellows that bring the old women of England a drop of brandy, and let
+these ragamuffins smuggle in as much papistry and--Hark!--was that
+a whistle? No, it’s only a plover. You, Jem Collier, keep a look-out
+ahead--we’ll meet them at the High Whins, or Brotthole bottom, or
+nowhere. Go a furlong ahead, I say, and look sharp.--These Misses
+Arthurets feed the hungry, and clothe the naked, and such-like
+acts--which my poor father used to say were filthy rags, but he dressed
+himself out with as many of them as most folk.--D--n that stumbling
+horse! Father Crackenthorp should be d--d himself for putting an honest
+fellow’s neck in such jeopardy.’
+
+Thus, and with much more to the same purpose, Nanty ran on, increasing,
+by his well-intended annoyance, the agony of Alan Fairford, who,
+tormented by a racking pain along the back and loins, which made the
+rough trot of the horse torture to him, had his aching head still
+further rended and split by the hoarse voice of the sailor, close to
+his ear. Perfectly passive, however, he did not even essay to give
+any answer; and indeed his own bodily distress was now so great and
+engrossing, that to think of his situation was impossible, even if he
+could have mended it by doing so.
+
+Their course was inland; but in what direction, Alan had no means of
+ascertaining. They passed at first over heaths and sandy downs; they
+crossed more than one brook, or beck, as they are called in that
+country--some of them of considerable depth--and at length reached
+a cultivated country, divided, according to the English fashion of
+agriculture, into very small fields or closes, by high banks, overgrown
+with underwood, and surmounted by hedge-row trees, amongst which winded
+a number of impracticable and complicated lanes, where the boughs
+projecting from the embankments on each side, intercepted the light of
+the moon, and endangered the safety of the horsemen. But through this
+labyrinth the experience of the guides conducted them without a blunder,
+and without even the slackening of their pace. In many places, however,
+it was impossible for three men to ride abreast; and therefore the
+burden of supporting Alan Fairford fell alternately to old Jephson
+and to Nanty; and it was with much difficulty that they could keep him
+upright in his saddle.
+
+At length, when his powers of sufferance were quite worn out, and he was
+about to implore them to leave him to his fate in the first cottage or
+shed--or under a haystack or a hedge--or anywhere, so he was left at
+ease, Collier, who rode ahead, passed back the word that they were at
+the avenue to Fairladies--‘Was he to turn up?’
+
+Committing the charge of Fairford to Jephson, Nanty dashed up to the
+head of the troop, and gave his orders.--‘Who knows the house best?’
+
+‘Sam Skelton’s a Catholic,’ said Lowther.
+
+‘A d--d bad religion,’ said Nanty, of whose Presbyterian education a
+hatred of Popery seemed to be the only remnant. ‘But I am glad there is
+one amongst us, anyhow. You, Sam, being a Papist, know Fairladies and
+the old maidens I dare say; so do you fall out of the line, and wait
+here with me; and do you, Collier, carry on to Walinford bottom, then
+turn down the beck till you come to the old mill, and Goodman Grist the
+Miller, or old Peel-the-Causeway, will tell you where to stow; but I
+will be up with you before that.’
+
+The string of loaded horses then struck forward at their former pace,
+while Nanty, with Sam Skelton, waited by the roadside till the rear came
+up, when Jephson and Fairford joined them, and, to the great relief
+of the latter, they began to proceed at an easier pace than formerly,
+suffering the gang to precede them, till the clatter and clang attending
+their progress began to die away in the distance. They had not proceeded
+a pistol-shot from the place where they parted, when a short turning
+brought them in front of an old mouldering gateway, whose heavy
+pinnacles were decorated in the style of the seventeenth century, with
+clumsy architectural ornaments; several of which had fallen down from
+decay, and lay scattered about, no further care having been taken than
+just to remove them out of the direct approach to the avenue. The great
+stone pillars, glimmering white in the moonlight, had some fanciful
+resemblance to supernatural apparitions, and the air of neglect all
+around, gave an uncomfortable idea of the habitation to those who passed
+its avenue.
+
+‘There used to be no gate here,’ said Skelton, finding their way
+unexpectedly stopped.
+
+‘But there is a gate now, and a porter too,’ said a rough voice from
+within. ‘Who be you, and what do you want at this time of night?’
+
+‘We want to come to speech of the ladies--of the Misses Arthuret,’ said
+Nanty; ‘and to ask lodging for a sick man.’
+
+‘There is no speech to be had of the Miss Arthurets at this time of
+night, and you may carry your sick man to the doctor,’ answered the
+fellow from within, gruffly; ‘for as sure as there is savour in salt,
+and scent in rosemary, you will get no entrance--put your pipes up and
+be jogging on.’
+
+‘Why, Dick Gardener,’ said Skelton, ‘be thou then turned porter?’
+
+‘What, do you know who I am?’ said the domestic sharply.
+
+‘I know you, by your by-word,’ answered the other; ‘What, have you
+forgot little Sam Skelton, and the brock in the barrel?’
+
+‘No, I have not forgotten you,’ answered the acquaintance of Sam
+Skelton; ‘but my orders are peremptory to let no one up the avenue this
+night, and therefore’--
+
+‘But we are armed, and will not be kept back,’ said Nanty. ‘Hark ye,
+fellow, were it not better for you to take a guinea and let us in, than
+to have us break the door first, and thy pate afterwards? for I won’t
+see my comrade die at your door be assured of that.’
+
+‘Why, I dunna know,’ said the fellow; ‘but what cattle were those that
+rode by in such hurry?’
+
+‘Why, some of our folk from Bowness, Stoniecultrum, and thereby,’
+answered Skelton; ‘Jack Lowther, and old Jephson, and broad Will
+Lamplugh, and such like.’
+
+‘Well,’ said Dick Gardener, ‘as sure as there is savour in salt, and
+scent in rosemary, I thought it had been the troopers from Carlisle and
+Wigton, and the sound brought my heart to my mouth.’
+
+‘Had thought thou wouldst have known the clatter of a cask from the
+clash of a broadsword, as well as e’er a quaffer in Cumberland,’ said
+Skelton.
+
+‘Come, brother, less of your jaw and more of your legs, if you please,’
+said Nanty; ‘every moment we stay is a moment lost. Go to the ladies,
+and tell them that Nanty Ewart, of the JUMPING JENNY, has brought
+a young gentleman, charged with letters from Scotland to a certain
+gentleman of consequence in Cumberland--that the soldiers are out, and
+the gentleman is very ill and if he is not received at Fairladies he
+must be left either to die at the gate, or to be taken, with all his
+papers about him, by the redcoats.’
+
+Away ran Dick Gardener with this message; and, in a few minutes, lights
+were seen to flit about, which convinced Fairford, who was now, in
+consequence of the halt, a little restored to self-possession, that they
+were traversing the front of a tolerably large mansion-house.
+
+‘What if thy friend, Dick Gardener, comes not back again?’ said Jephson
+to Skelton.
+
+‘Why, then,’ said the person addressed, ‘I shall owe him just such a
+licking as thou, old Jephson, had from Dan Cooke, and will pay as duly
+and truly as he did.’
+
+The old man was about to make an angry reply, when his doubts were
+silenced by the return of Dick Gardener, who announced that Miss
+Arthuret was coming herself as far as the gateway to speak with them.
+
+Nanty Ewart cursed in a low tone the suspicions of old maids and the
+churlish scruples of Catholics, that made so many obstacles to helping
+a fellow creature, and wished Miss Arthuret a hearty rheumatism or
+toothache as the reward of her excursion; but the lady presently
+appeared, to cut short further grumbling. She was attended by a
+waiting-maid with a lantern, by means of which she examined the party
+on the outside, as closely as the imperfect light, and the spars of the
+newly-erected gate, would permit.
+
+‘I am sorry we have disturbed you so late, Madam Arthuret,’ said Nanty;
+‘but the case is this’--
+
+‘Holy Virgin,’ said she, ‘why do you speak so loud? Pray, are you not
+the captain of the SAINTE GENEVIEVE?’
+
+‘Why, aye, ma’am,’ answered Ewart, ‘they call the brig so at Dunkirk,
+sure enough; but along shore here, they call her the JUMPING JENNY.’
+
+‘You brought over the holy Father Buonaventure, did you not?’
+
+‘Aye, aye, madam, I have brought over enough of them black cattle,’
+answered Nanty. ‘Fie! fie! friend,’ said Miss Arthuret; ‘it is a pity
+that the saints should commit these good men to a heretic’s care.’
+
+‘Why, no more they would, ma’am,’ answered Nanty, ‘could they find a
+Papist lubber that knew the coast as I do; then I am trusty as steel
+to owners, and always look after cargo--live lumber, or dead flesh,
+or spirits, all is one to me; and your Catholics have such d--d large
+hoods, with pardon, ma’am, that they can sometimes hide two faces under
+them. But here is a gentleman dying, with letters about him from the
+Laird of Summertrees to the Laird of the Lochs, as they call him, along
+Solway, and every minute he lies here is a nail in his coffin.’
+
+‘Saint Mary! what shall we do?’ said Miss Arthuret; ‘we must admit him,
+I think, at all risks. You, Richard Gardener, help one of these men to
+carry the gentleman up to the Place; and you, Selby, see him lodged at
+the end of the long gallery. You are a heretic, captain, but I think you
+are trusty, and I know you have been trusted--but if you are imposing on
+me’--
+
+‘Not I, madam--never attempt to impose on ladies of your experience--my
+practice that way has been all among the young ones. Come, cheerly, Mr.
+Fairford--you will be taken good care of--try to walk.’
+
+Alan did so; and, refreshed by his halt, declared himself able to walk
+to the house with the sole assistance of the gardener.
+
+‘Why, that’s hearty. Thank thee, Dick, for lending him thine arm’--and
+Nanty slipped into his hand the guinea he had promised.--‘Farewell,
+then, Mr. Fairford, and farewell, Madam Arthuret, for I have been too
+long here.’
+
+So saying, he and his two companions threw themselves on horseback, and
+went off at a gallop. Yet, even above the clatter of their hoofs did the
+incorrigible Nanty hollo out the old ballad--
+
+  A lovely lass to a friar came,
+  To confession a-morning early;--
+  ‘In what, my dear, are you to blame?
+  Come tell me most sincerely?’
+  ‘Alas!  my fault I dare not name--
+  But my lad he loved me dearly.’
+
+‘Holy Virgin!’ exclaimed Miss Seraphina, as the unhallowed sounds
+reached her ears; ‘what profane heathens be these men, and what frights
+and pinches we be put to among them! The saints be good to us, what a
+night has this been!--the like never seen at Fairladies. Help me to make
+fast the gate, Richard, and thou shalt come down again to wait on it,
+lest there come more unwelcome visitors--Not that you are unwelcome,
+young gentleman, for it is sufficient that you need such assistance as
+we can give you, to make you welcome to Fairladies--only, another time
+would have done as well--but, hem! I dare say it is all for the best.
+The avenue is none of the smoothest, sir, look to your feet. Richard
+Gardener should have had it mown and levelled, but he was obliged to go
+on a pilgrimage to Saint Winifred’s Well, in Wales.’ (Here Dick gave
+a short dry cough, which, as if he had found it betrayed some internal
+feeling a little at variance with what the lady said, he converted into
+a muttered SANCTA WINIFREDA, ORA PRO NOBIS. Miss Arthuret, meantime,
+proceeded) ‘We never interfere with our servants’ vows or penances,
+Master Fairford--I know a very worthy father of your name, perhaps a
+relation--I say, we never interfere with our servants vows. Our Lady
+forbid they should not know some difference between our service and a
+heretic’s.--Take care, sir, you will fall if you have not a care. Alas!
+by night and day there are many stumbling-blocks in our paths!’
+
+With more talk to the same purpose, all of which tended to show a
+charitable and somewhat silly woman with a strong inclination to her
+superstitious devotion, Miss Arthuret entertained her new guest, as,
+stumbling at every obstacle which the devotion of his guide, Richard,
+had left in the path, he at last, by ascending some stone steps
+decorated on the side with griffins, or some such heraldic anomalies,
+attained a terrace extending in front of the Place of Fairladies; an
+old-fashioned gentleman’s house of some consequence, with its range of
+notched gable-ends and narrow windows, relieved by here and there an old
+turret about the size of a pepper-box. The door was locked during the
+brief absence of the mistress; a dim light glimmered through the sashed
+door of the hall, which opened beneath a huge stone porch, loaded with
+jessamine and other creepers. All the windows were dark as pitch.
+
+Miss Arthuret tapped at the door. ‘Sister, sister Angelica.’ ‘Who is
+there?’ was answered from within; ‘is it you, sister Seraphina?’
+
+‘Yes, yes, undo the door; do you not know my voice?’
+
+‘No doubt, sister,’ said Angelica, undoing bolt and bar; ‘but you know
+our charge, and the enemy is watchful to surprise us--INCEDIT SICUT LEO
+VORANS, saith the breviary. Whom have you brought here? Oh, sister, what
+have you done?’
+
+‘It is a young man,’ said Seraphina, hastening to interrupt her sister’s
+remonstrance, ‘a relation, I believe, of our worthy Father Fairford;
+left at the gate by the captain of that blessed vessel the SAINTE
+GENEVIEVE--almost dead--and charged with dispatches to ‘--
+
+She lowered her voice as she mumbled over the last words.
+
+‘Nay, then, there is no help,’ said Angelica; ‘but it is unlucky.’
+
+During this dialogue between the vestals of Fairladies, Dick Gardener
+deposited his burden in a chair, where the young lady, after a moment
+of hesitation, expressing a becoming reluctance to touch the hand of a
+stranger, put her finger and thumb upon Fairford’s wrist, and counted
+his pulse.
+
+‘There is fever here, sister,’ she said; ‘Richard must call Ambrose, and
+we must send some of the febrifuge.’
+
+Ambrose arrived presently, a plausible and respectable-looking old
+servant, bred in the family, and who had risen from rank to rank in
+the Arthuret service till he was become half-physician, half-almoner,
+half-butler, and entire governor; that is, when the Father Confessor,
+who frequently eased him of the toils of government, chanced to be
+abroad. Under the direction, and with the assistance of this venerable
+personage, the unlucky Alan Fairford was conveyed to a decent apartment
+at the end of a long gallery, and, to his inexpressible relief,
+consigned to a comfortable bed. He did not attempt to resist the
+prescription of Mr. Ambrose, who not only presented him with the
+proposed draught, but proceeded so far as to take a considerable
+quantity of blood from him, by which last operation he probably did his
+patient much service.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD, CONTINUED
+
+On the next morning, when Fairford awoke, after no very refreshing
+slumbers, in which were mingled many wild dreams of his father and of
+Darsie Latimer,--of the damsel in the green mantle and the vestals of
+Fairladies,--of drinking small beer with Nanty Ewart and being immersed
+in the Solway with the JUMPING JENNY,--he found himself in no condition
+to dispute the order of Mr. Ambrose, that he should keep his bed, from
+which, indeed, he could not have raised himself without assistance. He
+became sensible that his anxiety, and his constant efforts for some days
+past, had been too much for his health, and that, whatever might be his
+impatience, he could not proceed in his undertaking until his strength
+was re-established.
+
+In the meanwhile, no better quarters could have been found for an
+invalid. The attendants spoke under their breath, and moved only on
+tiptoe--nothing was done unless PAR ORDONNANCE DU MEDECIN. Aesculapius
+reigned paramount in the premises at Fairladies. Once a day, the ladies
+came in great state to wait upon him and inquire after his health, and
+it was then that; Alan’s natural civility, and the thankfulness which
+he expressed for their timely and charitable assistance, raised him
+considerably in their esteem. He was on the third day removed to a
+better apartment than that in which he had been at first accommodated.
+When he was permitted to drink a glass of wine, it was of the first
+quality; one of those curious old-fashioned cobwebbed bottles being
+produced on the occasion, which are only to be found in the crypts of
+old country-seats, where they may have lurked undisturbed for more than
+half a century.
+
+But however delightful a residence for an invalid, Fairladies, as
+its present inmate became soon aware, was not so agreeable to a
+convalescent. When he dragged himself to the window so soon as he could
+crawl from bed, behold it was closely grated, and commanded no view
+except of a little paved court. This was nothing remarkable, most
+old Border houses having their windows so secured. But then Fairford
+observed, that whosoever entered or left the room always locked the
+door with great care and circumspection; and some proposals which he
+made to take a walk in the gallery, or even in the garden, were so
+coldly received, both by the ladies and their prime minister, Mr.
+Ambrose, that he saw plainly such an extension of his privileges as a
+guest would not be permitted.
+
+Anxious to ascertain whether this excessive hospitality would permit
+him his proper privilege of free agency, he announced to this important
+functionary, with grateful thanks for the care with which he had been
+attended, his purpose to leave Fairladies next morning, requesting only,
+as a continuance of the favours with which he had been loaded, the
+loan of a horse to the next town; and, assuring Mr. Ambrose that his
+gratitude would not be limited by such, a trifle, he slipped three
+guineas into his hand, by way of seconding his proposal. The fingers of
+that worthy domestic closed as naturally upon the honorarium, as if a
+degree in the learned faculty had given him a right to clutch it; but
+his answer concerning Alan’s proposed departure was at first evasive,
+and when he was pushed, it amounted to a peremptory assurance that he
+could not be permitted to depart to-morrow; it was as much as his life
+was worth, and his ladies would not authorize it.
+
+‘I know best what my own life is worth,’ said Alan; ‘and I do not value
+it in comparison to the business which requires my instant attention.’
+
+Receiving still no satisfactory answer from Mr. Ambrose, Fairford
+thought it best to state his resolution to the ladies themselves, in
+the most measured, respectful, and grateful terms; but still such as
+expressed a firm determination to depart on the morrow, or next day
+at farthest. After some attempts to induce him to stay, on the alleged
+score of health, which were so expressed that he was convinced they were
+only used to delay his departure, Fairford plainly told them that he was
+entrusted with dispatches of consequence to the gentleman known by the
+name of Herries, Redgauntlet, and the Laird of the Lochs; and that it
+was matter of life and death to deliver them early.
+
+‘I dare say, Sister Angelica,’ said the elder Miss Arthuret, that the
+gentleman is honest; and if he is really a relation of Father Fairford,
+we can run no risk.’
+
+‘Jesu Maria!’ exclaimed the younger. ‘Oh, fie, Sister Seraphina! Fie,
+fie!--‘VADE RETRO--get thee behind me!’
+
+‘Well, well; but, sister--Sister Angelica--let me speak with you in the
+gallery.’
+
+So out the ladies rustled in their silks and tissues, and it was a good
+half-hour ere they rustled in again, with importance and awe on their
+countenances.
+
+‘To tell you the truth, Mr. Fairford, the cause of our desire to delay
+you is--there is a religious gentleman in this house at present’--
+
+‘A most excellent person indeed’--said the sister Angelica.
+
+‘An anointed of his Master!’ echoed Seraphina,--‘and we should be glad
+that, for conscience’ sake, you would hold some discourse with him
+before your departure.’
+
+‘Oho!’ thought Fairford, ‘the murder is out--here is a design of
+conversion! I must not affront the good ladies, but I shall soon send
+off the priest, I think.’ He then answered aloud, ‘that he should be
+happy to converse with any friend of theirs--that in religious matters
+he had the greatest respect for every modification of Christianity,
+though, he must say, his belief was made up to that in which he had
+been educated; nevertheless, if his seeing the religious person they
+recommended could in the least show his respect’--
+
+‘It is not quite that,’ said Sister Seraphina, ‘although I am sure the
+day is too short to hear him--Father Buonaventure, I mean--speak upon
+the concerns of our souls; but’--
+
+‘Come, come, Sister Seraphina,’ said the younger, ‘it is needless
+to talk so much about it. His--his Eminence--I mean Father
+Buonaventure--will himself explain what he wants this gentleman to
+know.’
+
+‘His Eminence!’ said Fairford, surprised--‘is this gentleman so high in
+the Catholic Church? The title is given only to Cardinals, I think.’
+
+‘He is not a Cardinal as yet,’ answered Seraphina; ‘but I assure you,
+Mr. Fairford, he is as high in rank as he is eminently endowed with good
+gifts, and’--
+
+‘Come away,’ said Sister Angelica. ‘Holy Virgin, how you do talk! What
+has Mr. Fairford to do with Father Buonaventure’s rank? Only, sir, you
+will remember that the Father has been always accustomed to be treated
+with the most profound deference; indeed’--
+
+‘Come away, sister,’ said Sister Seraphina, in her turn; ‘who talks now,
+I pray you? Mr. Fairford will know how to comport himself.’
+
+‘And we had best both leave the room,’ said the younger lady, ‘for here
+his Eminence comes.’
+
+She lowered her voice to a whisper as she pronounced the last words; and
+as Fairford was about to reply, by assuring her that any friend of hers
+should be treated by him with all the ceremony he could expect, she
+imposed silence on him, by holding up her finger.
+
+A solemn and stately step was now heard in the gallery; it might have
+proclaimed the approach not merely of a bishop or cardinal, but of
+the Sovereign Pontiff himself. Nor could the sound have been more
+respectfully listened to by the two ladies, had it announced that the
+Head of the Church was approaching in person. They drew themselves,
+like sentinels on duty, one on each side of the door by which the
+long gallery communicated with Fairford’s apartment, and stood there
+immovable, and with countenances expressive of the deepest reverence.
+
+The approach of Father Buonaventure was so slow, that Fairford had time
+to notice all this, and to marvel in his mind what wily and ambitious
+priest could have contrived to subject his worthy but simple-minded
+hostesses to such superstitious trammels. Father Buonaventure’s entrance
+and appearance in some degree accounted for the whole.
+
+He was a man of middle life, about forty or upwards; but either care, or
+fatigue, or indulgence, had brought on the appearance of premature
+old age, and given to his fine features a cast of seriousness or even
+sadness. A noble countenance, however, still remained; and though his
+complexion was altered, and wrinkles stamped upon his brow in many a
+melancholy fold, still the lofty forehead, the full and well-opened eye,
+and the well-formed nose, showed how handsome in better days he
+must have been. He was tall, but lost the advantage of his height
+by stooping; and the cane which he wore always in his hand, and
+occasionally used, as well as his slow though majestic gait, seemed to
+intimate that his form and limbs felt already some touch of infirmity.
+The colour of his hair could not be discovered, as, according to the
+fashion, he wore a periwig. He was handsomely, though gravely dressed in
+a secular habit, and had a cockade in his hat; circumstances which did
+not surprise Fairford, who knew that a military disguise was very often
+assumed by the seminary priests, whose visits to England, or residence
+there, subjected them to legal penalties.
+
+As this stately person entered the apartment, the two ladies facing
+inward, like soldiers on their post when about to salute a superior
+officer, dropped on either hand of the father a curtsy so profound that
+the hoop petticoats which performed the feat seemed to sink down to
+the very floor, nay, through it, as if a trap-door had opened for the
+descent of the dames who performed this act of reverence.
+
+The father seemed accustomed to such homage, profound as it was; he
+turned his person a little way first towards one sister, and then
+towards the other, while, with a gracious inclination of his person,
+which certainly did not amount to a bow, he acknowledged their curtsy.
+But he passed forward without addressing them, and seemed by doing so to
+intimate that their presence in the apartment was unnecessary.
+
+They accordingly glided out of the room, retreating backwards, with
+hands clasped and eyes cast upwards, as if imploring blessings on the
+religious man whom they venerated so highly. The door of the apartment
+was shut after them, but not before Fairford had perceived that there
+were one or two men in the gallery, and that, contrary to what he had
+before observed, the door, though shut, was not locked on the outside.
+
+‘Can the good souls apprehend danger from me to this god of their
+idolatry?’ thought Fairford. But he had no time to make further
+observations, for the stranger had already reached the middle of his
+apartment.
+
+Fairford rose to receive him respectfully, but as he fixed his eyes on
+the visitor, he thought that the father avoided his looks. His reasons
+for remaining incognito were cogent enough to account for this, and
+Fairford hastened to relieve him, by looking downwards in his turn;
+but when again he raised his face, he found the broad light eye of the
+stranger so fixed on him that he was almost put out of countenance by
+the steadiness of his gaze. During this time they remained standing.
+
+‘Take your seat, sir,’ said the father; ‘you have been an invalid.’
+
+He spoke with the tone of one who desires an inferior to be seated in
+his presence, and his voice was full and melodious.
+
+Fairford, somewhat surprised to find himself overawed by the airs of
+superiority, which could be only properly exercised towards one over
+whom religion gave the speaker influence, sat down at his bidding, as
+if moved by springs, and was at a loss how to assert the footing of
+equality on which he felt that they ought to stand. The stranger kept
+the advantage which he had obtained.
+
+‘Your name, sir, I am informed, is Fairford?’ said the father.
+
+Alan answered by a bow.
+
+‘Called to the Scottish bar,’ continued his visitor, ‘There is, I
+believe, in the West, a family of birth and rank called Fairford of
+Fairford.’
+
+Alan thought this a strange observation from a foreign ecclesiastic,
+as his name intimated Father Buonaventure to be; but only answered he
+believed there was such, a family.
+
+‘Do you count kindred with them, Mr. Fairford?’ continued the inquirer.
+
+‘I have not the honour to lay such a claim,’ said Fairford.
+
+‘My father’s industry has raised his family from a low and obscure
+situation--I have no hereditary claim to distinction of any kind. May I
+ask the cause of these inquiries?’
+
+‘You will learn it presently,’ said Father Buonaventure, who had given
+a dry and dissatisfied HEM at the young man’s acknowledging a plebeian
+descent. He then motioned to him to be silent, and proceeded with his
+queries.
+
+‘Although not of condition, you are, doubtless, by sentiments and
+education, a man of honour and a gentleman?’
+
+‘I hope so, sir,’ said Alan, colouring with displeasure. ‘I have not
+been accustomed to have it questioned.’
+
+‘Patience, young man,’ said the unperturbed querist--‘we are on serious
+business, and no idle etiquette must prevent its being discussed
+seriously. You are probably aware that you speak to a person proscribed
+by the severe and unjust laws of the present government?’
+
+‘I am aware of the statute 1700, chapter 3,’ said Alan, ‘banishing from
+the realm priests and trafficking Papists, and punishing by death, on
+summary conviction, any such person who being so banished may return.
+But I have no means of knowing you, sir, to be one of those persons; and
+I think your prudence may recommend to you to keep your own counsel.’
+
+‘It is sufficient, sir; and I have no apprehensions of disagreeable
+consequences from your having seen me in this house,’ said the priest.
+
+‘Assuredly no,’ said Alan. ‘I consider myself as indebted for my life to
+the mistresses of Fairladies; and it would be a vile requital on my
+part to pry into or make known what I may have seen or heard under
+this hospitable roof. If I were to meet the Pretender himself in such
+a situation, he should, even at the risk of a little stretch to my
+loyalty, be free from any danger from my indiscretion.’
+
+‘The Pretender!’ said the priest, with some angry emphasis; but
+immediately softened his tone and added, ‘No doubt, however, that
+person is a pretender; and some people think his pretensions are not ill
+founded. But, before running into politics, give me leave to say, that I
+am surprised to find a gentleman of your opinions in habits of intimacy
+with Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees and Mr. Redgauntlet, and the medium of
+conducting the intercourse betwixt them.’
+
+‘Pardon me, sir,’ replied Alan Fairford; ‘I do not aspire to the honour
+of being reputed their confidant or go-between. My concern with those
+gentlemen is limited to one matter of business, dearly interesting to
+me, because it concerns the safety--perhaps the life--of my dearest
+friend.’
+
+‘Would you have any objection to entrust me with the cause of your
+journey?’ said Father Buonaventure. ‘My advice may be of service to you,
+and my influence with one or both these gentlemen is considerable.’
+
+Fairford hesitated a moment, and, hastily revolving all circumstances,
+concluded that he might perhaps receive some advantage from propitiating
+this personage; while, on the other hand, he endangered nothing by
+communicating to him the occasion of his journey. He, therefore, after
+stating shortly that he hoped Mr. Buonaventure would render him the same
+confidence which he required on his part, gave a short account of Darsie
+Latimer--of the mystery which hung over his family--and of the disaster
+which had befallen him. Finally, of his own resolution to seek for his
+friend, and to deliver him, at the peril of his own life.
+
+The Catholic priest, whose manner it seemed to be to avoid all
+conversation which did not arise from his own express motion, made
+no remarks upon what he had heard, but only asked one or two abrupt
+questions, where Alan’s narrative appeared less clear to him; then
+rising from his seat, he took two turns through the apartment, muttering
+between his teeth, with emphasis, the word ‘madman!’ But apparently he
+was in the habit of keeping all violent emotions under restraint; for he
+presently addressed Fairford with the most perfect indifference.
+
+‘If,’ said he, ‘you thought you could do so without breach of
+confidence, I wish you would have the goodness to show me the letter
+of Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees. I desire to look particularly at the
+address.’
+
+Seeing no cause to decline this extension of his confidence, Alan,
+without hesitation, put the letter into his hand. Having turned it
+round as old Trumbull and Nanty Ewart had formerly done, and, like them,
+having examined the address with much minuteness, he asked whether he
+had observed these words, pointing to a pencil-writing upon the under
+side of the letter. Fairford answered in the negative, and, looking
+at the letter, read with surprise, ‘CAVE NE LITERAS BELLEROPHONTIS
+ADFERRES’; a caution which coincided so exactly with the provost’s
+admonition, that he would do well to inspect the letter of which he was
+bearer, that he was about to spring up and attempt an escape, he knew
+not wherefore, or from whom.
+
+‘Sit still, young man,’ said the father, with the same tone of authority
+which reigned in his whole manner, although mingled with stately
+courtesy. ‘You are in no danger--my character shall be a pledge for your
+safety. By whom do you suppose these words have been written?’
+
+Fairford could have answered, ‘By Nanty Ewart,’ for he remembered seeing
+that person scribble something with a pencil, although he was not well
+enough to observe with accuracy where or upon what. But not knowing
+what suspicions, or what worse consequences the seamen’s interest in his
+affairs might draw upon him, he judged it best to answer that he knew
+not the hand.
+
+Father Buonaventure was again silent for a moment or two, which he
+employed in surveying the letter with the strictest attention; then
+stepped to the window, as if to examine the address and writing of the
+envelope with the assistance of a stronger light, and Alan Fairford
+beheld him, with no less amazement than high displeasure, coolly and
+deliberately break the seal, open the letter, and peruse the contents.
+
+‘Stop, sir, hold!’ he exclaimed, so soon as his astonishment permitted
+him to express his resentment in words; ‘by what right do you dare’--
+
+‘Peace, young gentleman,’ said the father, repelling him with a wave
+of his hand; ‘be assured I do not act without warrant--nothing can pass
+betwixt Mr. Maxwell and Mr. Redgauntlet that I am not fully entitled to
+know.’
+
+‘It may be so,’ said Alan, extremely angry; ‘but though you may be these
+gentlemen’s father confessor, you are not mine; and in breaking the seal
+of a letter entrusted to my care, you have done me’--
+
+‘No injury, I assure you,’ answered the unperturbed priest; ‘on the
+contrary, it may be a service.’
+
+‘I desire no advantage at such a rate, or to be obtained in such a
+manner,’ answered Fairford; ‘restore me the letter instantly, or’--
+
+‘As you regard your own safety,’ said the priest, ‘forbear all injurious
+expressions, and all menacing gestures. I am not one who can be
+threatened or insulted with impunity; and there are enough within
+hearing to chastise any injury or affront offered to me, in case I may
+think it unbecoming to protect or avenge myself with my own hand.’
+
+In saying this, the father assumed an air of such fearlessness and calm
+authority, that the young lawyer, surprised and overawed, forbore, as he
+had intended, to snatch the letter from his hand, and confined himself
+to bitter complaints of the impropriety of his conduct, and of the light
+in which he himself must be placed to Redgauntlet should he present him
+a letter with a broken seal.
+
+‘That,’ said Father Buonaventure, ‘shall be fully cared for. I will
+myself write to Redgauntlet, and enclose Maxwell’s letter, provided
+always you continue to desire to deliver it, after perusing the
+contents.’
+
+He then restored the letter to Fairford, and, observing that he
+hesitated to peruse it, said emphatically, ‘Read it, for it concerns
+you.’
+
+This recommendation, joined to what Provost Crosbie had formerly
+recommended, and to the warning which he doubted not that Nanty intended
+to convey by his classical allusion, decided Fairford’s resolution. ‘If
+these correspondents,’ he thought, ‘are conspiring against my person,
+I have a right to counterplot them; self-preservation, as well as my
+friend’s safety, require that I should not be too scrupulous.’
+
+So thinking, he read the letter, which was in the following words:--
+
+‘DEAR RUGGED AND DANGEROUS, ‘Will you never cease meriting your old
+nick-name? You have springed your dottrel, I find, and what is the
+consequence?--why, that there will be hue and cry after you presently.
+The bearer is a pert young lawyer, who has brought a formal complaint
+against you, which, luckily, he has preferred in a friendly court.
+Yet, favourable as the judge was disposed to be, it was with the utmost
+difficulty that cousin Jenny and I could keep him to his tackle. He
+begins to be timid, suspicious, and untractable, and I fear Jenny will
+soon bend her brows on him in vain. I know not what to advise--the
+lad who carries this is a good lad--active for his friend--and I have
+pledged my honour he shall have no personal ill-usage. Pledged my
+honour, remark these words, and remember I can be rugged and dangerous
+as well, as my neighbours. But I have not ensured him against a short
+captivity, and as he is a stirring active fellow, I see no remedy but
+keeping him out of the way till this business of the good Father B----
+is safely blown over, which God send it were!--Always thine, even should
+I be once more CRAIG-IN-PERIL.’
+
+‘What think you, young man, of the danger you have been about to
+encounter so willingly?’
+
+‘As strangely,’ replied Alan Fairford, ‘as of the extraordinary means
+which you have been at present pleased to use for the discovery of Mr.
+Maxwell’s purpose.
+
+‘Trouble not yourself to account for my conduct,’ said the father; ‘I
+have a warrant for what I do, and fear no responsibility. But tell me
+what is your present purpose.’
+
+‘I should not perhaps name it to you, whose own safety may be
+implicated.’
+
+‘I understand you,’ answered the father; ‘you would appeal to the
+existing government? That can at no rate be permitted--we will rather
+detain you at Fairladies by compulsion.’
+
+‘You will probably,’ said Fairford, ‘first weigh the risk of such a
+proceeding in a free country.’
+
+‘I have incurred more formidable hazard,’ said the priest, smiling; ‘yet
+I am willing to find a milder expedient. Come; let us bring the matter
+to a compromise.’ And he assumed a conciliating graciousness of
+manner, which struck Fairford as being rather too condescending for the
+occasion; ‘I presume you will be satisfied to remain here in seclusion
+for a day or two longer, provided I pass my solemn word to you that you
+shall meet with the person whom you seek after--meet with him in perfect
+safety, and, I trust, in good health, and be afterwards both at liberty
+to return to Scotland, or dispose of yourselves as each of you may be
+minded?’
+
+‘I respect the VERBUM SACERDOTIS as much as can reasonably be expected
+from a Protestant,’ answered Fairford; ‘but methinks, you can scarce
+expect me to repose so much confidence in the word of an unknown person
+as is implied in the guarantee which you offer me.’
+
+‘I am not accustomed, sir,’ said the father, in a very haughty tone, ‘to
+have my word disputed. But,’ he added, while the angry hue passed from
+his cheek, after a moment’s reflection, ‘you know me not, and ought to
+be excused. I will repose more confidence in your honour than you seem
+willing to rest upon mine; and, since we are so situated that one must
+rely upon the other’s faith, I will cause you to be set presently at
+liberty, and furnished with the means of delivering your letter as
+addressed, provided that now, knowing the contents, you think it safe
+for yourself to execute the commission.’
+
+Alan Fairford paused. ‘I cannot see,’ he at length replied, ‘how I can
+proceed with respect to the accomplishment of my sole purpose, which is
+the liberation of my friend, without appealing to the law and obtaining
+the assistance of a magistrate. If I present this singular letter of
+Mr. Maxwell, with the contents of which I have become so unexpectedly
+acquainted, I shall only share his captivity.’
+
+‘And if you apply to a magistrate, young man, you will bring ruin on
+these hospitable ladies, to whom, in all human probability, you owe your
+life. You cannot obtain a warrant for your purpose, without giving a
+clear detail of all the late scenes through which you have passed. A
+magistrate would oblige you to give a complete account of yourself,
+before arming you with his authority against a third party; and in
+giving such an account, the safety of these ladies will necessarily be
+compromised. A hundred spies have had, and still have, their eyes
+upon this mansion; but God will protect his own.’--He crossed himself
+devoutly, and then proceeded,--‘You can take an hour to think of your
+best plan, and I will pledge myself to forward it thus far, provided
+it be not asking you to rely more on my word than your prudence can
+warrant. You shall go to Redgauntlet,--I name him plainly, to show
+my confidence in you,--and you shall deliver him this letter of Mr.
+Maxwell’s, with one from me, in which I will enjoin him to set your
+friend at liberty, or at least to make no attempts upon your own person,
+either by detention or otherwise. If you can trust me thus far,’ he
+said, with a proud emphasis on the words ‘I will on my side see you
+depart from this place with the most perfect confidence that you will
+not return armed with powers to drag its inmates to destruction. You
+are young and inexperienced--bred to a profession also which sharpens
+suspicion, and gives false views of human nature. I have seen much of
+the world, and have known better than most men how far mutual confidence
+is requisite in managing affairs of consequence.’
+
+He spoke with an air of superiority, even of authority, by which
+Fairford, notwithstanding his own internal struggles, was silenced and
+overawed so much, that it was not till the father had turned to leave
+the apartment that he found words to ask him what the consequences would
+be, should he decline to depart on the terms proposed.
+
+‘You must then, for the safety of all parties, remain for some days
+an inhabitant of Fairladies, where we have the means of detaining you,
+which self-preservation will in that case compel us to make use of. Your
+captivity will be short; for matters cannot long remain as they are. The
+cloud must soon rise, or it must sink upon us for ever. BENEDICITE!’
+
+With these words he left the apartment.
+
+Fairford, upon his departure, felt himself much at a loss what course to
+pursue. His line of education, as well as his father’s tenets in matters
+of church and state, had taught him a holy horror for Papists, and a
+devout belief in whatever had been said of the Punic faith of Jesuits,
+and of the expedients of mental reservation by which the Catholic
+priests in general were supposed to evade keeping faith with heretics.
+Yet there was something of majesty, depressed indeed and overclouded,
+but still grand and imposing, in the manner and words of Father
+Buonaventure, which it was difficult to reconcile with those
+preconceived opinions which imputed subtlety and fraud to his sect and
+order. Above all, Alan was aware that if he accepted not his freedom
+upon the terms offered him, he was likely to be detained by force; so
+that, in every point of view, he was a gainer by accepting them.
+
+A qualm, indeed, came across him, when he considered, as a lawyer, that
+this father was probably, in the eye of law, a traitor; and that there
+was an ugly crime on the Statute Book, called misprision of treason. On
+the other hand, whatever he might think or suspect, he could not take
+upon him to say that the man was a priest, whom he had never seen in the
+dress of his order, or in the act of celebrating mass; so that he felt
+himself at liberty to doubt of that respecting which he possessed no
+legal proof. He therefore arrived at the conclusion, that he would
+do well to accept his liberty, and proceed to Redgauntlet under the
+guarantee of Father Buonaventure, which he scarce doubted would be
+sufficient to save him from personal inconvenience. Should he once
+obtain speech of that gentleman, he felt the same confidence as
+formerly, that he might be able to convince him of the rashness of
+his conduct, should he not consent to liberate Darsie Latimer. At all
+events, he should learn where his friend was, and how circumstanced.
+
+Having thus made up his mind, Alan waited anxiously for the expiration
+of the hour which had been allowed him for deliberation. He was not kept
+on the tenter-hooks of impatience an instant longer than the appointed
+moment arrived, for, even as the clock struck, Ambrose appeared at the
+door of the gallery, and made a sign that Alan should follow him. He did
+so, and after passing through some of the intricate avenues common in
+old houses, was ushered into a small apartment, commodiously fitted
+up, in which he found Father Buonaventure reclining on a couch, in the
+attitude of a man exhausted by fatigue or indisposition. On a small
+table beside him, a silver embossed salver sustained a Catholic book of
+prayer, a small flask of medicine, a cordial, and a little tea-cup of
+old china. Ambrose did not enter the room--he only bowed profoundly, and
+closed the door with the least possible noise, so soon as Fairford had
+entered.
+
+‘Sit down, young man,’ said the father, with the same air of
+condescension which had before surprised, and rather offended
+Fairford. ‘You have been ill, and I know too well by my own case that
+indisposition requires indulgence. Have you,’ he continued, so soon as
+he saw him seated, ‘resolved to remain, or to depart?’
+
+‘To depart,’ said Alan, ‘under the agreement that you will guarantee my
+safety with the extraordinary person who has conducted himself in such a
+lawless manner toward my friend, Darsie Latimer.’
+
+‘Do not judge hastily, young man,’ replied the father. ‘Redgauntlet
+has the claims of a guardian over his ward, in respect to the young
+gentleman, and a right to dictate his place of residence, although he
+may have been injudicious in selecting the means by which he thinks to
+enforce his authority.’
+
+‘His situation as an attainted person abrogates such rights,’ said
+Fairford, hastily.
+
+‘Surely,’ replied the priest, smiling at the young lawyer’s readiness;
+‘in the eye of those who acknowledge the justice of the attainder--but
+that do not I. However, sir, here is the guarantee--look at its
+contents, and do not again carry the letters of Uriah.’
+
+Fairford read these words:--
+
+‘GOOD FRIEND, ‘We send you hither a young man desirous to know the
+situation of your ward, since he came under your paternal authority, and
+hopeful of dealing with you for having your relative put at large. This
+we recommend to your prudence, highly disapproving, at the same time, of
+any force or coercion when such can be avoided, and wishing, therefore,
+that the bearer’s negotiation may be successful. At all rates, however,
+the bearer hath our pledged word for his safety and freedom, which,
+therefore, you are to see strictly observed, as you value our honour and
+your own. We further wish to converse with you, with as small loss of
+time as may be, having matters of the utmost confidence to impart.
+For this purpose we desire you to repair hither with all haste, and
+thereupon we bid you heartily farewell. P. B.’
+
+‘You will understand, sir,’ said the father, when he saw that Alan had
+perused his letter, ‘that, by accepting charge of this missive, you bind
+yourself to try the effect of it before having recourse to any legal
+means, as you term them, for your friend’s release.’
+
+‘There are a few ciphers added to this letter,’ said Fairford, when he
+had perused the paper attentively,--‘may I inquire what their import
+is?’
+
+‘They respect my own affairs,’ answered the father, briefly; ‘and have
+no concern whatever with yours.’
+
+‘It seems to me, however,’ replied Alan, ‘natural to suppose’--
+
+‘Nothing must be supposed incompatible with my honour,’ replied the
+priest, interrupting him; ‘when such as I am confer favours, we expect
+that they shall be accepted with gratitude, or declined with thankful
+respect--not questioned or discussed.’
+
+‘I will accept your letter, then,’ said Fairford, after a minute’s
+consideration, ‘and the thanks you expect shall be most liberally paid,
+if the result answer what you teach me to expect.’
+
+‘God only commands the issue,’ said Father Buonaventure. ‘Man uses
+means. You understand that, by accepting this commission, you engage
+yourself in honour to try the effect of my letter upon Mr. Redgauntlet,
+before you have recourse to informations or legal warrants?’
+
+‘I hold myself bound, as a man of good faith and honour, to do so,’ said
+Fairford.
+
+‘Well, I trust you,’ said the father. ‘I will now tell you that an
+express, dispatched by me last night, has, I hear, brought Redgauntlet
+to a spot many miles nearer this place, where he will not find it safe
+to attempt any violence on your friend, should he be rash enough to
+follow the advice of Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees rather than my commands.
+We now understand each other.’
+
+He extended his hand towards Alan, who was about to pledge his faith in
+the usual form by grasping it with his own, when the father drew
+back hastily. Ere Alan had time to comment upon this repulse, a small
+side-door, covered with tapestry, was opened; the hangings were
+drawn aside, and a lady, as if by sudden apparition, glided into the
+apartment. It was neither of the Misses Arthuret, but a woman in the
+prime of life, and in the full-blown expansion of female beauty, tall,
+fair, and commanding in her aspect. Her locks, of paly gold, were taught
+to fall over a brow, which, with the stately glance of the large, open,
+blue eyes, might have become Juno herself; her neck and bosom were
+admirably formed, and of a dazzling whiteness. She was rather inclined
+to EMBONPOINT, but not more than became her age, of apparently thirty
+years. Her step was that of a queen, but it was of Queen Vashti, not
+Queen Esther--the bold and commanding, not the retiring beauty.
+
+Father Buonaventure raised himself on the couch, angrily, as if
+displeased by this intrusion. ‘How now, madam,’ he said, with some
+sternness; ‘why have we the honour of your company?’
+
+‘Because it is my pleasure,’ answered the lady, composedly.
+
+‘Your pleasure, madam!’ he repeated in the same angry tone.
+
+‘My pleasure, sir,’ she continued, ‘which always keeps exact pace with
+my duty. I had heard you were unwell--let me hope it is only business
+which produces this seclusion.’
+
+‘I am well,’ he replied; ‘perfectly well, and I thank you for your
+care--but we are not alone, and this young man’--
+
+‘That young man?’ she said, bending her large and serious eye on
+Alan Fairford, as if she had been for the first time aware of his
+presence,--‘may I ask who he is?’
+
+‘Another time, madam; you shall learn his history after he is gone. His
+presence renders it impossible for me to explain further.’
+
+‘After he is gone may be too late,’ said the lady; ‘and what is his
+presence to me, when your safety is at stake? He is the heretic lawyer
+whom those silly fools, the Arthurets, admitted into this house at a
+time when they should have let their own father knock at the door in
+vain, though the night had been a wild one. You will not surely dismiss
+him?’
+
+‘Your own impatience can alone make that step perilous,’ said the
+father; ‘I have resolved to take it--do not let your indiscreet
+zeal, however excellent its motive, add any unnecessary risk to the
+transaction.’
+
+‘Even so?’ said the lady, in a tone of reproach, yet mingled with
+respect and apprehension. ‘And thus you will still go forward, like a
+stag upon the hunter’s snares, with undoubting confidence, after all
+that has happened?’
+
+‘Peace, madam,’ said Father Buonaventure, rising up; ‘be silent, or quit
+the apartment; my designs do not admit of female criticism.’
+
+To this peremptory command the lady seemed about to make a sharp reply;
+but she checked herself, and pressing her lips strongly together, as if
+to secure the words from bursting from them which were already formed
+upon her tongue, she made a deep reverence, partly as it seemed in
+reproach, partly in respect, and left the room as suddenly as she had
+entered it.
+
+The father looked disturbed at this incident, which he seemed sensible
+could not but fill Fairford’s imagination with an additional throng of
+bewildering suspicions; he bit his lip and muttered something to himself
+as he walked through the apartment; then suddenly turned to his visitor
+with a smile of much sweetness, and a countenance in which every rougher
+expression was exchanged for those of courtesy and kindness.
+
+‘The visit we have been just honoured with, my young friend, has given
+you,’ he said, ‘more secrets to keep than I would have wished
+you burdened with. The lady is a person of condition--of rank and
+fortune--but nevertheless is so circumstanced that the mere fact of her
+being known to be in this country would occasion many evils. I should
+wish you to observe secrecy on this subject, even to Redgauntlet or
+Maxwell, however much I trust them in all that concerns my own affairs.’
+
+‘I can have no occasion,’ replied Fairford, ‘for holding any discussion
+with these gentlemen, or with any others, on the circumstance which
+I have just witnessed--it could only have become the subject of my
+conversation by mere accident, and I will now take care to avoid the
+subject entirely.’
+
+‘You will do well, sir, and I thank you,’ said the father, throwing much
+dignity into the expression of obligation which he meant to convey. ‘The
+time may perhaps come when you will learn what it is to have obliged one
+of my condition. As to the lady, she has the highest merit, and nothing
+can be said of her justly which would not redound to her praise.
+Nevertheless--in short, sir, we wander at present as in a morning
+mist--the sun will, I trust, soon rise and dispel it, when all that now
+seems mysterious will be fully revealed--or it will sink into rain,’
+he added, in a solemn tone, ‘and then explanation will be of little
+consequence.--Adieu, sir; I wish you well.’
+
+He made a graceful obeisance, and vanished through the same side-door by
+which the lady had entered; and Alan thought he heard their voices high
+in dispute in the adjoining apartment.
+
+Presently afterwards, Ambrose entered, and told him that a horse and
+guide waited him beneath the terrace.
+
+‘The good Father Buonaventure,’ added the butler, ‘has been graciously
+pleased to consider your situation, and desired me to inquire whether
+you have any occasion for a supply of money?’
+
+‘Make my respects to his reverence,’ answered Fairford, ‘and assure
+him I am provided in that particular. I beg you also to make my
+acknowledgements to the Misses Arthuret, and assure them that their kind
+hospitality, to which I probably owe my life, shall be remembered with
+gratitude as long as that life lasts. You yourself, Mr. Ambrose, must
+accept of my kindest thanks for your skill and attention.’
+
+Mid these acknowledgements they left the house, descended the terrace,
+and reached the spot where the gardener, Fairford’s old acquaintance,
+waited for him, mounted upon one horse and leading another.
+
+Bidding adieu to Ambrose, our young lawyer mounted, and rode down the
+avenue, often looking back to the melancholy and neglected dwelling
+in which he had witnessed such strange scenes, and musing upon the
+character of its mysterious inmates, especially the noble and almost
+regal-seeming priest, and the beautiful but capricious dame, who, if
+she was really Father Buonaventure’s penitent, seemed less docile to the
+authority of the church than, as Alan conceived, the Catholic discipline
+permitted. He could not indeed help being sensible that the whole
+deportment of these persons differed much from his preconceived notions
+of a priest and devotee. Father Buonaventure, in particular, had
+more natural dignify and less art and affectation in his manner, than
+accorded with the idea which Calvinists were taught to entertain of that
+wily and formidable person, a Jesuitical missionary.
+
+While reflecting on these things, he looked back so frequently at the
+house, that Dick Gardener, a forward, talkative fellow, who began
+to tire of silence, at length said to him, ‘I think you will know
+Fairladies when you see it again, sir?’
+
+‘I dare say I shall, Richard,’ answered Fairford good-humouredly.
+‘I wish I knew as well where I am to go next. But you can tell me,
+perhaps?’
+
+‘Your worship should know better than I,’ said Dick Gardener;
+‘nevertheless, I have a notion you are going where all you Scotsmen
+should be sent, whether you will or no.’
+
+‘Not to the devil, I hope, good Dick?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘Why, no. That is a road which you may travel as heretics; but as
+Scotsmen, I would only send you three-fourths of the way--and that is
+back to Scotland again--always craving your honour’s pardon.’
+
+‘Does our journey lie that way?’ said Fairford.
+
+‘As far as the waterside,’ said Richard. ‘I am to carry you to old
+Father Crackenthorp’s, and then you are within a spit and a stride of
+Scotland, as the saying is. But mayhap you may think twice of going
+thither, for all that; for Old England is fat feeding-ground for
+north-country cattle.’
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+NARRATIVE OF DARSIE LATIMER
+
+Our history must now, as the old romancers wont to say, ‘leave to
+tell’ of the quest of Alan Fairford, and instruct our readers of the
+adventures which befell Darsie Latimer, left as he was in the precarious
+custody of his self-named tutor, the Laird of the Lochs of Solway,
+to whose arbitrary pleasure he found it necessary for the present to
+conform himself.
+
+In consequence of this prudent resolution, and although he did not
+assume such a disguise without some sensations of shame and degradation,
+Darsie permitted Cristal Nixon to place over his face, and secure by a
+string, one of those silk masks which ladies frequently wore to preserve
+their complexions, when exposed to the air during long journeys on
+horseback. He remonstrated somewhat more vehemently against the long
+riding-skirt, which converted his person from the waist into the female
+guise, but was obliged to concede this point also.
+
+The metamorphosis was then complete; for the fair reader must be
+informed, that in those rude times, the ladies, when they honoured the
+masculine dress by assuming any part of it, wore just such hats, coats,
+and waistcoats as the male animals themselves made use of, and had no
+notion of the elegant compromise betwixt male and female attire, which
+has now acquired, PAR EXCELLENCE, the name of a HABIT. Trolloping
+things our mothers must have looked, with long square-cut coats, lacking
+collars, and with waistcoats plentifully supplied with a length of
+pocket, which hung far downwards from the middle. But then they had
+some advantage from the splendid colours, lace, and gay embroidery
+which masculine attire then exhibited; and, as happens in many similar
+instances, the finery of the materials made amends for the want of
+symmetry and grace of form in the garments themselves. But this is a
+digression.
+
+In the court of the old mansion, half manor-place, half farm-house, or
+rather a decayed manor-house, converted into an abode for a Cumberland
+tenant, stood several saddled horses. Four or five of them were mounted
+by servants or inferior retainers, all of whom were well armed with
+sword, pistol, and carabine. But two had riding furniture for the use
+of females--the one being accoutred with a side-saddle, the other with a
+pillion attached to the saddle.
+
+Darsie’s heart beat quicker within him; he easily comprehended that one
+of these was intended for his own use; and his hopes suggested that the
+other was designed for that of the fair Green Mantle, whom, according
+to his established practice, he had adopted for the queen of his
+affections, although his opportunities of holding communication with her
+had not exceeded the length of a silent supper on one occasion, and the
+going down a country-dance on another. This, however, was no unwonted
+mood of passion with Darsie Latimer, upon whom Cupid was used to triumph
+only in the degree of a Mahratta conqueror, who overruns a province with
+the rapidity of lightning, but finds it impossible to retain it beyond
+a very brief space. Yet this new love was rather more serious than the
+scarce skinned-up wounds which his friend Fairford used to ridicule.
+The damsel had shown a sincere interest in his behalf; and the air of
+mystery with which that interest was veiled, gave her, to his lively
+imagination, the character of a benevolent and protecting spirit, as
+much as that of a beautiful female.
+
+At former times, the romance attending his short-lived attachments
+had been of his own creating, and had disappeared as soon as ever he
+approached more closely to the object with which he had invested it.
+On the present occasion, it really flowed from external circumstances,
+which might have interested less susceptible feelings, and an
+imagination less lively than that of Darsie Latimer, young,
+inexperienced, and enthusiastic as he was.
+
+He watched, therefore, anxiously to whose service the palfrey bearing
+the lady’s saddle was destined. But ere any female appeared to occupy
+it, he was himself summoned to take his seat on the pillion behind
+Cristal Nixon, amid the grins of his old acquaintance Jan who helped him
+to horse, and the unrestrained laughter of Cicely, who displayed on the
+occasion a case of teeth which might have rivalled ivory.
+
+Latimer was at an age when being an object of general ridicule even to
+clowns and milkmaids was not a matter of indifference, and he longed
+heartily to have laid his horse-whip across Jan’s shoulders. That,
+however, was a solacement of his feelings which was not at the moment to
+be thought of; and Cristal Nixon presently put an end to his unpleasant
+situation, by ordering the riders to go on. He himself kept the centre
+of the troop, two men riding before and two behind him, always, as it
+seemed to Darsie, having their eye upon him, to prevent any attempt to
+escape. He could see from time to time, when the straight line of the
+road, or the advantage of an ascent permitted him, that another troop
+of three or four riders followed them at about a quarter of a mile’s
+distance, amongst whom he could discover the tall form of Redgauntlet,
+and the powerful action of his gallant black horse. He had little
+doubt that Green Mantle made one of the party, though he was unable to
+distinguish her from the others.
+
+In this manner they travelled from six in the morning until nearly ten
+of the clock, without Darsie exchanging a word with any one; for he
+loathed the very idea of entering into conversation with Cristal Nixon,
+against whom he seemed to feel an instinctive aversion; nor was that
+domestic’s saturnine and sullen disposition such as to have encouraged
+advances, had he thought of making them.
+
+At length the party halted for the purpose of refreshment; but as they
+had hitherto avoided all villages and inhabited places upon their route,
+so they now stopped at one of those large ruinous Dutch barns, which
+are sometimes found in the fields, at a distance from the farm-houses to
+which they belong. Yet in this desolate place some preparations had been
+made for their reception. There were in the end of the barn racks filled
+with provender for the horses, and plenty of provisions for the party
+were drawn from the trusses of straw, under which the baskets that
+contained them had been deposited. The choicest of these were selected
+and arranged apart by Cristal Nixon, while the men of the party threw
+themselves upon the rest, which he abandoned to their discretion. In a
+few minutes afterwards the rearward party arrived and dismounted, and
+Redgauntlet himself entered the barn with the green-mantled maiden by
+his side. He presented her to Darsie with these words:--
+
+‘It is time you two should know each other better. I promised you my
+confidence, Darsie, and the time is come for reposing it. But first we
+will have our breakfast; and then, when once more in the saddle, I will
+tell you that which it is necessary that you should know. Salute Lilias,
+Darsie.’
+
+The command was sudden, and surprised Latimer, whose confusion was
+increased by the perfect ease and frankness with which Lilias offered at
+once her cheek and her hand, and pressing his as she rather took it than
+gave her own, said very frankly, ‘Dearest Darsie, how rejoiced I am that
+our uncle has at last permitted us to become acquainted!’
+
+Darsie’s head turned round; and it was perhaps well that Redgauntlet
+called on him to sit down, as even that movement served to hide his
+confusion. There is an old song which says--
+
+  --when ladies are willing,
+  A man can but look like a fool;
+
+And on the same principle Darsie Latimer’s looks at this unexpected
+frankness of reception, would have formed an admirable vignette for
+illustrating the passage. ‘Dearest Darsie,’ and such a ready, nay, eager
+salute of lip and hand! It was all very gracious, no doubt--and ought to
+have been received with much gratitude; but, constituted as our friend’s
+temper was, nothing could be more inconsistent with his tone of feeling.
+If a hermit had proposed to him to club for a pot of beer, the illusion
+of his reverend sanctity could not have been dispelled more effectually
+than the divine qualities of Green Mantle faded upon the ill-imagined
+frank-heartedness of poor Lilias. Vexed with her forwardness, and
+affronted at having once more cheated himself, Darsie could hardly help
+muttering two lines of the song we have already quoted:
+
+  The fruit that must fall without shaking
+  Is rather too mellow for me.
+
+And yet it was pity for her too--she was a very pretty young woman--his
+fancy had scarcely overrated her in that respect--and the slight
+derangement of the beautiful brown locks which escaped in natural
+ringlets from under her riding-hat, with the bloom which exercise had
+brought into her cheek, made her even more than usually fascinating.
+Redgauntlet modified the sternness of his look when it was turned
+towards her, and in addressing her, used a softer tone than his usual
+deep bass. Even the grim features of Cristal Nixon relaxed when he
+attended on her, and it was then, if ever, that his misanthropical
+visage expressed some sympathy with the rest of humanity.
+
+‘How can she,’ thought Latimer, ‘look so like an angel, yet be so mere
+a mortal after all? How could so much seeming modesty have so much
+forwardness of manner, when she ought to have been most reserved? How
+can her conduct be reconciled to the grace and ease of her general
+deportment?’
+
+The confusion of thoughts which occupied Darsie’s imagination, gave to
+his looks a disordered appearance, and his inattention to the food which
+was placed before him, together with his silence and absence of mind,
+induced Lilias solicitously to inquire, whether he did not feel some
+return of the disorder under which he had suffered so lately. This led
+Mr. Redgauntlet, who seemed also lost in his own contemplations, to
+raise his eyes, and join in the same inquiry with some appearance of
+interest. Latimer explained to both that he was perfectly well.
+
+‘It is well it is so,’ answered Redgauntlet; ‘for we have that before
+us which will brook no delay from indisposition--we have not, as Hotspur
+says, leisure to be sick.’
+
+Lilias, on her part, endeavoured to prevail upon Darsie to partake of
+the food which she offered him, with a kindly and affectionate courtesy
+corresponding to the warmth of the interest she had displayed at their
+meeting; but so very natural, innocent, and pure in its character, that
+it would have been impossible for the vainest coxcomb to have mistaken
+it for coquetry, or a desire of captivating a prize so valuable as
+his affection. Darsie, with no more than the reasonable share of
+self-opinion common to most youths when they approach twenty-one, knew
+not how to explain her conduct.
+
+Sometimes he was tempted to think that his own merits had, even during
+the short intervals when they had seen each other, secured such a hold
+of the affections of a young person who had probably been bred up in
+ignorance of the world and its forms that she was unable to conceal
+her partiality. Sometimes he suspected that she acted by her guardian’s
+order, who, aware that he, Darsie, was entitled to a considerable
+fortune, might have taken this bold stroke to bring about a marriage
+betwixt him and so near a relative.
+
+But neither of these suppositions was applicable to the character of the
+parties. Miss Lilias’s manners, however soft and natural, displayed in
+their ease and versatility considerable acquaintance with the habits
+of the world, and in the few words she said during the morning repast,
+there were mingled a shrewdness and good sense, which could scarce
+belong to a miss capable of playing the silly part of a love-smitten
+maiden so broadly. As for Redgauntlet, with his stately bearing, his
+fatal frown, his eye of threat and of command, it was impossible, Darsie
+thought, to suspect him of a scheme having private advantage for its
+object; he could as soon have imagined Cassius picking Caesar’s pocket,
+instead of drawing his poniard on the dictator.
+
+While he thus mused, unable either to eat, drink, or answer to the
+courtesy of Lilias, she soon ceased to speak to him, and sat silent as
+himself.
+
+They had remained nearly an hour in their halting-place, when
+Redgauntlet said aloud, ‘Look out, Cristal Nixon. If we hear nothing
+from Fairladies, we must continue our journey.’
+
+Cristal went to the door, and presently returned and said to his master,
+in a voice as harsh as his features, ‘Gilbert Gregson is coming, his
+horse as white with foam as if a fiend had ridden him.’
+
+Redgauntlet threw from him the plate on which he had been eating, and
+hastened towards the door of the barn, which the courier at that moment
+entered; a smart jockey with a black velvet hunting-cap, and a broad
+belt drawn tight round his waist, to which was secured his express-bag.
+The variety of mud with which he was splashed from cap to spur showed
+he had had a rough and rapid ride. He delivered a letter to Mr.
+Redgauntlet, with an obeisance, and then retired to the end of the barn,
+where the other attendants were sitting or lying upon the straw, in
+order to get some refreshment.
+
+Redgauntlet broke the letter open with haste, and read it with anxious
+and discomposed looks. On a second perusal, his displeasure seemed to
+increase, his brow darkened, and was distinctly marked with the fatal
+sign peculiar to his family and house. Darsie had never before observed
+his frown bear such a close resemblance to the shape which tradition
+assigned it.
+
+Redgauntlet held out the open letter with one hand, and struck it with
+the forefinger of the other, as, in a suppressed and displeased tone,
+he said to Cristal Nixon, ‘Countermanded--ordered northward once
+more! ‘Northward, when all our hopes lie to the south--a second Derby
+direction, when we turned our back on glory, and marched in quest of
+ruin!’
+
+Cristal Nixon took the letter and ran it over, then returned it to his
+master with the cold observation, ‘A female influence predominates.’
+
+‘But it shall predominate no longer,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘it shall wane
+as ours rises in the horizon. Meanwhile, I will on before--and you,
+Cristal, will bring the party to the place assigned in the letter.
+You may now permit the young persons to have unreserved communication
+together; only mark that you watch the young man closely enough to
+prevent his escape, if he should be idiot enough to attempt it, but not
+approaching so close as to watch their free conversation.’
+
+‘I care naught about their conversation,’ said Nixon, surlily.
+
+‘You hear my commands, Lilias,’ said the laird, turning to the young
+lady. ‘You may use my permission and authority to explain so much of our
+family matters as you yourself know. At our next meeting I will complete
+the task of disclosure, and I trust I shall restore one Redgauntlet more
+to the bosom of our ancient family. Let Latimer, as he calls himself,
+have a horse to himself; he must for some time retain his disguise.--My
+horse--my horse!’
+
+In two minutes they heard him ride off from the door of the barn,
+followed at speed by two of the armed men of his party.
+
+The commands of Cristal Nixon, in the meanwhile, put all the remainder
+of the party in motion, but the laird himself was long out of sight ere
+they were in readiness to resume their journey. When at length they set
+out, Darsie was accommodated with a horse and side-saddle, instead of
+being obliged to resume his place on the pillion behind the detestable
+Nixon. He was obliged, however, to retain his riding-skirt, and to
+reassume his mask. Yet, notwithstanding this disagreeable circumstance,
+and although he observed that they gave him the heaviest and slowest
+horse of the party, and that, as a further precaution against escape, he
+was closely watched on every side, yet riding in company with the pretty
+Lilias was an advantage which overbalanced these inconveniences.
+
+It is true that this society, to which that very morning he would
+have looked forward as a glimpse of heaven, had, now that it was
+thus unexpectedly indulged, something much less rapturous than he had
+expected.
+
+It was in vain that, in order to avail himself of a situation so
+favourable for indulging his romantic disposition, he endeavoured to
+coax back, if I may so express myself, that delightful dream of ardent
+and tender passion; he felt only such a confusion of ideas at the
+difference between the being whom he had imagined, and her with whom he
+was now in contact, that it seemed to him like the effect of witchcraft.
+What most surprised him was, that this sudden flame should have died
+away so rapidly, notwithstanding that the maiden’s personal beauty was
+even greater than he had expected--her demeanour, unless it should be
+deemed over kind towards himself, as graceful and becoming as he could
+have fancied if, even in his gayest dreams. It were judging hardly
+of him to suppose that the mere belief of his having attracted
+her affections more easily than he expected was the cause of his
+ungratefully undervaluing a prize too lightly won, or that his transient
+passion played around his heart with the hitting radiance of a wintry
+sunbeam flashing against an icicle, which may brighten it for a moment,
+but cannot melt it. Neither of these was precisely the ease, though such
+fickleness of disposition might also have some influence in the change.
+
+The truth is, perhaps, the lover’s pleasure, like that of the hunter, is
+in the chase; and that the brightest beauty loses half its merit, as
+the fairest flower its perfume, when the willing hand can reach it
+too easily. There must be doubt--there must be danger--there must be
+difficulty; and if, as the poet says, the course of ardent affection
+never does run smooth, it is perhaps because, without some intervening
+obstacle, that which is called the romantic passion of love, in its high
+poetical character and colouring can hardly have an existence--any more
+than there can be a current in a river without the stream being narrowed
+by steep banks, or checked by opposing rocks.
+
+Let not those, however, who enter into a union for life without those
+embarrassments which delight a Darsie Latimer, or a Lydia Languish, and
+which are perhaps necessary to excite an enthusiastic passion in breasts
+more firm than theirs, augur worse of their future happiness because
+their own alliance is formed under calmer auspices. Mutual esteem, an
+intimate knowledge of each other’s character, seen, as in their case,
+undisguised by the mists of too partial passion--a suitable proportion
+of parties in rank and fortune, in taste and pursuits--are more
+frequently found in a marriage of reason, than in a union of romantic
+attachment; where the imagination, which probably created the virtues
+and accomplishments with which it invested the beloved object, is
+frequently afterwards employed in magnifying the mortifying consequences
+of its own delusion, and exasperating all the stings of disappointment.
+Those who follow the banners of Reason are like the well-disciplined
+battalion, which, wearing a more sober uniform and making a less
+dazzling show than the light troops commanded by imagination, enjoy more
+safety, and even more honour, in the conflicts of human life. All this,
+however, is foreign to our present purpose.
+
+Uncertain in what manner to address her whom he had been lately so
+anxious to meet with, and embarrassed by a TETE-A-TETE to which his own
+timid inexperience, gave some awkwardness, the party had proceeded more
+than a hundred yards before Darsie assumed courage to accost, or even
+to look at, his companion. Sensible, however, of the impropriety of his
+silence, he turned to speak to her; and observing that, although she
+wore her mask, there was something like disappointment and dejection
+in her manner, he was moved by self-reproach for his own coldness, and
+hastened to address her in the kindest tone he could assume.
+
+‘You must think me cruelly deficient in gratitude, Miss Lilias, that
+I have been thus long in your company, without thanking you for the
+interest which you have deigned to take in my unfortunate affairs?’
+
+‘I am glad you have at length spoken,’ she said, ‘though I owe it is
+more coldly than I expected. MISS Lilias! DEIGN to take interest! In
+whom, dear Darsie, CAN I take interest but in you; and why do you put
+this barrier of ceremony betwixt us, whom adverse circumstances have
+already separated for such a length of time?’
+
+Darsie was again confounded at the extra candour, if we may use the
+term, of this frank avowal. ‘One must love partridge very well,’ thought
+he, ‘to accept it when thrown in one’s face--if this is not plain
+speaking, there is no such place as downright Dunstable in being!’
+
+Embarrassed with these reflections, and himself of a nature fancifully,
+almost fastidiously, delicate, he could only in reply stammer forth an
+acknowledgement of his companion’s goodness, and his own gratitude. She
+answered in a tone partly sorrowful and partly impatient, repeating,
+with displeased emphasis, the only distinct words he had been able
+to bring forth--‘Goodness--gratitude!--O Darsie! should these be the
+phrases between you and me? Alas! I am too sure you are displeased with
+me, though I cannot even guess on what account. Perhaps you think I
+have been too free in venturing upon my visit to your friend. But then
+remember, it was in your behalf, and that I knew no better way to put
+you on your guard against the misfortunes and restraint which you have
+been subjected to, and are still enduring.’
+
+‘Dear Lady’--said Darsie, rallying his recollection, and suspicious
+of some error in apprehension,--a suspicion which his mode of address
+seemed at once to communicate to Lilias, for she interrupted him,--
+
+‘LADY! dear LADY! For whom, or for what, in Heaven’s name, do you take
+me, that you address me so formally?’
+
+Had the question been asked in that enchanted hall in fairyland, where
+all interrogations must be answered with absolute sincerity, Darsie
+had certainly replied, that he took her for the most frank-hearted and
+ultra-liberal lass that had ever lived since Mother Eve eat the pippin
+without paring. But as he was still on middle-earth, and free to avail
+himself of a little polite deceit, he barely answered that he believed
+he had the honour of speaking to the niece of Mr. Redgauntlet.
+
+‘Surely,’ she replied; ‘but were it not as easy for you to have said, to
+your own only sister?’
+
+Darsie started in his saddle, as if he had received a pistol-shot.
+
+‘My sister!’ he exclaimed.
+
+‘And you did NOT know it, then?’ said she. ‘I thought your reception of
+me was cold and indifferent!’
+
+A kind and cordial embrace took place betwixt the relatives; and so
+light was Darsie’s spirit, that he really felt himself more relieved, by
+getting quit of the embarrassments of the last half-hour, during which
+he conceived himself in danger of being persecuted by the attachment of
+a forward girl, than disappointed by the vanishing of so many day-dreams
+as he had been in the habit of encouraging during the time when the
+green-mantled maiden was goddess of his idolatry. He had been already
+flung from his romantic Pegasus, and was too happy at length to find
+himself with bones unbroken, though with his back on the ground. He was,
+besides, with all his whims and follies, a generous, kind-hearted youth,
+and was delighted to acknowledge so beautiful and amiable a relative,
+and to assure her in the warmest terms of his immediate affection and
+future protection, so soon as they should be extricated from their
+present situation. Smiles and tears mingled on Lilias’s cheeks, like
+showers and sunshine in April weather.
+
+‘Out on me,’ she said, ‘that I should be so childish as to cry at what
+makes me so sincerely happy! since, God knows, family-love is what my
+heart has most longed after, and to which it has been most a stranger.
+My uncle says that you and I, Darsie, are but half Redgauntlets, and
+that the metal of which our father’s family was made, has been softened
+to effeminacy in our mother’s offspring.’
+
+‘Alas!’ said Darsie, ‘I know so little of our family story, that I
+almost doubted that I belonged to the House of Redgauntlet, although the
+chief of the family himself intimated so much to me.’
+
+‘The chief of the family!’ said Lilias. ‘You must know little of
+your own descent indeed, if you mean my uncle by that expression. You
+yourself, my dear Darsie, are the heir and representative of our ancient
+House, for our father was the elder brother--that brave and unhappy Sir
+Henry Darsie Redgauntlet, who suffered at Carlisle in the year 1746. He
+took the name of Darsie, in conjunction with his own, from our mother,
+heiress to a Cumberland family of great wealth and antiquity, of whose
+large estates you are the undeniable heir, although those of your father
+have been involved in the general doom of forfeiture. But all this must
+be necessarily unknown to you.’
+
+‘Indeed I hear it for the first time in my life,’ answered Darsie.
+
+‘And you knew not that I was your sister?’ said Lilias. ‘No wonder you
+received me so coldly. What a strange, wild, forward young person you
+must have thought me--mixing myself in the fortunes of a stranger whom
+I had only once spoken to--corresponding with him by signs--Good Heaven!
+what can you have supposed me?’
+
+‘And how should I have come to the knowledge of our connexion?’ said
+Darsie. ‘You are aware I was not acquainted with it when we danced
+together at Brokenburn.’
+
+‘I saw that with concern, and fain I would have warned you,’ answered
+Lilias; ‘but I was closely watched, and before I could find or make an
+opportunity of coming to a full explanation with you on a subject so
+agitating, I was forced to leave the room. What I did say was, you may
+remember, a caution to leave the southern border, for I foresaw what
+has since happened. But since my uncle has had you in his power, I never
+doubted he had communicated to you our whole family history.’
+
+‘He has left me to learn it from you, Lilias; and assure yourself that I
+will hear it with more pleasure from your lips than from his. I have no
+reason to be pleased with his conduct towards me.’
+
+‘Of that,’ said Lilias, ‘you will judge better when you have heard what
+I have to tell you;’ and she began her communication in the following
+manner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+NARRATIVE OF DARSIE LATIMER, CONTINUED
+
+‘The House of Redgauntlet,’ said the young lady, ‘has for centuries been
+supposed to lie under a doom, which has rendered vain their courage,
+their talents, their ambition, and their wisdom. Often making a figure
+in history, they have been ever in the situation of men striving against
+both wind and tide, who distinguish themselves by their desperate
+exertions of strength, and their persevering endurance of toil, but
+without being able to advance themselves upon their course by either
+vigour or resolution. They pretend to trace this fatality to a legendary
+history, which I may tell you at a less busy moment.’
+
+Darsie intimated that he had already heard the tragic story of Sir
+Alberick Redgauntlet.
+
+‘I need only say, then,’ proceeded Lilias, ‘that our father and uncle
+felt the family doom in its full extent. They were both possessed of
+considerable property, which was largely increased by our father’s
+marriage, and were both devoted to the service of the unhappy House
+of Stuart; but (as our mother at least supposed) family considerations
+might have withheld her husband from joining openly in the affair of
+1745, had not the high influence which the younger brother possessed
+over the elder, from his more decided energy of character, hurried him
+along with himself into that undertaking.
+
+‘When, therefore, the enterprise came to the fatal conclusion which
+bereaved our father of his life and consigned his brother to exile, Lady
+Redgauntlet fled from the north of England, determined to break off all
+communication with her late husband’s family, particularly his brother,
+whom she regarded as having, by their insane political enthusiasm, been
+the means of his untimely death; and determined that you, my brother, an
+infant, and that I, to whom she had just given birth, should be brought
+up as adherents of the present dynasty. Perhaps she was too hasty in
+this determination--too timidly anxious to exclude, if possible, from
+the knowledge of the very spot where we existed, a relation so nearly
+connected with us as our father’s only brother. But you must make
+allowance for what she had suffered. See, brother,’ she said, pulling
+her glove off, ‘these five blood-specks on my arm are a mark by which
+mysterious Nature has impressed, on an unborn infant, a record of its
+father’s violent death and its mother’s miseries.’ [Several persons
+have brought down to these days the impressions which Nature had thus
+recorded, when they were yet babes unborn. One lady of quality, whose
+father was long under sentence of death previous to the Rebellion, was
+marked on the back of the neck by the sign of a broad axe. Another whose
+kinsmen had been slain in battle and died on the scaffold to the number
+of seven, bore a child spattered on the right shoulder and down the
+arm with scarlet drops, as if of blood. Many other instances might be
+quoted.]
+
+‘You were not, then, born when my father suffered?’ said Darsie.
+
+‘Alas, no!’ she replied; ‘nor were you a twelvemonth old. It was no
+wonder that my mother, after going through such scenes of agony,
+became irresistibly anxious for the sake of her children--of her son in
+particular; the more especially as the late Sir Henry, her husband, had,
+by a settlement of his affairs, confided the custody of the persons
+of her children, as well as the estates which descended to them,
+independently of those which fell under his forfeiture, to his brother
+Hugh, in whom he placed unlimited confidence.’
+
+‘But my mother had no reason to fear the operation of such a deed,
+conceived in favour of an attainted man,’ said Darsie.
+
+‘True,’ replied Lilias; ‘but our uncle’s attainder might have been
+reversed, like that of so many other persons, and our mother, who both
+feared and hated him, lived in continual terror that this would be the
+case, and that she should see the author, as she thought him, of her
+husband’s death come armed with legal powers, and in a capacity to
+use them for the purpose of tearing her children from her protection.
+Besides, she feared, even in his incapacitated condition, the
+adventurous and pertinacious spirit of her brother-in-law, Hugh
+Redgauntlet, and felt assured that he would make some attempt to possess
+himself of the persons of the children. On the other hand, our uncle,
+whose proud disposition might, perhaps, have been soothed by the offer
+of her confidence, revolted against the distrustful and suspicious
+manner in which Lady Darsie Redgauntlet acted towards him. She basely
+abused, he said, the unhappy circumstances in which he was placed,
+in order to deprive him of his natural privilege of protecting and
+educating the infants, whom nature and law, and the will of their
+father, had committed to his charge, and he swore solemnly he would
+not submit to such an injury. Report of his threats was made to Lady
+Redgauntlet, and tended to increase those fears which proved but too
+well founded. While you and I, children at that time of two or three
+years old, were playing together in a walled orchard, adjacent to our
+mother’s residence which she had fixed somewhere in Devonshire, my uncle
+suddenly scaled the wall with several men, and I was snatched up; and
+carried off to a boat which waited for them. My mother, however, flew to
+your rescue, and as she seized on and held you fast, my uncle could not,
+as he has since told me, possess himself of your person, without using
+unmanly violence to his brother’s widow. Of this he was incapable; and,
+as people began to assemble upon my mother’s screaming, he withdrew,
+after darting upon you and her one of those fearful looks, which, it is
+said, remain with our family, as a fatal bequest of Sir Alberick, our
+ancestor.’
+
+‘I have some recollection of the scuffle which you mention,’ said
+Darsie; ‘and I think it was my uncle himself (since my uncle he is)
+who recalled the circumstance to my mind on a late occasion. I can now
+account for the guarded seclusion under which my poor mother lived--for
+her frequent tears, her starts of hysterical alarm, and her constant and
+deep melancholy. Poor lady! what a lot was hers, and what must have been
+her feelings when it approached to a close!’
+
+‘It was then that she adopted,’ said Lilias, ‘every precaution her
+ingenuity could suggest, to keep your very existence concealed from the
+person whom she feared--nay, from yourself; for she dreaded, as she
+is said often to have expressed herself, that the wildfire blood of
+Redgauntlet would urge you to unite your fortunes to those of your
+uncle, who was well known still to carry on political intrigues, which
+most other persons had considered as desperate. It was also possible
+that he, as well as others, might get his pardon, as government showed
+every year more lenity towards the remnant of the Jacobites, and then he
+might claim the custody of your person, as your legal guardian. Either
+of these events she considered as the direct road to your destruction.’
+
+‘I wonder she had not claimed the protection of Chancery for me,’ said
+Darsie; ‘or confided me to the care of some powerful friend.’
+
+‘She was on indifferent terms with her relations, on account of her
+marriage with our father,’ said Lilias, ‘and trusted more to secreting
+you from your uncle’s attempts, than to any protection which law
+might afford against them. Perhaps she judged unwisely, but surely not
+unnaturally, for one rendered irritable by so many misfortunes and so
+many alarms. Samuel Griffiths, an eminent banker, and a worthy clergyman
+now dead were, I believe, the only persons whom she intrusted with the
+execution of her last will; and my uncle believes that she made them
+both swear to observe profound secrecy concerning your birth and
+pretensions, until you should come to the age of majority, and, in the
+meantime, to breed you up in the most private way possible, and that
+which was most likely to withdraw you from my uncle’s observation.’
+
+‘And I have no doubt,’ said Darsie, ‘that betwixt change of name
+and habitation, they might have succeeded perfectly, but for the
+accident--lucky or unlucky, I know not which to term it--which brought
+me to Brokenburn, and into contact with Mr. Redgauntlet. I see also why
+I was warned against England, for in England’--
+
+‘In England alone, if I understand rightly,’ said Miss Redgauntlet,
+‘the claims of your uncle to the custody of your person could have
+been enforced, in case of his being replaced in the ordinary rights of
+citizenship, either by the lenity of the government or by some change
+in it. In Scotland, where you possess no property, I understand his
+authority might; have been resisted, and measures taken to put you under
+the protection of the law. But, pray, think it not unlucky that you
+have taken the step of visiting Brokenburn--I feel confident that the
+consequences must be ultimately fortunate, for have they not already
+brought us into contact with each other?’
+
+So saying, she held out her hand to her brother, who grasped it with a
+fondness of pressure very different from the manner in which they first
+clasped hands that morning. There was a moment’s pause, while the hearts
+of both were overflowing with a feeling of natural affection, to which
+circumstances had hitherto rendered them strangers.
+
+At length Darsie broke silence; ‘I am ashamed,’ he said, ‘my dearest
+Lilias, that I have suffered you to talk so long about matters
+concerning myself only, while I remain ignorant of your story, and your
+present situation.’
+
+‘The former is none of the most interesting, nor the latter the most
+safe or agreeable,’ answered Lilias; ‘but now, my dearest brother, I
+shall have the inestimable support of your countenance and affection;
+and were I but sure that we could weather the formidable crisis which
+I find so close at hand, I should have little apprehensions for the
+future.’
+
+‘Let me know,’ said Darsie, ‘what our present situation is; and rely
+upon my utmost exertions both in your defence and my own. For what
+reason can my uncle desire to detain me a prisoner? If in mere
+opposition to the will of my mother, she has long been no more; and I
+see not why he should wish, at so much trouble and risk, to interfere
+with the free will of one, to whom a few months will give a privilege
+of acting for himself, with which he will have no longer any pretence to
+interfere.’
+
+‘My dearest Arthur,’ answered Lilias--‘for that name, as well as
+Darsie, properly belongs to you--it is the leading feature in my uncle’s
+character, that he has applied every energy of his powerful mind to the
+service of the exiled family of Stuart. The death of his brother, the
+dilapidation of his own fortunes, have only added to his hereditary zeal
+for the House of Stuart a deep and almost personal hatred against the
+present reigning family. He is, in short, a political enthusiast of
+the most dangerous character, and proceeds in his agency with as much
+confidence, as if he felt himself the very Atlas who is alone capable of
+supporting a sinking cause.’
+
+‘And where or how did you, my Lilias, educated, doubtless, under his
+auspices, learn to have a different view of such subjects?’
+
+‘By a singular chance,’ replied Lilias, ‘in the nunnery where my uncle
+placed me. Although the abbess was a person exactly after his own heart,
+my education as a pensioner devolved much on an excellent old mother who
+had adopted the tenets of the Jansenists, with perhaps a still further
+tendency towards the reformed doctrines, than those of Port Royal. The
+mysterious secrecy with which she inculcated these tenets, gave them
+charms to my young mind, and I embraced them the rather that they were
+in direct opposition to the doctrines of the abbess, whom I hated so
+much for her severity, that I felt a childish delight in setting her
+control at defiance, and contradicting in my secret soul all that I was
+openly obliged to listen to with reverence. Freedom of religious opinion
+brings on, I suppose, freedom of political creed; for I had no sooner
+renounced the Pope’s infallibility, than I began to question the
+doctrine of hereditary and indefeasible right. In short, strange as it
+may seem, I came out of a Parisian convent, not indeed an instructed
+Whig and Protestant, but with as much inclination to be so as if I had
+been bred up, like you, within the Presbyterian sound of Saint Giles’s
+chimes.’
+
+‘More so, perhaps,’ replied Darsie; ‘for the nearer the church--the
+proverb is somewhat musty. But how did these liberal opinions of yours
+agree with the very opposite prejudices of my uncle?’
+
+‘They would have agreed like fire and water,’ answered Lilias, ‘had I
+suffered mine to become visible; but as that would have subjected me to
+constant reproach and upbraiding, or worse, I took great care to keep my
+own secret; so that occasional censures for coldness, and lack of zeal
+for the good cause, were the worst I had to undergo; and these were bad
+enough.’
+
+‘I applaud your caution,’ said Darsie.
+
+‘You have reason,’ replied his sister; ‘but I got so terrible a specimen
+of my uncle’s determination of character, before I had been acquainted
+with him for much more than a week, that it taught me at what risk I
+should contradict his humour. I will tell you the circumstances; for it
+will better teach you to appreciate the romantic and resolved nature
+of his character, than anything which I could state of his rashness and
+enthusiasm.
+
+‘After I had been many a long year at the convent, I was removed from
+thence, and placed with a meagre old Scottish lady of high rank, the
+daughter of an unfortunate person whose head had in the year 1715 been
+placed on Temple Bar. She subsisted on a small pension from the French
+Court, aided by an occasional gratuity from the Stuarts; to which the
+annuity paid for my board formed a desirable addition. She was not
+ill-tempered, nor very covetous--neither beat me nor starved me--but she
+was so completely trammelled by rank and prejudices, so awfully profound
+in genealogy, and so bitterly keen, poor lady, in British, politics,
+that I sometimes thought it pity that the Hanoverians, who murdered, as
+she used to tell me, her poor dear father, had left his dear daughter in
+the land of the living. Delighted, therefore, was I, when my uncle made
+his appearance, and abruptly announced his purpose of conveying me
+to England. My extravagant joy at the idea of leaving Lady Rachel
+Rougedragon was somewhat qualified by observing the melancholy look,
+lofty demeanour, and commanding tone of my near relative. He held more
+communication with me on the journey, however, than consisted with his
+taciturn demeanour in general, and seemed anxious to ascertain my tone
+of character, and particularly in point of courage. Now, though I am
+a tamed Redgauntlet, yet I have still so much of our family spirit as
+enables me to be as composed in danger as most of my sex; and upon two
+occasions in the course of our journey--a threatened attack by banditti,
+and the overturn of our carriage--I had the fortune so to conduct
+myself, as to convey to my uncle a very favourable idea of my
+intrepidity. Probably this encouraged him to put in execution the
+singular scheme which he had in agitation.
+
+‘Ere we reached London we changed our means of conveyance, and altered
+the route by which we approached the city, more than once; then, like a
+hare which doubles repeatedly at some distance from the seat she means
+to occupy, and at last leaps into her form from a distance so great as
+she can clear by a spring, we made a forced march, and landed in private
+and obscure lodgings in a little old street in Westminster, not far from
+the Cloisters.
+
+‘On the morning of the day on which we arrived my uncle went abroad, and
+did not return for some hours. Meantime I had no other amusement than to
+listen to the tumult of noises which succeeded each other, or reigned
+in confusion together during the whole morning. Paris I had thought
+the most noisy capital in the world, but Paris seemed midnight silence
+compared to London. Cannon thundered near and at a distance--drums,
+trumpets, and military music of every kind, rolled, flourished, and
+pierced the clouds, almost without intermission. To fill up the concert,
+bells pealed incessantly from a hundred steeples. The acclamations of
+an immense multitude were heard from time to time, like the roaring of a
+mighty ocean, and all this without my being able to glean the least idea
+of what was going on, for the windows of our apartment looked upon
+a waste backyard, which seemed totally deserted. My curiosity became
+extreme, for I was satisfied, at length, that it must be some festival
+of the highest order which called forth these incessant sounds.
+
+‘My uncle at length returned, and with him a man of an exterior
+singularly unprepossessing. I need not describe him to you, for--do not
+look round--he rides behind us at this moment.’
+
+‘That respectable person, Mr. Cristal Nixon, I suppose?’ said Darsie.
+
+‘The same,’ answered Lilias; ‘make no gesture, that may intimate we are
+speaking of him.’
+
+Darsie signified that he understood her, and she pursued her relation.
+
+‘They were both in full dress, and my uncle, taking a bundle from Nixon,
+said to me, “Lilias, I am come to carry you to see a grand ceremony--put
+on as hastily as you can the dress you will find in that parcel, and
+prepare to attend me.” I found a female dress, splendid and elegant,
+but somewhat bordering upon the antique fashion. It might be that of
+England, I thought, and I went to my apartment full of curiosity, and
+dressed myself with all speed.
+
+‘My uncle surveyed me with attention--“She may pass for one of the
+flower-girls,” he said to Nixon, who only answered with a nod.
+
+‘We left the house together, and such was their knowledge of the lanes,
+courts, and bypaths, that though there was the roar of a multitude in
+the broad streets, those which we traversed were silent and deserted;
+and the strollers whom we met, tired of gazing upon gayer figures,
+scarcely honoured us with a passing look, although, at any other time,
+we should, among these vulgar suburbs, have attracted a troublesome
+share of observation. We crossed at length a broad street, where many
+soldiers were on guard, while others, exhausted with previous duty, were
+eating, drinking, smoking, and sleeping beside their piled arms.
+
+‘“One day, Nixon,” whispered my uncle, “we will make these redcoated
+gentry stand to their muskets more watchfully.”
+
+‘“Or it will be the worse for them,” answered his attendant, in a voice
+as unpleasant as his physiognomy.
+
+‘Unquestioned and unchallenged by any one, we crossed among the guards;
+and Nixon tapped thrice at a small postern door in a huge ancient
+building, which was straight before us. It opened, and we entered
+without my perceiving by whom we were admitted. A few dark and narrow
+passages at length conveyed us into an immense Gothic hall, the
+magnificence of which baffles my powers of description.
+
+‘It was illuminated by ten thousand wax lights, whose splendour at first
+dazzled my eyes, coming as we did from these dark and secret avenues.
+But when my sight began to become steady, how shall I describe what
+I beheld? Beneath were huge ranges of tables, occupied by princes and
+nobles in their robes of state--high officers of the crown, wearing
+their dresses and badges of authority--reverend prelates and judges, the
+sages of the church and law, in their more sombre, yet not less awful
+robes--with others whose antique and striking costume announced their
+importance, though I could not even guess who they might be. But at
+length the truth burst on me at once--it was, and the murmurs around
+confirmed it, the Coronation Feast. At a table above the rest, and
+extending across the upper end of the hall, sat enthroned the youthful
+sovereign himself, surrounded by the princes of the blood, and other
+dignitaries, and receiving the suit and homage of his subjects. Heralds
+and pursuivants, blazing in their fantastic yet splendid armorial
+habits, and pages of honour, gorgeously arrayed in the garb of other
+days, waited upon the princely banqueters. In the galleries with which
+this spacious hall was surrounded, shone all, and more than all, that
+my poor imagination could conceive, of what was brilliant in riches, or
+captivating in beauty. Countless rows of ladies, whose diamonds, jewels,
+and splendid attire were their least powerful charms, looked down from
+their lofty seats on the rich scene beneath, themselves forming a show
+as dazzling and as beautiful as that of which they were spectators.
+Under these galleries, and behind the banqueting tables, were a
+multitude of gentlemen, dressed as if to attend a court, but whose garb,
+although rich enough to have adorned a royal drawing room, could not
+distinguish them in such a high scene as this. Amongst these we wandered
+for a few minutes, undistinguished and unregarded. I saw several
+young persons dressed as I was, so was under no embarrassment from the
+singularity of my habit, and only rejoiced, as I hung on my uncle’s
+arm, at the magical splendour of such a scene, and at his goodness for
+procuring me the pleasure of beholding it.
+
+‘By and by, I perceived that my uncle had acquaintances among those
+who were under the galleries, and seemed, like ourselves, to be mere
+spectators of the solemnity. They recognized each other with a single
+word, sometimes only with a grip of the hand-exchanged some private
+signs, doubtless--and gradually formed a little group, in the centre of
+which we were placed.
+
+‘“Is it not a grand sight, Lilias?” said my uncle. “All the noble, and
+all the wise, and all the wealthy of Britain, are there assembled.”
+
+‘“It is indeed,” said I, “all that my mind could have fancied of regal
+power and splendour.”
+
+‘“Girl,” he whispered,--and my uncle can make his whispers as terribly
+emphatic as his thundering voice or his blighting look--“all that is
+noble and worthy in this fair land are there assembled--but it is to
+bend like slaves and sycophants before the throne of a new usurper.”
+
+‘I looked at him, and the dark hereditary frown of our unhappy ancestor
+was black upon his brow.
+
+‘“For God’s sake,” I whispered, “consider where we are.”
+
+‘“Fear nothing,” he said; “we are surrounded by friends.” As he
+proceeded, his strong and muscular frame shook with suppressed
+agitation. “See,” he said, “yonder bends Norfolk, renegade to his
+Catholic.faith; there stoops the Bishop of ----, traitor to the Church
+of England; and,--shame of shames! yonder the gigantic form of Errol
+bows his head before the grandson of his father’s murderer! But a sign
+shall be seen this night amongst them--MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN,
+shall be read on these walls, as distinctly as the spectral handwriting
+made them visible on those of Belshazzar!”
+
+‘“For God’s sake,” said I, dreadfully alarmed, “it is impossible you can
+meditate violence in such a presence!”
+
+‘“None is intended, fool,” he answered, “nor can the slightest mischance
+happen, provided you will rally your boasted courage, and obey my
+directions. But do it coolly and quickly, for there are a hundred lives
+at stake.”
+
+‘“Alas! what--can I do?” I asked in the utmost terror.
+
+‘“Only be prompt to execute my bidding,” said he; “it is but to lift a
+glove--Here, hold this in your hand--throw the train of your dress over
+it, be firm, composed, and ready--or, at all events, I step forward
+myself.”
+
+‘“If there is no violence designed,” I said, taking, mechanically, the
+iron glove he put into my hand.
+
+‘“I could not conceive his meaning; but, in the excited state of mind in
+which I beheld him, I was convinced that disobedience on my part would
+lead to some wild explosion. I felt, from the emergency of the occasion,
+a sudden presence of mind, and resolved to do anything that might avert
+violence and bloodshed. I was not long held in suspense. A loud flourish
+of trumpets and the voice of heralds were mixed with the clatter of
+horses’ hoofs, while a champion, armed at all points like those I had
+read of in romances, attended by squires, pages, and the whole
+retinue of chivalry, pranced forward, mounted upon a barbed steed. His
+challenge, in defiance of all who dared impeach the title of the new
+sovereign, was recited aloud--once, and again.”
+
+‘“Rush in at the third sounding,” said my uncle to me; “bring me the
+parader’s gage, and leave mine in lieu of it.”
+
+‘I could not see how this was to be done, as we were surrounded by
+people on all sides. But, at the third sounding of the trumpets, a lane
+opened as if by word of command, betwixt me and the champion, and my
+uncle’s voice said, “Now, Lilias, NOW!”
+
+‘With a swift and yet steady step, and with a presence of mind for
+which I have never since been able to account, I discharged the perilous
+commission. I was hardly seen, I believe, as I exchanged the pledges of
+battle, and in an instant retired. “Nobly done, my girl!” said my
+uncle, at whose side I found myself, shrouded as I was before, by the
+interposition of the bystanders. “Cover our retreat, gentlemen,” he
+whispered to those around him.
+
+‘Room was made for us to approach the wall, which seemed to open, and we
+were again involved in the dark passages through which we had formerly
+passed. In a small anteroom, my uncle stopped, and hastily muffling me
+in a mantle which was lying there, we passed the guards--threaded the
+labyrinth of empty streets and courts, and reached our retired lodgings
+without attracting the least attention.’
+
+‘I have often heard,’ said Darsie, ‘that a female, supposed to be a
+man in disguise,--and yet, Lilias, you do not look very masculine,--had
+taken up the champion’s gauntlet at the present king’s coronation, and
+left in its place a gage of battle, with a paper, offering to accept the
+combat, provided a fair field should be allowed for it. I have hitherto
+considered it as an idle tale. I little thought how nearly I was
+interested in the actors of a scene so daring. How could you have
+courage to go through with it?’ [See Note 9.]
+
+‘Had I had leisure for reflection,’ answered his sister, ‘I should have
+refused, from a mixture of principle and of fear. But, like many people
+who do daring actions, I went on because I had not time to think of
+retreating. The matter was little known, and it is said the king had
+commanded that it should not be further inquired into;--from prudence,
+as I suppose, and lenity, though my uncle chooses to ascribe the
+forbearance of the Elector of Hanover, as he calls him, sometimes to
+pusillanimity, and sometimes to a presumptuous scorn of the faction who
+opposes his title.’
+
+‘And have your subsequent agencies under this frantic enthusiast,’ said
+Darsie, ‘equalled this in danger?’
+
+‘No--nor in importance,’ replied Lilias; ‘though I have witnessed much
+of the strange and desperate machinations, by which, in spite of every
+obstacle, and in contempt of every danger, he endeavours to awaken the
+courage of a broken party. I have traversed, in his company, all England
+and Scotland, and have visited the most extraordinary and contrasted
+scenes; now lodging at the castles of the proud gentry of Cheshire and
+Wales, where the retired aristocrats, with opinions as antiquated as
+their dwellings and their manners, still continue to nourish Jacobitical
+principles; and the next week, perhaps, spent among outlawed smugglers,
+or Highland banditti. I have known my uncle often act the part of a
+hero, and sometimes that of a mere vulgar conspirator, and turn himself,
+with the most surprising flexibility, into all sorts of shapes to
+attract proselytes to his cause.’
+
+‘Which, in the present day,’ said Darsie, ‘he finds, I presume, no easy
+task.’
+
+‘So difficult,’ said Lilias, ‘that, I believe, he has, at different
+times, disgusted with the total falling away of some friends, and
+the coldness of others, been almost on the point of resigning his
+undertaking. How often I have I known him affect an open brow and a
+jovial manner, joining in the games of the gentry, and even in the
+sports of the common people, in order to invest himself with a temporary
+degree of popularity; while, in fact, his heart was bursting to witness
+what he called the degeneracy of the times, the decay of activity among
+the aged, and the want of zeal in the rising generation. After the day
+has been spent in the hardest exercise, he has spent the night in pacing
+his solitary chamber, bewailing the downfall of the cause, and wishing
+for the bullet of Dundee or the axe of Balmerino.’
+
+‘A strange delusion,’ said Darsie; ‘and it is wonderful that it does not
+yield to the force of reality.’
+
+‘Ah, but,’ replied Lilias, ‘realities of late have seemed to flatter his
+hopes. The general dissatisfaction with the peace--the unpopularity
+of the minister, which has extended itself even to the person of his
+master--the various uproars which have disturbed the peace of the
+metropolis, and a general state of disgust and disaffection, which seems
+to affect the body of the nation, have given unwonted encouragement to
+the expiring hopes of the Jacobites, and induced many, both at the Court
+of Rome, and, if it can be called so, of the Pretender, to lend a more
+favourable ear than they had hitherto done to the insinuations of those
+who, like my uncle, hope, when hope is lost to all but themselves.
+Nay, I really believe that at this moment they meditate some desperate
+effort. My uncle has been doing all in his power, of late, to conciliate
+the affections of those wild communities that dwell on the Solway, over
+whom our family possessed a seignorial interest before the forfeiture,
+and amongst whom, on the occasion of 1745, our unhappy father’s
+interest, with his own, raised a considerable body of men. But they are
+no longer willing to obey his summons; and, as one apology among others,
+they allege your absence as their natural head and leader. This has
+increased his desire to obtain possession of your person, and, if he
+possibly can, to influence your mind, so as to obtain your authority to
+his proceedings.’
+
+‘That he shall never obtain,’ answered Darsie; ‘my principles and
+my prudence alike forbid such a step. Besides, it would be totally
+unavailing to his purpose. Whatever these people may pretend, to evade
+your uncle’s importunities, they cannot, at this time of day, think of
+subjecting their necks again to the feudal yoke, which was effectually
+broken by the act of 1748, abolishing vassalage and hereditary
+jurisdictions.’
+
+‘Aye, but that my uncle considers as the act of a usurping government,’
+said Lilias.
+
+‘Like enough he may think so,’ answered her brother, ‘for he is a
+superior, and loses his authority by, the enactment. But the question
+is, what the vassals will think of it who have gained their freedom
+from feudal slavery, and have now enjoyed that freedom for many years?
+However, to cut the matter short, if five hundred men would rise at the
+wagging of my finger, that finger shall not be raised in a cause which I
+disapprove of, and upon that my uncle may reckon.’
+
+‘But you may temporize,’ said Lilias, upon whom the idea of her uncle’s
+displeasure made evidently a strong impression,--‘you may temporize,
+as most of the gentry in this country do, and let the bubble burst of
+itself; for it is singular how few of them venture to oppose my uncle
+directly. I entreat you to avoid direct collision with him. To hear
+you, the head of the House of Redgauntlet, declare against the family
+of Stuart, would either break his heart, or drive him to some act of
+desperation.’
+
+‘Yes, but, Lilias, you forget that the consequences of such an act of
+complaisance might be, that the House of Redgauntlet and I might lose
+both our heads at one blow.’
+
+‘Alas!’ said she, ‘I had forgotten that danger. I have grown familiar
+with perilous intrigues, as the nurses in a pest-house are said to
+become accustomed to the air around them, till they forget even that it
+is noisome.’
+
+‘And yet,’ said Darsie, ‘if I could free myself from him without coming
+to an open rupture. Tell me, Lilias, do you think it possible that he
+can have any immediate attempt in view?’
+
+‘To confess the truth,’ answered Lilias, ‘I cannot doubt that he has.
+There has been an unusual bustle among the Jacobites of late. They have
+hopes, as I told you, from circumstances unconnected with their own
+strength. Just before you came to the country, my uncle’s desire to find
+you out became, if possible, more eager than ever--he talked of men
+to be presently brought together, and of your name and influence for
+raising them. At this very time your first visit to Brokenburn took
+place. A suspicion arose in my uncle’s mind, that you might be the
+youth he sought, and it was strengthened by papers and letters which the
+rascal Nixon did not hesitate to take from your pocket. Yet a mistake
+might have occasioned a fatal explosion; and my uncle therefore posted
+to Edinburgh to follow out the clue he had obtained, and fished enough
+of information from old Mr. Fairford to make him certain that you were
+the person he sought. Meanwhile, and at the expense of some personal
+and perhaps too bold exertion, I endeavoured, through your friend young
+Fairford, to put you on your guard.’
+
+‘Without success,’ said Darsie, blushing under his mask when he
+recollected how he had mistaken his sister’s meaning.
+
+‘I do not wonder that my warning was fruitless,’ said she; ‘the thing
+was doomed to be. Besides, your escape would have been difficult. You
+were dogged the whole time you were at the Shepherd’s Bush and at Mount
+Sharon, by a spy who scarcely ever left you.’
+
+‘The wretch, little Benjie!’ exclaimed Darsie. ‘I will wring the
+monkey’s neck round, the first time we meet.’
+
+‘It was he indeed who gave constant information of your motions to
+Cristal Nixon,’ said Lilias.
+
+‘And Cristal Nixon--I owe him, too, a day’s work in harvest,’ said
+Darsie; ‘for I am mistaken if he was not the person that struck me down
+when I was made prisoner among the rioters.’
+
+‘Like enough; for he has a head and hand for any villany. My uncle was
+very angry about it; for though the riot was made to have an opportunity
+of carrying you off in the confusion, as well as to put the fishermen
+at variance with the public law, it would have been his last thought to
+have injured a hair of your head. But Nixon has insinuated himself into
+all my uncle’s secrets, and some of these are so dark and dangerous,
+that though there are few things he would not dare, I doubt if he dare
+quarrel with him. And yet I know that of Cristal would move my uncle to
+pass his sword through his body.’
+
+‘What is it, for Heaven’s sake?’, said Darsie. ‘I have a particular
+desire for wishing to know.’
+
+‘The old, brutal desperado, whose face and mind are a libel upon human
+nature, has had the insolence to speak to his master’s niece as one whom
+he was at liberty to admire; and when I turned on him with the anger and
+contempt he merited, the wretch grumbled out something, as if he held
+the destiny of our family in his hand.’
+
+‘I thank you, Lilias,’ said Darsie, eagerly,--‘I thank you with all my
+heart for this communication. I have blamed myself as a Christian man
+for the indescribable longing I felt from the first moment I saw that
+rascal, to send a bullet through his head; and now you have perfectly
+accounted for and justified this very laudable wish. I wonder my uncle,
+with the powerful sense you describe him to be possessed of, does not
+see through such a villain.’
+
+‘I believe he knows him to be capable of much evil,’ answered
+Lilias--‘selfish, obdurate, brutal, and a man-hater. But then
+he conceives him to possess the qualities most requisite for a
+conspirator--undaunted courage, imperturbable coolness and address, and
+inviolable fidelity. In the last particular he may be mistaken. I have
+heard Nixon blamed for the manner in which our poor father was taken
+after Culloden.’
+
+‘Another reason for my innate aversion,’ said Darsie, but I will be on
+my guard with him.’
+
+‘See, he observes us closely,’ said Lilias. ‘What a thing is conscience!
+He knows we are now speaking of him, though he cannot have heard a word
+that we have said.’
+
+It seemed as if she had guessed truly; for Cristal Nixon at that moment
+rode up to them, and said, with an affectation of jocularity, which sat
+very ill on his sullen features, ‘Come, young ladies, you have had time
+enough for your chat this morning, and your tongues, I think, must
+be tired. We are going to pass a village, and I must beg you to
+separate--you, Miss Lilias, to ride a little behind--and you, Mrs.,
+or Miss, or Master, whichever you choose to be called, to be jogging a
+little before.’
+
+Lilias checked her horse without speaking, but not until she had given
+her brother an expressive look, recommending caution; to which he
+replied by a signal indicating that he understood and would comply with
+her request.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+NARRATTVE OF DARSIE LATIMER, CONTINUED
+
+Left to his solitary meditations, Darsie (for we will still term Sir
+Arthur Darsie Redgauntlet of that Ilk by the name to which the reader
+is habituated) was surprised not only at the alteration of his own state
+and condition, but at the equanimity with which he felt himself disposed
+to view all these vicissitudes.
+
+His fever--fit of love had departed like a morning’s dream, and left
+nothing behind but a painful sense of shame, and a resolution to be more
+cautious ere he again indulged in such romantic visions. His station
+in society was changed from that of a wandering, unowned youth, in whom
+none appeared to take an interest excepting the strangers by whom he had
+been educated, to the heir of a noble house, possessed of such influence
+and such property, that it seemed as if the progress or arrest of
+important political events were likely to depend upon his resolution.
+Even this sudden elevation, the more than fulfilment of those wishes
+which had haunted him ever since he was able to form a wish on the
+subject, was contemplated by Darsie, volatile as his disposition was,
+without more than a few thrills of gratified vanity.
+
+It is true, there were circumstances in his present situation to
+counterbalance such high advantages. To be a prisoner in the hands of a
+man so determined as his uncle, was no agreeable consideration, when
+he was calculating how he might best dispute his pleasure and refuse
+to join him in the perilous enterprise which he seemed to meditate.
+Outlawed and desperate himself, Darsie could not doubt that his uncle
+was surrounded by men capable of anything--that he was restrained by
+no personal considerations--and therefore what degree of compulsion he
+might apply to his brother’s son, or in what manner he might feel at
+liberty to punish his contumacy, should he disavow the Jacobite cause,
+must depend entirely upon the limits of his own conscience; and who
+was to answer for the conscience of a heated enthusiast who considers
+opposition to the party he has espoused, as treason to the welfare of
+his country? After a short interval, Cristal Nixon was pleased to throw
+some light upon the subject which agitated him.
+
+When that grim satellite rode up without ceremony close to Darsie’s
+side, the latter felt his very flesh creep with abhorrence, so little
+was he able to endure his presence, since the story of Lilias had added
+to his instinctive hatred of the man.
+
+His voice, too, sounded like that of a screech-owl, as he said, ‘So, my
+young cock of the north, you now know it all, and no doubt are blessing
+your uncle for stirring you up to such an honourable action.’
+
+‘I will acquaint my uncle with my sentiments on the subject, before I
+make them known to any one else,’ said Darsie, scarcely prevailing on
+his tongue to utter even these few words in a civil manner.
+
+‘Umph,’ murmured Cristal betwixt his teeth. ‘Close as wax, I see; and
+perhaps not quite so pliable. But take care, my pretty youth,’ he added,
+scornfully; ‘Hugh Redgauntlet will prove a rough colt-breaker--he will
+neither spare whipcord nor spur-rowel, I promise you.’
+
+‘I have already said, Mr. Nixon, answered Darsie, ‘that I will canvass
+those matters of which my sister has informed me, with my uncle himself,
+and with no other person.’
+
+‘Nay, but a word of friendly advice would do you no harm, young master,’
+replied Nixon. ‘Old Redgauntlet is apter at a blow than a word--likely
+to bite before he barks--the true man for giving Scarborough warning,
+first knock you down, then bid you stand. So, methinks, a little kind
+warning as to consequences were not amiss, lest they come upon you
+unawares.’
+
+‘If the warning is really kind, Mr. Nixon,’ said the young man, ‘I
+will hear it thankfully; and indeed, if otherwise, I must listen to it
+whether I will or no, since I have at present no choice of company or of
+conversation.’
+
+‘Nay, I have but little to say,’ said Nixon, affecting to give to his
+sullen and dogged manner the appearance of an honest bluntness; ‘I am
+as little apt to throw away words as any one. But here is the
+question--Will you join heart and hand with your uncle, or no?’
+
+‘What if I should say Aye?’ said Darsie, determined, if possible, to
+conceal his resolution from this man.
+
+‘Why, then,’ said Nixon, somewhat surprised at the readiness of his
+answer, ‘all will go smooth, of course--you will take share in this
+noble undertaking, and, when it succeeds, you will exchange your open
+helmet for an earl’s coronet perhaps.’
+
+‘And how if it fails?’ said Darsie.
+
+‘Thereafter as it may be,’ said Nixon; ‘they who play at bowls must meet
+with rubbers.’
+
+‘Well, but suppose, then, I have some foolish tenderness for my
+windpipe, and that when my uncle proposes the adventure to me I should
+say No--how then, Mr. Nixon?’
+
+‘Why, then, I would have you look to yourself, young master. There are
+sharp laws in France against refractory pupils--LETTRES DE CACHET
+are easily come by when such men as we are concerned with interest
+themselves in the matter.’
+
+‘But we are not in France,’ said poor Darsie, through whose blood ran a
+cold shivering at the idea of a French prison.
+
+‘A fast-sailing lugger will soon bring you there though, snug stowed
+under hatches, like a cask of moonlight.’
+
+‘But the French are at peace with us,’ said Darsie, ‘and would not
+dare’--
+
+‘Why, who would ever hear of you?’ interrupted Nixon; ‘do you imagine
+that a foreign court would call you up for judgement, and put the
+sentence of imprisonment in the COURRIER DE L’EUROPE, as they do at the
+Old Bailey? No, no, young gentleman--the gates of the Bastille, and of
+Mont Saint Michel, and the Castle of Vincennes, move on d--d easy hinges
+when they let folk in--not the least jar is heard. There are cool cells
+there for hot heads--as calm, and quiet, and dark, as you could wish in
+Bedlam--and the dismissal comes when the carpenter brings the prisoner’s
+coffin, and not sooner.’
+
+‘Well, Mr. Nixon,’ said Darsie, affecting a cheerfulness which he was
+far from feeling, ‘mine is a hard case--a sort of hanging choice, you
+will allow--since I must either offend our own government here and
+run the risk of my life for doing so, or be doomed to the dungeons of
+another country, whose laws I have never offended since I have never
+trod its soil--Tell me what you would do if you were in my place.
+
+‘I’ll tell you that when I am there,’ said Nixon, and, checking his
+horse, fell back to the rear of the little party.
+
+‘It is evident,’ thought the young man, ‘that the villain believes me
+completely noosed, and perhaps has the ineffable impudence to suppose
+that my sister must eventually succeed to the possessions which have
+occasioned my loss of freedom, and that his own influence over the
+destinies of our unhappy family may secure him possession of the
+heiress; but he shall perish by my hand first!--I must now be on the
+alert to make my escape, if possible, before I am forced on shipboard.
+Blind Willie will not, I think, desert me without an effort on my
+behalf, especially if he has learned that I am the son of his late
+unhappy patron. What a change is mine! Whilst I possessed neither rank
+nor fortune, I lived safely and unknown, under the protection of the
+kind and respectable friends whose hearts Heaven had moved towards me.
+Now that I am the head of an honourable house, and that enterprises of
+the most daring character await my decision, and retainers and vassals
+seem ready to rise at my beck, my safety consists chiefly in the
+attachment of a blind stroller!’
+
+While he was revolving these things in his mind, and preparing himself
+for the interview with his uncle which could not but be a stormy one,
+he saw Hugh Redgauntlet come riding slowly back to meet them without any
+attendants. Cristal Nixon rode up as he approached, and, as they met,
+fixed on him a look of inquiry.
+
+‘The fool, Crackenthorp,’ said Redgauntlet, has let strangers into his
+house. Some of his smuggling comrades, I believe; we must ride slowly to
+give him time to send them packing.’
+
+‘Did you see any of your friends?’ said Cristal.
+
+‘Three, and have letters from many more. They are unanimous on the
+subject you wot of--and the point must be conceded to them, or, far as
+the matter has gone, it will go no further.’
+
+‘You will hardly bring the father to stoop to his flock,’ said Cristal,
+with a sneer.
+
+‘He must and shall!’ answered Redgauntlet, briefly. ‘Go to the front,
+Cristal--I would speak with my nephew. I trust, Sir Arthur Redgauntlet,
+you are satisfied with the manner in which I have discharged my duty to
+your sister?’
+
+‘There can be no fault found to her manners or sentiments,’ answered
+Darsie; ‘I am happy in knowing a relative so amiable.’
+
+‘I am glad of it,’ answered Mr. Redgauntlet. ‘I am no nice judge of
+women’s qualifications, and my life has been dedicated to one great
+object; so that since she left France she has had but little opportunity
+of improvement. I have subjected her, however, as little as possible to
+the inconveniences and privations of my wandering and dangerous life.
+From time to time she has resided for weeks and months with families of
+honour and respectability, and I am glad that she has, in, your opinion,
+the manners and behaviour which become her birth.’
+
+Darsie expressed himself perfectly satisfied, and there was a little
+pause, which Redgauntlet broke by solemnly addressing his nephew.
+
+‘For you, my nephew, I also hoped to have done much. The weakness and
+timidity of your mother sequestered you from my care, or it would have
+been my pride and happiness to have trained up the son of my unhappy
+brother in those paths of honour in which our ancestors have always
+trod.’
+
+‘Now comes the storm,’ thought Darsie to himself, and began to collect
+his thoughts, as the cautious master of a vessel furls his sails and
+makes his ship snug when he discerns the approaching squall.
+
+‘My mother’s conduct in respect to me might be misjudged,’ he said, ‘but
+it was founded on the most anxious affection.’
+
+‘Assuredly,’ said his uncle, ‘and I have no wish to reflect on her
+memory, though her mistrust has done so much injury, I will not say to
+me, but to the cause of my unhappy country. Her scheme was, I think,
+to have made you that wretched pettifogging being, which they still
+continue to call in derision by the once respectable name of a Scottish
+Advocate; one of those mongrel things that must creep to learn the
+ultimate decision of his causes to the bar of a foreign court, instead
+of pleading before the independent and august Parliament of his own
+native kingdom.’
+
+‘I did prosecute the study of law for a year or two, said Darsie, ‘but I
+found I had neither taste nor talents for the science.’
+
+‘And left it with scorn, doubtless,’ said Mr. Redgauntlet. ‘Well, I now
+hold up to you, my dearest nephew, a more worthy object of ambition.
+Look eastward--do you see a monument standing on yonder plain, near a
+hamlet?’
+
+Darsie replied that he did,
+
+‘The hamlet is called Burgh-upon-Sands, and yonder monument is erected
+to the memory of the tyrant Edward I. The just hand of Providence
+overtook him on that spot, as he was leading his bands to complete the
+subjugation of Scotland whose civil dissensions began under his accursed
+policy. The glorious career of Bruce might have been stopped in its
+outset; the field of Bannockburn might have remained a bloodless turf,
+if God had not removed, in the very crisis, the crafty and bold tyrant
+who had so long been Scotland’s scourge. Edward’s grave is the cradle of
+our national freedom. It is within sight of that great landmark of our
+liberty that I have to propose to you an undertaking, second in honour
+and importance to none since the immortal Bruce stabbed the Red Comyn,
+and grasped with his yet bloody hand the independent crown of Scotland.’
+
+He paused for an answer; but Darsie, overawed by the energy of his
+manner, and unwilling to commit himself by a hasty explanation, remained
+silent.
+
+‘I will not suppose,’ said Hugh Redgauntlet, after a pause, that you
+are either so dull as not to comprehend the import of my words--or so
+dastardly as to be dismayed by my proposal--or so utterly degenerate
+from the blood and sentiments of your ancestors, as not to feel my
+summons as the horse hears the war-trumpet.’
+
+‘I will not pretend to misunderstand you, sir,’ said Darsie; ‘but an
+enterprise directed against a dynasty now established for three reigns
+requires strong arguments, both in point of justice and of expediency,
+to recommend it to men of conscience and prudence.’
+
+‘I will not,’ said Redgauntlet, while his eyes sparkled with anger,--‘I
+will not hear you speak a word against the justice of that enterprise,
+for which your oppressed country calls with the voice of a parent,
+entreating her children for aid--or against that noble revenge which
+your father’s blood demands from his dishonoured grave. His skull is
+yet standing over the Rikargate, [The northern gate of Carlisle was long
+garnished with the heads of the Scottish rebels executed in 1746.] and
+even its bleak and mouldered jaws command you to be a man. I ask you,
+in the name of God and of your country, will you draw your sword and
+go with me to Carlisle, were it but to lay your father’s head, now the
+perch of the obscene owl and carrion crow and the scoff of every ribald
+clown, in consecrated earth as befits his long ancestry?’
+
+Darsie, unprepared to answer an appeal urged with so much passion, and
+not doubting a direct refusal would cost him his liberty or life, was
+again silent.
+
+‘I see,’ said his uncle, in a more composed tone, ‘that it is not
+deficiency of spirit, but the grovelling habits of a confined education,
+among the poor-spirited class you were condemned to herd with, that
+keeps you silent. You scarce yet believe yourself a Redgauntlet; your
+pulse has not yet learned the genuine throb that answers to the summons
+of honour and of patriotism.’
+
+‘I trust,’ replied Darsie, at last, ‘that I shall never be found
+indifferent to the call of either; but to answer them with effect--even
+were I convinced that they now sounded in my ear--I must see some
+reasonable hope of success in the desperate enterprise in which you
+would involve me. I look around me, and I see a settled government--an
+established authority--a born Briton on the throne--the very Highland
+mountaineers, upon whom alone the trust of the exiled family reposed,
+assembled into regiments which act under the orders of the existing
+dynasty. [The Highland regiments were first employed by the celebrated
+Earl of Chatham, who assumed to himself no small degree of praise for
+having called forth to the support of the country and the government,
+the valour which had been too often directed against both.] France has
+been utterly dismayed by the tremendous lessons of the last war, and
+will hardly provoke another. All without and within the kingdom is
+adverse to encountering a hopeless struggle, and you alone, sir, seem
+willing to undertake a desperate enterprise.’
+
+‘And would undertake it were it ten times more desperate; and have
+agitated it when ten times the obstacles were interposed. Have I forgot
+my brother’s blood? Can I--dare I even now repeat the Pater Noster,
+since my enemies and the murderers remain unforgiven? Is there an art I
+have not practised--a privation to which I have not submitted, to bring
+on the crisis, which I now behold arrived? Have I not been a vowed and a
+devoted man, forgoing every comfort of social life, renouncing even the
+exercise of devotion unless when I might name in prayer my prince and
+country, submitting to everything to make converts to this noble cause?
+Have I done all this, and shall I now stop short?’ Darsie was about to
+interrupt him, but he pressed his hand affectionately upon his shoulder,
+and enjoining, or rather imploring, silence, ‘Peace,’ he said, ‘heir of
+my ancestors’ fame--heir of all my hopes and wishes. Peace, son of my
+slaughtered brother! I have sought for thee, and mourned for thee, as
+a mother for an only child. Do not let me again lose you in the moment
+when you are restored to my hopes. Believe me, I distrust so much my own
+impatient temper, that I entreat you, as the dearest boon, do naught to
+awaken it at this crisis.’
+
+Darsie was not sorry to reply that his respect for the person of his
+relation would induce him to listen to all which he had to apprise him
+of, before he formed any definite resolution upon the weighty subjects
+of deliberation which he proposed to him.
+
+‘Deliberation!’ repeated Redgauntlet, impatiently; ‘and yet it is not
+ill said. I wish there had been more warmth in thy reply, Arthur; but I
+must recollect, were an eagle bred in a falcon’s mew and hooded like a
+reclaimed hawk, he could not at first gaze steadily on the sun. Listen
+to me, my dearest Arthur. The state of this nation no more implies
+prosperity, than the florid colour of a feverish patient is a symptom
+of health. All is false and hollow. The apparent success of Chatham’s
+administration has plunged the country deeper in debt than all the
+barren acres of Canada are worth, were they as fertile as Yorkshire--the
+dazzling lustre of the victories of Minden and Quebec have been dimmed
+by the disgrace of the hasty peace--by the war, England, at immense
+expense, gained nothing but honour, and that she has gratuitously
+resigned. Many eyes, formerly cold and indifferent, are now looking
+towards the line of our ancient and rightful monarchs, as the only
+refuge in the approaching storm--the rich are alarmed--the nobles are
+disgusted--the populace are inflamed--and a band of patriots, whose
+measures are more safe than their numbers are few, have resolved to set
+up King Charles’s standard.’
+
+‘But the military,’ said Darsie--‘how can you, with a body of unarmed
+and disorderly insurgents, propose to encounter a regular army. The
+Highlanders are now totally disarmed.’
+
+‘In a great measure, perhaps,’ answered Redgauntlet; ‘but the policy
+which raised the Highland regiments has provided for that. We have
+already friends in these corps; nor can we doubt for a moment what their
+conduct will be when the white cockade is once more mounted. The rest
+of the standing army has been greatly reduced since the peace; and we
+reckon confidently on our standard being joined by thousands of the
+disbanded troops.’
+
+‘Alas!’ said Darsie, ‘and is it upon such vague hopes as these, the
+inconstant humour of a crowd or of a disbanded soldiery, that men of
+honour are invited to risk their families, their property, their life?’
+
+‘Men of honour, boy,’ said Redgauntlet, his eyes glancing with
+impatience, ‘set life, property, family, and all at stake, when that
+honour commands it! We are not now weaker than when seven men, landing
+in the wilds of Moidart, shook the throne of the usurper till it
+tottered--won two pitched fields, besides overrunning one kingdom and
+the half of another, and, but for treachery, would have achieved what
+their venturous successors are now to attempt in their turn.’
+
+‘And will such an attempt be made in serious earnest?’ said Darsie.
+‘Excuse me, my uncle, if I can scarce believe a fact so extraordinary.
+Will there really be found men of rank and consequence sufficient to
+renew the adventure of 1745?’
+
+‘I will not give you my confidence by halves, Sir Arthur,’ replied his
+uncle--‘Look at that scroll--what say you to these names?--Are they not
+the flower of the western shires--of Wales of Scotland?’
+
+‘The paper contains indeed the names of many that are great and noble,’
+replied Darsie, after perusing it; ‘but’--
+
+‘But what?’ asked his uncle, impatiently; ‘do you doubt the ability of
+those nobles and gentlemen to furnish the aid in men and money at which
+they are rated?’
+
+‘Not their ability certainly,’ said Darsie, ‘for of that I am no
+competent judge; but I see in this scroll the name of Sir Arthur Darsie
+Redgauntlet of that Ilk, rated at a hundred men and upwards--I certainly
+am ignorant how he is to redeem that pledge.’
+
+‘I will be responsible for the men,’ replied Hugh Redgauntlet.
+
+‘But, my dear uncle,’ added Darsie, ‘I hope for your sake that the other
+individuals whose names are here written, have had more acquaintance
+with your plan than I have been indulged with.’
+
+‘For thee and thine I can be myself responsible,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘for
+if thou hast not the courage to head the force of thy house, the leading
+shall pass to other hands, and thy inheritance shall depart from thee
+like vigour and verdure from a rotten branch. For these honourable
+persons, a slight condition there is which they annex to their
+friendship--something so trifling that it is scarce worthy of mention.
+This boon granted to them by him who is most interested, there is no
+question they will take the field in the manner there stated.’
+
+Again Darsie perused the paper, and felt himself still less inclined to
+believe that so many men of family and fortune were likely to embark in
+an enterprise so fatal. It seemed as if some rash plotter had put
+down at a venture the names of all whom common report tainted with
+Jacobitism; or if it was really the act of the individuals named, he
+suspected that they must be aware of some mode of excusing themselves
+from compliance with its purport. It was impossible, he thought, that
+Englishmen, of large fortune, who had failed to join Charles when he
+broke into England at the head of a victorious army, should have the
+least thoughts of encouraging a descent when circumstances were so much
+less propitious. He therefore concluded the enterprise would fall to
+pieces of itself, and that his best way was, in the meantime, to remain
+silent, unless the actual approach of a crisis (which might, however,
+never arrive) should compel him to give a downright refusal to his
+uncle’s proposition; and if, in the interim, some door for escape should
+be opened, he resolved within himself not to omit availing himself of
+it.
+
+Hugh Redgauntlet watched his nephew’s looks for some time, and then, as
+if arriving from some other process of reasoning at the same conclusion,
+he said, ‘I have told you, Sir Arthur, that I do not urge your immediate
+accession to my proposal; indeed the consequences of a refusal would be
+so dreadful to yourself, so destructive to all the hopes which I have
+nursed, that I would not risk, by a moment’s impatience, the object of
+my whole life. Yes, Arthur, I have been a self-denying hermit at one
+time--at another, the apparent associate of outlaws and desperadoes--at
+another, the subordinate agent of men whom I felt in every way my
+inferiors--not for any selfish purpose of my own, no, not even to win
+for myself the renown of being the principal instrument in restoring
+my king and freeing my country. My first wish on earth is for
+that restoration and that freedom--my next, that my nephew, the
+representative of my house and of the brother of my love, may have the
+advantage and the credit of all my efforts in the good cause. But,’ he
+added, darting on Darsie one of his withering frowns, ‘if Scotland and
+my father’s house cannot stand and flourish together, then perish the
+very name of Redgauntlet! perish the son of my brother, with every
+recollection of the glories of my family, of the affections of my youth,
+rather than my country’s cause should be injured in the tithing of
+a barley-corn! The spirit of Sir Alberick is alive within me at this
+moment,’ he continued, drawing up his stately form and sitting erect in
+his saddle, while he pressed his finger against his forehead; ‘and if
+you yourself crossed my path in opposition, I swear, by the mark that
+darkens my brow, that a new deed should be done--a new doom should be
+deserved!’
+
+He was silent, and his threats were uttered in a tone of voice so deeply
+resolute, that Darsie’s heart sank within him, when he reflected on the
+storm of passion which he must encounter, if he declined to join his
+uncle in a project to which prudence and principle made him equally
+adverse. He had scarce any hope left but in temporizing until he could
+make his escape, and resolved to avail himself for that purpose of the
+delay which his uncle seemed not unwilling to grant. The stern,
+gloomy look of his companion became relaxed by degrees, and presently
+afterwards he made a sign to Miss Redgauntlet to join the party, and
+began a forced conversation on ordinary topics; in the course of which
+Darsie observed that his sister seemed to speak under the most cautious
+restraint, weighing every word before she uttered it, and always
+permitting her uncle to give the tone to the conversation, though of the
+most trifling kind. This seemed to him (such an opinion had he already
+entertained of his sister’s good sense and firmness) the strongest proof
+he had yet received of his uncle’s peremptory character, since he saw it
+observed with so much deference by a young person whose sex might have
+given her privileges, and who seemed by no means deficient either in
+spirit or firmness.
+
+The little cavalcade was now approaching the house of Father
+Crackenthorp, situated, as the reader knows, by the side of the
+Solway, and not far distant front a rude pier, near which lay several
+fishing-boats, which frequently acted in a different capacity. The house
+of the worthy publican was also adapted to the various occupations which
+he carried on, being a large scrambling assemblage of cottages attached
+to a house of two stories, roofed with flags of sandstone--the original
+mansion, to which the extensions of Mr. Crackenthorp’s trade had
+occasioned his making many additions. Instead of the single long
+watering-trough which usually distinguishes the front of the English
+public-house of the second class, there were three conveniences of that
+kind, for the use, as the landlord used to say, of the troop-horses when
+the soldiers came to search his house; while a knowing leer and a nod
+let you understand what species of troops he was thinking of. A huge
+ash-tree before the door, which had reared itself to a great size
+and height, in spite of the blasts from the neighbouring Solway,
+overshadowed, as usual, the ale-bench, as our ancestors called it,
+where, though it was still early in the day, several fellows, who seemed
+to be gentlemen’s servants, were drinking beer and smoking. One or two
+of them wore liveries which seemed known to Mr. Redgauntlet, for he
+muttered between his teeth, ‘Fools, fools! were they on a march to hell,
+they must have their rascals in livery with them, that the whole world
+might know who were going to be damned.’
+
+As he thus muttered, he drew bridle before the door of the place,
+from which several other lounging guests began to issue, to look with
+indolent curiosity as usual, upon an ARRIVAL.
+
+Redgauntlet sprang from his horse, and assisted his niece to dismount;
+but, forgetting, perhaps, his nephew’s disguise, he did not pay him the
+attention which his female dress demanded.
+
+The situation of Darsie was indeed something awkward; for Cristal Nixon,
+out of caution perhaps to prevent escape, had muffled the extreme folds
+of the riding-skirt with which he was accoutred, around his ankles and
+under his feet, and there secured it with large corking-pins. We presume
+that gentlemen-cavaliers may sometimes cast their eyes to that part
+of the person of the fair equestrians whom they chance occasionally to
+escort; and if they will conceive their own feet, like Darsie’s, muffled
+in such a labyrinth of folds and amplitude of robe, as modesty doubtless
+induces the fair creatures to assume upon such occasions, they will
+allow that, on a first attempt, they might find some awkwardness in
+dismounting. Darsie, at least, was in such a predicament, for, not
+receiving adroit assistance from the attendant of Mr. Redgauntlet, he
+stumbled as he dismounted from the horse, and might have had a bad fall,
+had it not been broken by the gallant interposition of a gentleman, who
+probably was, on his part, a little surprised at the solid weight of the
+distressed fair one whom he had the honour to receive in his embrace.
+But what was his surprise to that of Darsie, when the hurry of the
+moment and of the accident, permitted him to see that it was his friend
+Alan Fairford in whose arms he found himself! A thousand apprehensions
+rushed on him, mingled with the full career of hope and joy, inspired by
+the unexpected appearance of his beloved friend at the very crisis, it
+seemed, of his fate.
+
+He was about to whisper in his ear, cautioning him at the same time to
+be silent; yet he hesitated for a second or two to effect his purpose,
+since, should Redgauntlet take the alarm from any sudden exclamation on
+the part of Alan, there was no saying what consequences might ensue.
+
+Ere he could decide what was to be done, Redgauntlet, who had entered
+the house, returned hastily, followed by Cristal Nixon. ‘I’ll release
+you of the charge of this young lady, sir;’ he said, haughtily, to Alan
+Fairford, whom he probably did not recognize.
+
+‘I had no desire to intrude, sir,’ replied Alan; ‘the lady’s situation
+seemed to require assistance--and--but have I not the honour to speak to
+Mr. Herries of Birrenswork?’
+
+‘You are mistaken, sir,’ said Redgauntlet, turning short off, and
+making a sign with his hand to Cristal, who hurried Darsie, however
+unwillingly, into the house, whispering in his ear, ‘Come, miss, let us
+have no making of acquaintance from the windows. Ladies of fashion must
+be private. Show us a room, Father Crackenthorp.’
+
+So saying, he conducted Darsie into the house, interposing at the same
+time his person betwixt the supposed young lady and the stranger of whom
+he was suspicious, so as to make communication by signs impossible. As
+they entered, they heard the sound of a fiddle in the stone-floored
+and well-sanded kitchen, through which they were about to follow their
+corpulent host, and where several people seemed engaged in dancing to
+its strains.
+
+‘D--n thee,’ said Nixon to Crackenthorp, ‘would you have the lady go
+through all the mob of the parish? Hast thou no more private way to our
+sitting-room?’
+
+‘None that is fit for my travelling,’ answered the landlord, laying his
+hand on his portly stomach. ‘I am not Tom Turnpenny, to creep like a
+lizard through keyholes.’
+
+So saying, he kept moving on through the revellers in the kitchen; and
+Nixon, holding Darsie by his arm, as if to offer the lady support but
+in all probability to frustrate any effort at escape, moved through the
+crowd, which presented a very motley appearance, consisting of domestic
+servants, country fellows, seamen, and other idlers, whom Wandering
+Willie was regaling with his music.
+
+To pass another friend without intimation of his presence would have
+been actual pusillanimity; and just when they were passing the blind
+man’s elevated seat, Darsie asked him with some emphasis, whether he
+could not play a Scottish air? The man’s face had been the instant
+before devoid of all sort of expression, going through his performance
+like a clown through a beautiful country, too much accustomed to
+consider it as a task, to take any interest in the performance, and, in
+fact, scarce seeming to hear the noise that he was creating. In a
+word, he might at the time have made a companion to my friend Wilkie’s
+inimitable blind crowder. But with Wandering Willie this was only an
+occasional and a rare fit of dullness, such as will at times creep over
+all the professors of the fine arts, arising either from fatigue, or
+contempt of the present audience, or that caprice which so often tempts
+painters and musicians and great actors, in the phrase of the latter, to
+walk through their part, instead of exerting themselves with the energy
+which acquired their fame. But when the performer heard the voice of
+Darsie, his countenance became at once illuminated, and showed the
+complete mistake of those who suppose that the principal point of
+expression depends upon the eyes. With his face turned to the point from
+which the sound came, his upper lip a little curved, and quivering with
+agitation, and with a colour which surprise and pleasure had brought at
+once into his faded cheek, he exchanged the humdrum hornpipe which he
+had been sawing out with reluctant and lazy bow, for the fine Scottish
+air,
+
+  You’re welcome, Charlie Stuart,
+
+which flew from his strings as if by inspiration and after a breathless
+pause of admiration among the audience, was received with a clamour of
+applause, which seemed to show that the name and tendency, as well as
+the execution of the tune, was in the highest degree acceptable to all
+the party assembled.
+
+In the meantime, Cristal Nixon, still keeping hold of Darsie, and
+following the landlord, forced his way with some difficulty through the
+crowded kitchen, and entered a small apartment on the other side of it,
+where they found Lilias Redgauntlet already seated. Here Nixon gave
+way to his suppressed resentment, and turning sternly on Crackenthorp,
+threatened him with his master’s severest displeasure, because things
+were in such bad order to receive his family, when he had given such
+special advice that he desired to be private. But Father Crackenthorp
+was not a man to be brow-beaten.
+
+‘Why, brother Nixon, thou art angry this morning,’ he replied; ‘hast
+risen from thy wrong side, I think. You know, as well as I, that most of
+this mob is of the squire’s own making--gentlemen that come with their
+servants, and so forth, to meet him in the way of business, as old Tom
+Turnpenny says--the very last that came was sent down with Dick Gardener
+from Fairladies.’
+
+‘But the blind scraping scoundrel yonder,’ said Nixon, ‘how dared you
+take such a rascal as that across your threshold at such a time as this?
+If the squire should dream you have a thought of peaching--I am only
+speaking for your good, Father Crackenthorp.’
+
+‘Why, look ye, brother Nixon,’ said Crackenthorp, turning his quid with
+great composure, ‘the squire is a very worthy gentleman, and I’ll never
+deny it; but I am neither his servant nor his tenant, and so he need
+send me none of his orders till he hears I have put on his livery. As
+for turning away folk from my door, I might as well plug up the ale-tap,
+and pull down the sign--and as for peaching, and such like, the squire
+will find the folk here are as honest to the full as those he brings
+with him.’
+
+‘How, you impudent lump of tallow,’ said Nixon, ‘what do you mean by
+that?’
+
+‘Nothing,’ said Crackenthorp, ‘but that I can tour out as well as
+another--you understand me--keep good lights in my upper story--know a
+thing or two more than most folk in this country. If folk will come to
+my house on dangerous errands, egad they shall not find Joe Crackenthorp
+a cat’s-paw. I’ll keep myself clear, you may depend on it, and let every
+man answer for his own actions--that’s my way. Anything wanted, Master
+Nixon?’
+
+‘No--yes--begone!’ said Nixon, who seemed embarrassed with the
+landlord’s contumacy, yet desirous to conceal the effect it produced on
+him.
+
+The door was no sooner closed on Crackenthorp, than Miss Redgauntlet,
+addressing Nixon, commanded him to leave the room and go to his proper
+place.
+
+‘How, madam?’ said the fellow sullenly, yet with an air of respect,
+‘Would you have your uncle pistol me for disobeying his orders?’
+
+‘He may perhaps pistol you for some other reason, if you do not obey
+mine,’ said Lilias, composedly.
+
+‘You abuse your advantage over me, madam--I really dare not go--I am on
+guard over this other miss here; and if I should desert my post, my life
+were not worth five minutes’ purchase.’
+
+‘Then know your post, sir,’ said Lilias, ‘and watch on the outside of
+the door. You have no commission to listen to our private conversation,
+I suppose? Begone, sir, without further speech or remonstrance, or I
+will tell my uncle that which you would have reason to repent be should
+know.’
+
+The fellow looked at her with a singular expression of spite, mixed
+with deference. ‘You abuse your advantages, madam,’ he said, ‘and act as
+foolishly in doing so as I did in affording you such a hank over me. But
+you are a tyrant; and tyrants have commonly short reigns.’
+
+So saying, he left the apartment.
+
+‘The wretch’s unparalleled insolence,’ said Lilias to her brother, ‘has
+given me one great advantage over him. For knowing that my uncle would
+shoot him with as little remorse as a woodcock, if he but guessed at his
+brazen-faced assurance towards me, he dares not since that time assume,
+so far as I am concerned, the air of insolent domination which the
+possession of my uncle’s secrets, and the knowledge of his most secret
+plans, have led him to exert over others of his family.’
+
+‘In the meantime,’ said Darsie, ‘I am happy to see that the landlord
+of the house does not seem so devoted to him as I apprehended; and this
+aids the hope of escape which I am nourishing for you and for myself. O
+Lilias! the truest of friends, Alan Fairford, is in pursuit of me, and
+is here at this moment. Another humble, but, I think, faithful friend,
+is also within these dangerous walls.’
+
+Lilias laid her finger on her lips, and pointed to the door. Darsie took
+the hint, lowered his voice, and informed her in whispers of the arrival
+of Fairford, and that he believed he had opened a communication with
+Wandering Willie. She listened with the utmost interest, and had just
+begun to reply, when a loud noise was heard in the kitchen, caused
+by several contending voices, amongst which Darsie thought he could
+distinguish that of Alan Fairford.
+
+Forgetting how little his own condition permitted him to become the
+assistant of another, Darsie flew to the door of the room, and finding
+it locked and bolted on the outside, rushed against it with all
+his force, and made the most desperate efforts to burst it open,
+notwithstanding the entreaties of his sister that he would compose
+himself and recollect the condition in which he was placed. But the
+door, framed to withstand attacks from excisemen, constables, and other
+personages, considered as worthy to use what are called the king’s keys,
+[In common parlance, a crowbar and hatchet.] ‘and therewith to make
+lockfast places open and patent,’ set his efforts at defiance. Meantime
+the noise continued without, and we are to give an account of its origin
+in our next chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+NARRATIVE OF DARSIE LATIMER, CONTINUED
+
+Joe Crackenthorp’s public-house had never, since it first reared
+its chimneys on the banks of the Solway, been frequented by such a
+miscellaneous group of visitors as had that morning become its guests.
+Several of them were persons whose quality seemed much superior to
+their dresses and modes of travelling. The servants who attended them
+contradicted the inferences to be drawn from the garb of their masters,
+and, according to the custom of the knights of the rainbow, gave many
+hints that they were not people to serve any but men of first-rate
+consequence. These gentlemen, who had come thither chiefly for the
+purpose of meeting with Mr. Redgauntlet, seemed moody and anxious,
+conversed and walked together apparently in deep conversation, and
+avoided any communication with the chance travellers whom accident
+brought that morning to the same place of resort.
+
+As if Fate had set herself to confound the plans of the Jacobite
+conspirators, the number of travellers was unusually great, their
+appearance respectable, and they filled the public tap-room of the inn,
+where the political guests had already occupied most of the private
+apartments.
+
+Amongst others, honest Joshua Geddes had arrived, travelling, as he
+said, in the sorrow of the soul, and mourning for the fate of Darsie
+Latimer as he would for his first-born child. He had skirted the whole
+coast of the Solway, besides making various trips into the interior,
+not shunning, on such occasions, to expose himself to the laugh of the
+scorner, nay, even to serious personal risk, by frequenting the haunts
+of smugglers, horse-jockeys, and other irregular persons, who looked
+on his intrusion with jealous eyes, and were apt to consider him as
+an exciseman in the disguise of a Quaker. All this labour and peril,
+however, had been undergone in vain. No search he could make obtained
+the least intelligence of Latimer, so that he began to fear the poor lad
+had been spirited abroad--for the practice of kidnapping was then not
+infrequent, especially on the western coasts of Britain--if indeed he
+had escaped a briefer and more bloody fate.
+
+With a heavy heart, he delivered his horse, even Solomon, into the hands
+of the ostler, and walking into the inn, demanded from the landlord
+breakfast and a private room. Quakers, and such hosts as old Father
+Crackenthorp, are no congenial spirits; the latter looked askew over his
+shoulder, and replied, ‘If you would have breakfast here, friend, you
+are like to eat it where other folk eat theirs.’
+
+‘And wherefore can I not,’ said the Quaker, ‘have an apartment to
+myself, for my money?’
+
+‘Because, Master Jonathan, you must wait till your betters be served, or
+else eat with your equals.’
+
+Joshua Geddes argued the point no further, but sitting quietly down on
+the seat which Crackenthorp indicated to him, and calling for a pint
+of ale, with some bread, butter, and Dutch cheese, began to satisfy the
+appetite which the morning air had rendered unusually alert.
+
+While the honest Quaker was thus employed, another stranger entered the
+apartment, and sat down near to the table on which his victuals were
+placed. He looked repeatedly at Joshua, licked his parched and chopped
+lips as he saw the good Quaker masticate his bread and cheese, and
+sucked up his thin chops when Mr. Geddes applied the tankard to his
+mouth, as if the discharge of these bodily functions by another had
+awakened his sympathies in an uncontrollable degree. At last, being
+apparently unable to withstand his longings, he asked, in a faltering
+tone, the huge landlord, who was tramping through the room in all
+corpulent impatience, whether he could have a plack-pie?’
+
+‘Never heard of such a thing, master,’ said the landlord, and was about
+to trudge onward; when the guest, detaining him, said, in a strong
+Scottish tone, ‘Ya will maybe have nae whey then, nor buttermilk, nor ye
+couldna exhibit a souter’s clod?’
+
+‘Can’t tell what ye are talking about, master,’ said Crackenthorp.
+
+‘Then ye will have nae breakfast that will come within ‘the compass of a
+shilling Scots?’
+
+‘Which is a penny sterling,’ answered Crackenthorp, with a sneer. ‘Why,
+no, Sawney, I can’t say as we have--we can’t afford it; But you shall
+have a bellyful for love, as we say in the bull-ring.’
+
+‘I shall never refuse a fair offer,’ said the poverty-stricken guest;
+‘and I will say that for the English, if they were deils, that they are
+a ceeveleesed people to gentlemen that are under a cloud.’
+
+‘Gentlemen!--humph!’ said Crackenthorp--‘not a blue-cap among them but
+halts upon that foot.’ Then seizing on a dish which still contained a
+huge cantle of what had been once a princely mutton pasty, he placed
+it on the table before the stranger, saying, ‘There, master gentleman;
+there is what is worth all the black pies, as you call them, that were
+ever made of sheep’s head.’
+
+‘Sheep’s head is a gude thing, for a’ that,’ replied the guest; but
+not being spoken so loud as to offend his hospitable entertainer, the
+interjection might pass for a private protest against the scandal thrown
+out against the standing dish of Caledonia.
+
+This premised, he immediately began to transfer the mutton and
+pie-crust from his plate to his lips, in such huge gobbets, as if he was
+refreshing after a three days’ fast, and laying in provisions against a
+whole Lent to come.
+
+Joshua Geddes in his turn gazed on him with surprise, having never, he
+thought, beheld such a gaunt expression of hunger in the act of eating.
+‘Friend,’ he said, after watching him for some minutes, ‘if thou gorgest
+thyself in this fashion, thou wilt assuredly choke. Wilt thou not take a
+draught out of my cup to help down all that dry meat?’
+
+‘Troth,’ said the stranger, stopping and looking at the friendly
+propounder, ‘that’s nae bad overture, as they say in the General
+Assembly. I have heard waur motions than that frae wiser counsel.’
+
+Mr. Geddes ordered a quart of home-brewed to be placed before our friend
+Peter Peebles; for the reader must have already conceived that this
+unfortunate litigant was the wanderer in question.
+
+The victim of Themis had no sooner seen the flagon, than he seized
+it with the same energy which he had displayed in operating upon the
+pie--puffed off the froth with such emphasis, that some of it lighted on
+Mr. Geddes’s head--and then said, as if with it sudden recollection of
+what was due to civility, ‘Here’s to ye, friend. What! are ye ower grand
+to give me an answer, or are ye dull o’ hearing?’
+
+‘I prithee drink thy liquor, friend,’ said the good Quaker; ‘thou
+meanest it in civility, but we care not for these idle fashions.’
+
+‘What! ye are a Quaker, are ye?’ said Peter; and without further
+ceremony reared the flagon to his head, from which he withdrew it not
+while a single drop of ‘barley-broo’ remained. ‘That’s done you and
+me muckle gude,’ he said, sighing as he set down his pot; ‘but twa
+mutchkins o’ yill between twa folk is a drappie ower little measure.
+What say ye to anither pot? or shall we cry in a blithe Scots pint at
+ance? The yill is no amiss.’
+
+‘Thou mayst call for what thou wilt on thine own charges, friend,’ said
+Geddes; ‘for myself, I willingly contribute to the quenching of thy
+natural thirst; but I fear it were no such easy matter to relieve thy
+acquired and artificial drought.’
+
+‘That is to say, in plain terms, ye are for withdrawing your caution
+with the folk of the house? You Quaker folk are but fause comforters;
+but since ye have garred me drink sae muckle cauld yill--me that am no
+used to the like of it in the forenoon--I think ye might as weel have
+offered me a glass of brandy or usquabae--I’m nae nice body--I can drink
+onything that’s wet and toothsome.’
+
+‘Not a drop at my cost, friend,’ quoth Geddes. ‘Thou art an old man, and
+hast perchance a heavy and long journey before thee. Thou art, moreover,
+my countryman, as I judge from thy tongue; and I will not give thee the
+means of dishonouring thy grey hairs in a strange land.’
+
+‘Grey hairs, neighbour!’ said Peter, with a wink to the bystanders, whom
+this dialogue began to interest, and who were in hopes of seeing the
+Quaker played off by the crazed beggar, for such Peter Peebles appeared
+to be. ‘Grey hairs! The Lord mend your eyesight, neighbour, that disna
+ken grey hairs frae a tow wig!’
+
+This jest procured a shout of laughter, and, what was still more
+acceptable than dry applause, a man who stood beside called out, ‘Father
+Crackenthorp, bring a nipperkin of brandy. I’ll bestow a dram on this
+fellow, were it but for that very word.’
+
+The brandy was immediately brought by a wench who acted as barmaid; and
+Peter, with a grin of delight, filled a glass, quaffed it off, and then
+saying, ‘God bless me! I was so unmannerly as not to drink to ye--I
+think the Quaker has smitten me wi’ his ill-bred havings,’--he was about
+to fill another, when his hand was arrested by his new friend; who said
+at the same time, ‘No, no, friend--fair play’s a jewel--time about, if
+you please.’ And filling a glass for himself, emptied it as gallantly
+as Peter could have done. ‘What say you to that, friend?’ he continued,
+addressing the Quaker.
+
+‘Nay, friend,’ answered Joshua, ‘it went down thy throat, not mine; and
+I have nothing to say about what concerns me not; but if thou art a
+man of humanity, thou wilt not give this poor creature the means of
+debauchery. Bethink thee that they will spurn him from the door, as
+they would do a houseless and masterless dog, and that he may die on the
+sands or on the common. And if he has through thy means been rendered
+incapable of helping himself, thou shalt not be innocent of his blood.’
+
+‘Faith, Broadbrim, I believe thou art right, and the old gentleman in
+the flaxen jazy shall have no more of the comforter. Besides, we have
+business in hand to-day, and this fellow, for as mad as he looks, may
+have a nose on his face after all. Hark ye, father,--what is your name,
+and what brings you into such an out-of-the-way corner?’
+
+‘I am not just free to condescend on my name,’ said Peter; ‘and as for
+my business--there is a wee dribble of brandy in the stoup--it would be
+wrang to leave it to the lass--it is learning her bad usages.’
+
+‘Well, thou shalt have the brandy, and be d--d to thee, if thou wilt
+tell me what you are making here.’
+
+‘Seeking a young advocate chap that they ca’ Alan Fairford, that has
+played me a slippery trick, and ye maun ken a’ about the cause,’ said
+Peter.
+
+‘An advocate, man!’ answered the captain of the JUMPING JENNY--for it
+was he, and no other, who had taken compassion on Peter’s drought;
+‘why, Lord help thee, thou art on the wrong side of the Firth to seek
+advocates, whom I take to be Scottish lawyers, not English.’
+
+‘English lawyers, man!’ exclaimed Peter, ‘the deil a lawyer’s in a’
+England.’
+
+‘I wish from my soul it were true,’ said Ewart; ‘but what the devil put
+that in your head?’
+
+‘Lord, man, I got a grip of ane of their attorneys in Carlisle, and he
+tauld me that there wasna a lawyer in England ony mair than himsell that
+kend the nature of a multiple-poinding! And when I told him how this
+loopy lad, Alan Fairford, had served me, he said I might bring an action
+on the case--just as if the case hadna as mony actions already as one
+case can weel carry. By my word, it is a gude case, and muckle has it
+borne, in its day, of various procedure--but it’s the barley-pickle
+breaks the naig’s back, and wi’ my consent it shall not hae ony mair
+burden laid upon it.’
+
+‘But this Alan Fairford?’ said Nanty--‘come--sip up the drop of brandy,
+man, and tell me some more about him, and whether you are seeking him
+for good or for harm.’
+
+‘For my ain gude, and for his harm, to be sure,’ said Peter. ‘Think of
+his having left my cause in the dead-thraw between the tyneing and
+the winning, and capering off into Cumberland here, after a wild
+loup-the-tether lad they ca’ Darsie Latimer.’
+
+‘Darsie Latimer!’ said Mr. Geddes, hastily; ‘do you know anything of
+Darsie Latimer?’
+
+‘Maybe I do, and maybe I do not,’ answered Peter; ‘I am no free to
+answer every body’s interrogatory, unless it is put judicially, and by
+form of law--specially where folk think so much of a caup of sour yill,
+or a thimblefu’ of brandy. But as for this gentleman, that has shown
+himself a gentleman at breakfast, and will show himself a gentleman at
+the meridian, I am free to condescend upon any points in the cause that
+may appear to bear upon the question at issue.’
+
+‘Why, all I want to know from you, my friend, is, whether you are
+seeking to do this Mr. Alan Fairford good or harm; because if you come
+to do him good, I think you could maybe get speech of him--and if to do
+him harm, I will take the liberty to give you a cast across the Firth,
+with fair warning not to come back on such an errand, lest worse come of
+it.’
+
+The manner and language of Ewart were such that Joshua Geddes resolved
+to keep cautious silence, till he could more plainly discover whether he
+was likely to aid or impede him in his researches after Darsie Latimer.
+He therefore determined to listen attentively to what should pass
+between Peter and the seaman, and to watch for an opportunity of
+questioning the former, so soon as he should be separated from his new
+acquaintance.
+
+‘I wad by no means,’ said Peter Peebles, ‘do any substantial harm to the
+poor lad Fairford, who has had mony a gowd guinea of mine, as weel as
+his father before him; but I wad hae him brought back to the minding of
+my business and his ain; and maybe I wadna insist further in my action
+of damages against him, than for refunding the fees, and for some annual
+rent on the principal sum due frae the day on which he should have
+recovered it for me, plack and bawbee, at the great advising; for ye
+are aware, that is the least that I can ask NOMINE DAMNI; and I have nae
+thought to break down the lad bodily a’thegither--we maun live and let
+live--forgie and forget.’
+
+‘The deuce take me, friend Broadbrim,’ said Nanty Ewart, looking to the
+Quaker, ‘if I can make out what this old scarecrow means. If I thought
+it was fitting that Master Fairford should see him, why perhaps it is
+a matter that could be managed. Do you know anything about the old
+fellow?--you seemed to take some charge of him just now.’
+
+‘No more than I should have done by any one in distress,’ said Geddes,
+not sorry to be appealed to; ‘but I will try what I can do to find out
+who he is, and what he is about in this country. But are we not a little
+too public in this open room?’
+
+‘It’s well thought of,’ said Nanty; and at his command the barmaid
+ushered the party into a side-booth, Peter attending them in the
+instinctive hope that there would be more liquor drunk among them before
+parting. They had scarce sat down in their new apartment, when the sound
+of a violin was heard in the room which they had just left.
+
+‘I’ll awa back yonder,’ said Peter, rising up again; ‘yon’s the sound of
+a fiddle, and when there is music, there’s ay something ganging to eat
+or drink.’
+
+‘I am just going to order something here,’ said the Quaker; ‘but in the
+meantime, have you any objection, my good friend, to tell us your name?’
+
+‘None in the world, if you are wanting to drink to me by name and
+surname,’ answered Peebles; ‘but, otherwise, I would rather evite your
+interrogatories.’
+
+‘Friend,’ said the Quaker, ‘it is not for thine own health, seeing thou
+hast drunk enough already--however--here, handmaiden--bring me a gill of
+sherry.’
+
+‘Sherry’s but shilpit drink, and a gill’s a sma’ measure for twa
+gentlemen to crack ower at their first acquaintance. But let us see your
+sneaking gill of sherry,’ said Poor Peter, thrusting forth his huge
+hand to seize on the diminutive pewter measure, which, according to the
+fashion of the time, contained the generous liquor freshly drawn from
+the butt.
+
+‘Nay, hold, friend,’ said Joshua, ‘thou hast not yet told me what name
+and surname I am to call thee by.’
+
+‘D--d sly in the Quaker,’ said Nanty, apart, ‘to make him pay for his
+liquor before he gives it him. Now, I am such a fool, that I should have
+let him get too drunk to open his mouth, before I thought of asking him
+a question.’
+
+‘My name is Peter Peebles, then,’ said the litigant, rather sulkily,
+as one who thought his liquor too sparingly meted out to him; ‘and what
+have you to say to that?’
+
+‘Peter Peebles?’ repeated Nanty Ewart and seemed to muse upon something
+which the words brought to his remembrance, while the Quaker pursued his
+examination.
+
+‘But I prithee, Peter Peebles, what is thy further designation? Thou
+knowest, in our country, that some men are distinguished by their craft
+and calling, as cordwainers, fishers, weavers, or the like, and some by
+their titles as proprietors of land (which savours of vanity)--now, how
+may you be distinguished from others of the same name?’
+
+‘As Peter Peebles of the great plea of Poor Peter Peebles against
+Plainstanes, ET PER CONTRA--if I am laird of naething else, I am ay a
+DOMINUS LITIS.’
+
+‘It’s but a poor lairdship, I doubt,’ said Joshua.
+
+‘Pray, Mr. Peebles,’ said Nanty, interrupting the conversation abruptly,
+‘were not you once a burgess of Edinburgh?’
+
+‘WAS I a burgess!’ said Peter indignantly, ‘and AM I not a burgess even
+now? I have done nothing to forfeit my right, I trow--once provost and
+ay my lord.’
+
+‘Well, Mr. Burgess, tell me further, have you not some property in the
+Gude Town?’ continued Ewart.
+
+‘Troth have I--that is, before my misfortunes, I had twa or three bonny
+bits of mailings amang the closes and wynds, forby the shop and the
+story abune it. But Plainstanes has put me to the causeway now. Never
+mind though, I will be upsides with him yet.’
+
+‘Had not you once a tenement in the Covenant Close?’ again demanded
+Nanty.
+
+‘You have hit it, lad, though ye look not like a Covenanter,’ said
+Peter; ‘we’ll drink to its memory--(Hout! the heart’s at the mouth o’
+that ill-faur’d bit stoup already!)--it brought a rent, reckoning from
+the crawstep to the groundsill, that ye might ca’ fourteen punds a year,
+forby the laigh cellar that was let to Lucky Littleworth.’
+
+‘And do you not remember that you had a poor old lady for your tenant,
+Mrs. Cantrips of Kittlebasket?’ said Nanty, suppressing his emotion with
+difficulty.
+
+‘Remember! G--d, I have gude cause to remember her,’ said Peter, ‘for
+she turned a dyvour on my hands, the auld besom! and after a’ that the
+law could do to make me satisfied and paid, in the way of poinding and
+distrenzieing and sae forth, as the law will, she ran awa to the charity
+workhouse, a matter of twenty punds Scots in my debt--it’s a great shame
+and oppression that charity workhouse, taking in bankrupt dyvours that
+canna, pay their honest creditors.’
+
+‘Methinks, friend,’ said the Quaker, ‘thine own rags might teach thee
+compassion for other people’s nakedness.’
+
+‘Rags!’ said Peter, taking Joshua’s words literally; ‘does ony wise body
+put on their best coat when they are travelling, and keeping company
+with Quakers, and such other cattle as the road affords?’
+
+‘The old lady DIED, I have heard,’ said Nanty, affecting a moderation
+which was belied by accents that faltered with passion.
+
+‘She might live or die, for what I care,’ answered Peter the Cruel;
+‘what business have folk to do to live that canna live as law will, and
+satisfy their just and lawful creditors?’
+
+‘And you--you that are now yourself trodden down in the very kennel,
+are you not sorry for what you have done? Do you not repent having
+occasioned the poor widow woman’s death?’
+
+‘What for should I repent?’ said Peter; ‘the law was on my side--a
+decreet of the bailies, followed by poinding, and an act of warding--a
+suspension intented, and the letters found orderly proceeded. I followed
+the auld rudas through twa courts--she cost me mair money than her lugs
+were worth.’
+
+‘Now, by Heaven!’ said Nanty, ‘I would give a thousand guineas, if I had
+them, to have you worth my beating! Had you said you repented, it had
+been between God and your conscience; but to hear you boast of your
+villany--Do you think it little to have reduced the aged to famine, and
+the young to infamy--to have caused the death of one woman, the ruin of
+another, and to have driven a man to exile and despair? By Him that made
+me, I can scarce keep hands off you!
+
+‘Off me? I defy ye!’ said Peter. ‘I take this honest man to witness that
+if ye stir the neck of my collar, I will have my action for stouthreif,
+spulzie, oppression, assault and battery. Here’s a bra’ din, indeed,
+about an auld wife gaun to the grave, a young limmer to the close-heads
+and causeway, and a sticket stibbler [A student of divinity who has not
+been able to complete his studies on theology.] to the sea instead of
+the gallows!’
+
+‘Now, by my soul,’ said Nanty, ‘this is too much! and since you can feel
+no otherwise, I will try if I cannot beat some humanity into your head
+and shoulders.’
+
+He drew his hanger as he spoke, and although Joshua, who had in vain
+endeavoured to interrupt the dialogue to which he foresaw a violent
+termination, now threw himself between Nanty and the old litigant, he
+could not prevent the latter from receiving two or three sound slaps
+over the shoulder with the flat side of the weapon.
+
+Poor Peter Peebles, as inglorious in his extremity as he had been
+presumptuous in bringing it on, now ran and roared, and bolted out of
+the apartment and house itself, pursued by Nanty, whose passion became
+high in proportion to his giving way to its dictates, and by Joshua, who
+still interfered at every risk, calling upon Nanty to reflect on the
+age and miserable circumstances of the offender, and upon Poor Peter
+to stand and place himself under his protection. In front of the house,
+however, Peter Peebles found a more efficient protector than the worthy
+Quaker.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+NARRATIVE OF ALAN FAIRFORD
+
+Our readers may recollect that Fairford had been conducted by Dick
+Gardener from the house of Fairladies to the inn of old Father
+Crackenthorp, in order, as he had been informed by the mysterious Father
+Buonaventure, that he might have the meeting which he desired with Mr.
+Redgauntlet, to treat with him for the liberty of his friend Darsie. His
+guide, by the special direction of Mr. Ambrose, had introduced him into
+the public-house by a back-door, and recommended to the landlord to
+accommodate him with a private apartment, and to treat him with all
+civility; but in other respects to keep his eye on him, and even to
+secure his person, if he saw any reason to suspect him to be a spy. He
+was not, however, subjected to any direct restraint, but was ushered
+into an apartment where he was requested to await the arrival of
+the gentleman with whom he wished to have an interview, and who, as
+Crackenthorp assured, him with a significant nod, would be certainly
+there in the course of an hour. In the meanwhile, he recommended to him,
+with another significant sign, to keep his apartment, ‘as there were
+people in the house who were apt to busy themselves about other folk’s
+matters.’
+
+Alan Fairford complied with the recommendation, so long as he thought
+it reasonable; but when, among a large party riding up to the house, he
+discerned Redgauntlet, whom he had seen under the name of Mr. Herries
+of Birrenswork, and whom, by his height and strength, he easily
+distinguished from the rest, he thought it proper to go down to the
+front of the house, in hopes that, by more closely reconnoitring the
+party, he might discover if his friend Darsie was among them.
+
+The reader is aware that, by doing so, he had an opportunity of breaking
+Darsie’s fall from his side-saddle, although his disguise and mask
+prevented his recognizing his friend. It may be also recollected that
+while Nixon hurried Miss Redgauntlet and her brother into the house,
+their uncle, somewhat chafed at an unexpected and inconvenient
+interruption, remained himself in parley with Fairford, who had already
+successively addressed him by the names of Herries and Redgauntlet;
+neither of which, any more than the acquaintance of the young lawyer,
+he seemed at the moment willing to acknowledge, though an air of haughty
+indifference, which he assumed, could not conceal his vexation and
+embarrassment.
+
+‘If we must needs be acquainted, sir,’ he said at last--‘for which I
+am unable to see any necessity, especially as I am now particularly
+disposed to be private--I must entreat you will tell me at once what you
+have to say, and permit me to attend to matters of more importance.’
+
+‘My introduction,’ said Fairford, ‘is contained in this
+letter.--(Delivering that of Maxwell.)--I am convinced that, under
+whatever name it may be your pleasure for the present to be known, it is
+into your hands, and yours only, that it should be delivered.’
+
+Redgauntlet turned the letter in his hand--then read the contents then
+again looked upon the letter, and sternly observed, ‘The seal of the
+letter has been broken. Was this the case, sir, when it was delivered
+into your hand?’
+
+Fairford despised a falsehood as much as any man,--unless, perhaps, as
+Tom Turnpenny might have said, ‘in the way of business.’ He answered
+readily and firmly, ‘The seal was whole when the letter was delivered to
+me by Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees.’
+
+‘And did you dare, sir, to break the seal of a letter addressed to me?’
+said Redgauntlet, not sorry, perhaps, to pick a quarrel upon a point
+foreign to the tenor of the epistle.
+
+‘I have never broken the seal of any letter committed to my charge,’
+said Alan; ‘not from fear of those to whom such letter might be
+addressed, but from respect to myself.’
+
+‘That is well worded,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘and yet, young Mr. Counsellor,
+I doubt whether your delicacy prevented your reading my letter, or
+listening to the contents as read by some other person after it was
+opened.’
+
+‘I certainly did hear the contents read over,’ said Fairford; ‘and they
+were such as to surprise me a good deal.’
+
+‘Now that,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘I hold to be pretty much the same, IN
+FORO CONSCIENTIAE, as if you had broken the seal yourself. I shall hold
+myself excused from entering upon further discourse with a messenger
+so faithless; and you may thank yourself if your journey has been
+fruitless.’
+
+‘Stay, sir,’ said Fairford; ‘and know that I became acquainted with the
+contents of the paper without my consent--I may even say, against my
+will; for Mr. Buonaventure’--
+
+‘Who?’ demanded Redgauntlet, in a wild and alarmed manner--‘WHOM was it
+you named?’
+
+‘Father Buonaventure,’ said Alan,--‘a Catholic priest, as I apprehend,
+whom I saw at the Misses Arthuret’s house, called Fairladies.’
+
+‘Misses Arthuret!--Fairladies!--A Catholic priest!--Father
+Buonaventure!’ said Redgauntlet, repeating the words of Alan with
+astonishment.--‘Is it possible that human rashness can reach such a
+point of infatuation? Tell me the truth, I conjure you, sir. I have
+the deepest interest to know whether this is more than an idle legend,
+picked up from hearsay about the country. You are a lawyer, and know the
+risk incurred by the Catholic clergy, whom the discharge of their duty
+sends to these bloody shores.’
+
+‘I am a lawyer, certainly,’ said Fairford; ‘but my holding such a
+respectable condition in life warrants that I am neither an informer
+nor a spy. Here is sufficient evidence that I have seen Father
+Buonaventure.’
+
+He put Buonaventure’s letter into Redgauntlet’s hand, and watched his
+looks closely while he read it. ‘Double-dyed infatuation!’ he muttered,
+with looks in which sorrow, displeasure, and anxiety were mingled.
+‘“Save me from the indiscretion of my friends,” says the Spaniard; “I
+can save myself from the hostility of my enemies.”’
+
+He then read the letter attentively, and for two or three minutes
+was lost in thought, while some purpose of importance seemed to have
+gathered and sit brooding upon his countenance. He held up his finger
+towards his satellite, Cristal Nixon, who replied to his signal with a
+prompt nod; and with one or two of the attendants approached Fairford in
+such a manner as to make him apprehensive they were about to lay hold of
+him.
+
+At this moment a noise was heard from withinside of the house, and
+presently rushed forth Peter Peebles, pursued by Nanty Ewart with his
+drawn hanger, and the worthy Quaker, who was endeavouring to prevent
+mischief to others, at some risk of bringing it on himself.
+
+A wilder and yet a more absurd figure can hardly be imagined, than that
+of Poor Peter clattering along as fast as his huge boots would permit
+him, and resembling nothing so much as a flying scarecrow; while the
+thin emaciated form of Nanty Ewart, with the hue of death on his cheek,
+and the fire of vengeance glancing from his eye, formed a ghastly
+contrast with the ridiculous object of his pursuit.
+
+Redgauntlet threw himself between them. ‘What extravagant folly is
+this?’ he said. ‘Put up your weapon, captain. Is this a time to indulge
+in drunken brawls, or is such a miserable object as that a fitting
+antagonist for a man of courage?’
+
+‘I beg pardon,’ said the captain, sheathing his weapon--‘I was a little
+bit out of the way, to be sure; but to know the provocation, a man must
+read my heart, and that I hardly dare to do myself. But the wretch is
+safe from me. Heaven has done its own vengeance on us both.’
+
+While he spoke in this manner, Peter Peebles, who had at first crept
+behind Redgauntlet in bodily fear, began now to reassume his spirits.
+Pulling his protector by the sleeve, ‘Mr. Herries--Mr. Herries,’ he
+whispered, eagerly, ‘ye have done me mair than ae gude turn, and if ye
+will but do me anither at this dead pinch, I’ll forgie the girded keg of
+brandy that you and Captain Sir Harry Redgimlet drank out yon time. Ye
+sall hae an ample discharge and renunciation, and, though I should see
+you walking at the Cross of Edinburgh, or standing at the bar of the
+Court of Justiciary, no the very thumbikins themselves should bring to
+my memory that ever I saw you in arms yon day.’
+
+He accompanied this promise by pulling so hard at Redgauntlet’s cloak,
+that he at last turned round. ‘Idiot! speak in a word what you want.’
+
+‘Aweel, aweel. In a word, then,’ said Peter Peebles, ‘I have a warrant
+on me to apprehend that man that stands there, Alan Fairford by name,
+and advocate by calling. I bought it from Maister Justice Foxley’s
+clerk, Maister Nicholas Faggot, wi’ the guinea that you gied me.
+
+‘Ha!’ said Redgauntlet, ‘hast thou really such a warrant? let me see it.
+Look sharp that no one escape, Cristal Nixon.’
+
+Peter produced a huge, greasy, leathern pocketbook, too dirty to
+permit its original colour to be visible, filled with scrolls of notes,
+memorials to counsel, and Heaven knows what besides. From amongst this
+precious mass he culled forth a paper, and placed it in the hands of
+Redgauntlet, or Herries, as he continued to call him, saying, at the
+same time, ‘It’s a formal and binding warrant, proceeding on my affidavy
+made, that the said Alan Fairford, being lawfully engaged in my service,
+had slipped the tether and fled over the Border, and was now lurking
+there and thereabouts, to elude and evite the discharge of his bounden
+duty to me; and therefore granting warrant to constables and others,
+to seek for, take, and apprehend him, that he may be brought before
+the Honourable Justice Foxley for examination, and, if necessary, for
+commitment. Now, though a’ this be fairly set down, as I tell ye, yet
+where am I to get an officer to execute this warrant in sic a country as
+this, where swords and pistols flee out at a word’s speaking, and folk
+care as little for the peace of King George as the peace of Auld King
+Coul? There’s that drunken skipper, and that wet Quaker, enticed me into
+the public this morning, and because I wadna gie them’ as much brandy as
+wad have made them blind-drunk, they baith fell on me, and were in the
+way of guiding me very ill.’
+
+While Peter went on in this manner, Redgauntlet glanced his eye over the
+warrant, and immediately saw that it must be a trick passed by Nicholas
+Faggot, to cheat the poor insane wretch out of his solitary guinea. But
+the Justice had actually subscribed it, as he did whatever his clerk
+presented to him, and Redgauntlet resolved to use it for his own
+purposes.
+
+Without making any direct answer, therefore, to Peter Peebles, he walked
+up gravely to Fairford, who had waited quietly for the termination of
+a scene in which he was not a little surprised to find his client, Mr.
+Peebles, a conspicuous actor.
+
+‘Mr. Fairford,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘there are many reasons which might
+induce me to comply with the request, or rather the injunctions, of the
+excellent Father Buonaventure, that I should communicate with you upon
+the present condition of my ward, whom you know under the name of
+Darsie Latimer; but no man is better aware than you that the law must be
+obeyed, even in contradiction to our own feelings; now this poor man
+has obtained a warrant for carrying you before a magistrate, and, I am
+afraid, there is a necessity of your yielding to it, although to the
+postponement of the business which you may have with me.’
+
+‘A warrant against me!’ said Alan, indignantly; ‘and at that poor
+miserable wretch’s instance?--why, this is a trick, a mere and most
+palpable trick.’
+
+‘It may be so,’ replied Redgauntlet, with great equanimity; ‘doubtless
+you know best; only the writ appears regular, and with that respect
+for the law which has been,’ he said, with hypocritical formality, ‘a
+leading feature of my character through life, I cannot dispense with
+giving my poor aid to the support of a legal warrant. Look at it
+yourself, and be satisfied it is no trick of mine.’
+
+Fairford ran over the affidavit and the warrant, and then exclaimed once
+more, that it was an impudent imposition, and that he would hold those
+who acted upon such a warrant liable in the highest damages. ‘I guess
+at your motive, Mr. Redgauntlet,’ he said, ‘for acquiescing in so
+ridiculous a proceeding. But be assured you will find that, in this
+country, one act of illegal violence will not be covered or atoned for
+by practising another. You cannot, as a man of sense and honour, pretend
+to say you regard this as a legal warrant.’
+
+‘I am no lawyer, sir,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘and pretend not to know what
+is or is not law--the warrant is quite formal, and that is enough for
+me.’
+
+‘Did ever any one hear,’ said Fairford, ‘of an advocate being compelled
+to return to his task, like a collier or a salter [See Note 10.] who has
+deserted his master?’
+
+‘I see no reason why he should not,’ said Redgauntlet, dryly, ‘unless
+on the ground that the services of the lawyer are the most expensive and
+least useful of the two.’
+
+‘You cannot mean this in earnest,’ said Fairford; ‘you cannot really
+mean to avail yourself of so poor a contrivance, to evade the word
+pledged by your friend, your ghostly father, in my behalf. I may have
+been a fool for trusting it too easily, but think what you must be if
+you can abuse my confidence in this manner. I entreat you to reflect
+that this usage releases me from all promises of secrecy or connivance
+at what I am apt to think are very dangerous practices, and that’--
+
+‘Hark ye, Mr. Fairford,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘I must here interrupt you
+for your own sake. One word of betraying what you may have seen, or what
+you may have suspected, and your seclusion is like to have either a very
+distant or a very brief termination; in either case a most undesirable
+one. At present, you are sure of being at liberty in a very few
+days--perhaps much sooner.’
+
+‘And my friend,’ said Alan Fairford, ‘for whose sake I have run myself
+into this danger, what is to become of him? Dark and dangerous man!’ he
+exclaimed, raising his voice, I will not be again cajoled by deceitful
+promises’--
+
+‘I give you my honour that your friend is well,’ interrupted
+Redgauntlet; ‘perhaps I may permit you to see him, if you will but
+submit with patience to a fate which is inevitable.’
+
+But Alan Fairford, considering his confidence as having been abused,
+first by Maxwell, and next by the priest, raised his voice, and appealed
+to all the king’s lieges within hearing, against the violence with
+which he was threatened. He was instantly seized on by Nixon and two
+assistants, who, holding down his arms, and endeavouring to stop his
+mouth, were about to hurry him away.
+
+The honest Quaker, who had kept out of Redgauntlet’s presence, now came
+boldly forward.
+
+‘Friend,’ said he, ‘thou dost more than thou canst answer. Thou knowest
+me well, and thou art aware that in me thou hast a deeply injured
+neighbour, who was dwelling beside thee in the honesty and simplicity of
+his heart.’
+
+‘Tush, Jonathan,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘talk not to me, man; it is neither
+the craft of a young lawyer, nor the SIMPLICITY of an old hypocrite, can
+drive me from my purpose.
+
+‘By my faith,’ said the captain, coming forward in his turn, ‘this is
+hardly fair, general; and I doubt,’ he added, ‘whether the will of my
+owners can make me a party to such proceedings. Nay, never fumble with
+your sword-hilt, but out with it like a man, if you are for a tilting.’
+He unsheathed his hanger, and continued--‘I will neither see my comrade
+Fairford, nor the old Quaker, abused. D----n all warrants, false or
+true--curse the justice--confound the constable!--and here stands little
+Nanty Ewart to make good what he says against gentle and simple, in
+spite of horse-shoe or horse-radish either.’
+
+The cry of ‘Down with all warrants!’ was popular in the ears of the
+militia of the inn, and Nanty Ewart was no less so. Fishers, ostlers,
+seamen, smugglers, began to crowd to the spot. Crackenthorp endeavoured
+in vain to mediate. The attendants of Redgauntlet began to handle their
+firearms; but their master shouted to them to forbear, and, unsheathing
+his sword as quick as lightning, he rushed on Ewart in the midst of
+his bravado, and struck his weapon from his hand with such address and
+force, that it flew three yards from him. Closing with him at the same
+moment, he gave him a severe fall, and waved his sword over his head, to
+show he was absolutely at his mercy.
+
+‘There, you drunken vagabond,’ he said, ‘I give you your life--you are
+no bad fellow if you could keep from brawling among your friends. But
+we all know Nanty Ewart,’ he said to the crowd around, with a forgiving
+laugh, which, joined to the awe his prowess had inspired, entirely
+confirmed their wavering allegiance.
+
+They shouted, ‘The laird for ever!’ while poor Nanty, rising from the
+earth, on whose lap he had been stretched so rudely, went in quest of
+his hanger, lifted it, wiped it, and, as he returned the weapon to the
+scabbard, muttered between his teeth, ‘It is true they say of him, and
+the devil will stand his friend till his hour come; I will cross him no
+more.’
+
+So saying, he slunk from the crowd, cowed and disheartened by his
+defeat.
+
+‘For you, Joshua Geddes,’ said Redgauntlet, approaching the Quaker, who,
+with lifted hands and eyes, had beheld the scene of violence, ‘l shall
+take the liberty to arrest thee for a breach of the peace, altogether
+unbecoming thy pretended principles; and I believe it will go hard with
+thee both in a court of justice and among thine own Society of Friends,
+as they call themselves, who will be but indifferently pleased to
+see the quiet tenor of their hypocrisy insulted by such violent
+proceedings.’
+
+‘I violent!’ said Joshua; ‘I do aught unbecoming the principles of the
+Friends! I defy thee, man, and I charge thee, as a Christian, to forbear
+vexing my soul with such charges: it is grievous enough to me to have
+seen violences which I was unable to prevent.’
+
+‘O Joshua, Joshua!’ said Redgauntlet, with a sardonic smile; ‘thou light
+of the faithful in the town of Dumfries and the places adjacent, wilt
+thou thus fall away from the truth? Hast thou not, before us all,
+attempted to rescue a man from the warrant of law? Didst thou not
+encourage that drunken fellow to draw his weapon--and didst thou not
+thyself flourish thy cudgel in the cause? Think’st thou that the oaths
+of the injured Peter Peebles, and the conscientious Cristal Nixon,
+besides those of such gentlemen as look on this strange scene, who not
+only put on swearing as a garment, but to whom, in Custom House matters,
+oaths are literally meat and drink,--dost thou not think, I say, that
+these men’s oaths will go further than thy Yea and Nay in this matter?’
+
+‘I will swear to anything,’ said Peter. ‘All is fair when it comes to an
+oath AD LITEM.’
+
+‘You do me foul wrong,’ said the Quaker, undismayed by the general
+laugh. ‘I encouraged no drawing of weapons, though I attempted to move
+an unjust man by some use of argument--I brandished no cudgel, although
+it may be that the ancient Adam struggled within me, and caused my hand
+to grasp mine oaken staff firmer than usual, when I saw innocence borne
+down with violence. But why talk I what is true and just to thee, who
+hast been a man of violence from thy youth upwards? Let me rather speak
+to thee such language as thou canst comprehend. Deliver these young men
+up to me,’ he said, when he had led Redgauntlet a little apart from the
+crowd, ‘and I will not only free thee from the heavy charge of damages
+which thou hast incurred by thine outrage upon my property, but I will
+add ransom for them and for myself. What would it profit thee to do the
+youths wrong, by detaining them in captivity?’
+
+‘Mr. Geddes,’ said Redgauntlet, in a tone more respectful than he had
+hitherto used to the Quaker, ‘your language is disinterested, and I
+respect the fidelity of your friendship. Perhaps we have mistaken each
+other’s principles and motives; but if so, we have not at present time
+for explanation. Make yourself easy. I hope to raise your friend
+Darsie Latimer to a pitch of eminence which you will witness with
+pleasure;--nay, do not attempt to answer me. The other young man shall
+suffer restraint a few days, probably only a few hours,--it is not more
+than due for his pragmatical interference in what concerned him not.
+Do you, Mr. Geddes, be so prudent as to take your horse and leave this
+place, which is growing every moment more unfit for the abode of a man
+of peace. You may wait the event in safety at Mount Sharon.’
+
+‘Friend,’ replied Joshua, ‘I cannot comply with thy advice; I will
+remain here, even as thy prisoner, as thou didst but now threaten,
+rather than leave the youth who hath suffered by and through me and my
+misfortunes, in his present state of doubtful safety. Wherefore I will
+not mount my steed Solomon; neither will I turn his head towards Mount
+Sharon, until I see an end of this matter.’
+
+‘A prisoner, then, you must be,’ said Redgauntlet. ‘I have no time to
+dispute the matter further with you. But tell me for what you fix your
+eyes so attentively on yonder people of mine.’
+
+‘To speak the truth,’ said the Quaker, ‘I admire to behold among them
+a little wretch of a boy called Benjie, to whom I think Satan has given
+the power of transporting himself wheresoever mischief is going forward;
+so that it may be truly said, there is no evil in this land wherein he
+hath not a finger, if not a whole hand.’
+
+The boy, who saw their eyes fixed on him as they spoke, seemed
+embarrassed, slid rather desirous of making his escape; but at a signal
+from Redgauntlet he advanced, assuming the sheepish look and rustic
+manner with which the jackanapes covered much acuteness and roguery.
+
+‘How long have you been with the party, sirrah?’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+‘Since the raid on the stake-nets,’ said Benjie, with his finger in his
+mouth.
+
+‘And what made you follow us?’
+
+‘I dauredna stay at hame for the constables,’ replied the boy.
+
+‘And what have you been doing all this time?’
+
+‘Doing, sir? I dinna ken what ye ca’ doing--I have been doing naething,’
+said Benjie; then seeing something in Redgauntlet’s eye which was not
+to be trifled with, he added, ‘Naething but waiting on Maister Cristal
+Nixon.’
+
+‘Hum!--aye--indeed?’ muttered Redgauntlet. ‘Must Master Nixon bring his
+own retinue into the field? This must be seen to.’
+
+He was about to pursue his inquiry, when Nixon himself came to him with
+looks of anxious haste, ‘The Father is come,’ he whispered, ‘and the
+gentlemen are getting together in the largest room of the house, and
+they desire to see you. Yonder is your nephew, too, making a noise like
+a man in Bedlam.’
+
+‘I will look to it all instantly,’ said Redgauntlet. ‘Is the Father
+lodged as I directed?’
+
+Cristal nodded.
+
+‘Now, then, for the final trial,’ said Redgauntlet. He folded his
+hands--looked upwards--crossed himself--and after this act of devotion
+(almost the first which any one had observed him make use of) he
+commanded Nixon to keep good watch--have his horses and men ready for
+every emergence--look after the safe custody of the prisoners--but treat
+them at the same time well and civilly. And, these orders given, he
+darted hastily into the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+NARRATIVE CONTINUED
+
+Redgauntlet’s first course was to the chamber of his nephew. He unlocked
+the door, entered the apartment, and asked what he wanted, that he made
+so much noise.
+
+‘I want my liberty,’ said Darsie, who had wrought himself up to a pitch
+of passion in which his uncle’s wrath had lost its terrors. ‘I desire
+my liberty, and to be assured of the safety of my beloved friend, Alan
+Fairford, whose voice I heard but now.’
+
+‘Your liberty shall be your own within half an hour from this
+period--your friend shall be also set at freedom in due time--and you
+yourself be permitted to have access to his place of confinement.’
+
+‘This does not satisfy me,’ said Darsie; ‘I must see my friend
+instantly; he is here, and he is here endangered on my account only--I
+have heard violent exclamations--the clash of swords. You will gain no
+point with me unless I have ocular demonstration of his safety.’
+
+‘Arthur--dearest nephew,’ answered Redgauntlet, ‘drive me not mad! Thine
+own fate--that of thy house--that of thousands--that of Britain herself,
+are at this moment in the scales; and you are only occupied about the
+safety of a poor insignificant pettifogger!’
+
+‘He has sustained injury at your hands, then?’ said Darsie, fiercely. ‘I
+know he has; but if so, not even our relationship shall protect you.’
+
+‘Peace, ungrateful and obstinate fool!’ said Redgauntlet. Yet
+stay--will you be satisfied if you see this Alan Fairford, the bundle
+of bombazine--this precious friend of yours--well and sound? Will you,
+I say, be satisfied with seeing him in perfect safety without attempting
+to speak to or converse with him?’ Darsie signified his assent. ‘Take
+hold of my arm, then,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘and do you, niece Lilias, take
+the other; and beware; Sir Arthur, how you bear yourself.’
+
+Darsie was compelled to acquiesce, sufficiently aware that his uncle
+would permit him no interview with a friend whose influence would
+certainly be used against his present earnest wishes, and in some
+measure contented with the assurance of Fairford’s personal safety.
+
+Redgauntlet led them through one or two passages (for the house, as
+we have before said, was very irregular, and built at different times)
+until they entered an apartment, where a man with shouldered carabine
+kept watch at the door, but readily turned the key for their reception.
+In this room they found Alan Fairford and the Quaker, apparently in
+deep conversation with each other. They looked up as Redgauntlet and
+his party entered; and Alan pulled off his hat and made a profound
+reverence, which the young lady, who recognized him,--though, masked
+as she was, he could not know her,--returned with some embarrassment,
+arising probably from the recollection of the bold step she had taken in
+visiting him.
+
+Darsie longed to speak, but dared not. His uncle only said, ‘Gentlemen,
+I know you are as anxious on Mr. Darsie Latimer’s account as he is upon
+yours. I am commissioned by him to inform you, that he is as well as you
+are--I trust you will all meet soon. Meantime, although I cannot suffer
+you to be at large, you shall be as well treated as is possible under
+your temporary confinement.’
+
+He passed on, without pausing to hear the answers which the lawyer and
+the Quaker were hastening to prefer; and only waving his hand by way
+of adieu, made his exit, with the real and the seeming lady whom he
+had under his charge, through a door at the upper end of the apartment,
+which was fastened and guarded like that by which they entered.
+
+Redgauntlet next led the way into a very small room; adjoining which,
+but divided by a partition, was one of apparently larger dimensions; for
+they heard the trampling of the heavy boots of the period, as if several
+persons were walking to and fro and conversing in low and anxious
+whispers.
+
+‘Here,’ said Redgauntlet to his nephew, as he disencumbered him from
+the riding-skirt and the mask, ‘I restore you to yourself, and trust you
+will lay aside all effeminate thoughts with this feminine dress. Do
+not blush at having worn a disguise to which kings and heroes have been
+reduced. It is when female craft or female cowardice find their way
+into a manly bosom, that he who entertains these sentiments should take
+eternal shame to himself for thus having resembled womankind. Follow me,
+while Lilias remains here. I will introduce you to those whom I hope to
+see associated with you in the most glorious cause that hand ever drew
+sword in.’
+
+Darsie paused. ‘Uncle,’ he said, ‘my person is in your hands; but
+remember, my will is my own. I will not be hurried into any resolution
+of importance. Remember what I have already said--what I now
+repeat--that I will take no step of importance but upon conviction.’
+
+‘But canst thou be convinced, thou foolish boy, without hearing and
+understanding the grounds on which we act?’
+
+So saying he took Darsie by the arm, and walked with him to the next
+room--a large apartment, partly filled with miscellaneous articles of
+commerce, chiefly connected with contraband trade; where, among bales
+and barrels, sat, or walked to and fro, several gentlemen, whose manners
+and looks seemed superior to the plain riding dresses which they wore.
+
+There was a grave and stern anxiety upon their countenances, when, on
+Redgauntlet’s entrance, they drew from their separate coteries into one
+group around him, and saluted him with a formality which had something
+in it of ominous melancholy. As Darsie looked around the circle, he
+thought he could discern in it few traces of that adventurous hope which
+urges men upon desperate enterprises; and began to believe that the
+conspiracy would dissolve of itself, without the necessity of his
+placing himself in direct opposition to so violent a character as his
+uncle, and incurring the hazard with which such opposition must be
+attended.
+
+Mr. Redgauntlet, however, did not, or would not, see any such marks of
+depression of spirit amongst his coadjutors, but met them with cheerful
+countenance, and a warm greeting of welcome. ‘Happy to meet you here,
+my lord,’ he said, bowing low to a slender young man. ‘I trust you
+come with the pledges of your noble father, of B--, and all that loyal
+house.--Sir Richard, what news in the west? I am told you had two
+hundred men on foot to have joined when the fatal retreat from Derby was
+commenced. When the White Standard is again displayed, it shall not
+be turned back so easily, either by the force of its enemies, or the
+falsehood of its friends.--Doctor Grumball, I bow to the representative
+of Oxford, the mother of learning and loyalty.--Pengwinion, you
+Cornish chough, has this good wind blown you north?--Ah, my brave
+Cambro-Britons, when was Wales last in the race of honour?’
+
+Such and such-like compliments he dealt around, which were in general
+answered by silent bows; but when he saluted one of his own countrymen
+by the name of MacKellar, and greeted Maxwell of Summertrees by that
+of Pate-in-Peril, the latter replied, ‘that if Pate were not a fool,
+he would be Pate-in-Safety;’ and the former, a thin old gentle-man, in
+tarnished embroidery, said bluntly, ‘Aye, troth, Redgauntlet, I am here
+just like yourself; I have little to lose--they that took my land the
+last time, may take my life this; and that is all I care about it.’
+
+The English gentlemen, who were still in possession of their paternal
+estates, looked doubtfully on each other, and there was something
+whispered among them of the fox which had lost his tail.
+
+Redgauntlet hastened to address them. ‘I think, my lords and gentlemen,’
+he said, ‘that I can account for something like sadness which has crept
+upon an assembly gathered together for so noble a purpose. Our numbers
+seem, when thus assembled, too small and inconsiderable to shake the
+firm-seated usurpation of a half-century. But do not count us by what
+we are in thew and muscle, but by what our summons can do among our
+countrymen. In this small party are those who have power to raise
+battalions, and those who have wealth to pay them. And do not believe
+our friends who are absent are cold or indifferent to the cause. Let us
+once light the signal, and it will be hailed by all who retain love for
+the Stuart, and by all--a more numerous body--who hate the Elector. Here
+I have letters from’--
+
+Sir Richard Glendale interrupted the speaker. ‘We all confide,
+Redgauntlet, in your valour and skill--we admire your perseverance; and
+probably nothing short of your strenuous exertions, and the emulation
+awakened by your noble and disinterested conduct, could have brought
+so many of us, the scattered remnant of a disheartened party, to meet
+together once again in solemn consultation; for I take it, gentlemen,’
+he said, looking round, ‘this is only a consultation.’
+
+‘Nothing more,’ said the young lord.
+
+‘Nothing more,’ said Doctor Grumball, shaking his large academical
+peruke.
+
+And, ‘Only a consultation,’ was echoed by the others.
+
+Redgauntlet bit his lip. ‘I had hopes,’ he said, ‘that the discourses
+I have held with most of you, from time to time, had ripened into more
+maturity than your words imply, and that we were here to execute as
+well as to deliberate; and for this we stand prepared. I can raise five
+hundred men with my whistle.’
+
+‘Five hundred men!’ said one of the Welsh squires; ‘Cot bless us! and
+pray you, what cood could five hundred men do?’
+
+‘All that the priming does for the cannon, Mr. Meredith,’ answered
+Redgauntlet; ‘it will enable us to seize Carlisle, and you know what our
+friends have engaged for in that case.’
+
+‘Yes--but,’ said the young nobleman, ‘you must not hurry us on too fast,
+Mr. Redgauntlet; we are all, I believe, as sincere and truehearted in
+this business as you are, but we will not be driven forward blindfold.
+We owe caution to ourselves and our families, as well as to those whom
+we are empowered to represent on this occasion.’
+
+‘Who hurries you, my lord? Who is it that would drive this meeting
+forward blindfold? I do not understand your lordship,’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+‘Nay,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, ‘at least do not let us fall under
+our old reproach of disagreeing among ourselves. What my lord means,
+Redgauntlet, is, that we have this morning heard it is uncertain
+whether you could even bring that body of men whom you count upon; your
+countryman, Mr. MacKellar, seemed, just before you came in, to doubt
+whether your people would rise in any force, unless you could produce
+the authority of your nephew.’
+
+‘I might ask,’ said Redgauntlet,’ what right MacKellar, or any one, has
+to doubt my being able to accomplish what I stand pledged for? But our
+hopes consist in our unity. Here stands my nephew. Gentlemen, I present
+to you my kinsman, Sir Arthur Darsie Redgauntlet of that Ilk.’
+
+‘Gentlemen,’ said Darsie, with a throbbing bosom, for he felt the crisis
+a very painful one, ‘Allow me to say, that I suspend expressing my
+sentiments on the important subject under discussion until I have heard
+those of the present meeting.’
+
+‘Proceed in your deliberations, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘I will
+show my nephew such reasons for acquiescing in the result, as will
+entirely remove any scruples which may hang around his mind.’
+
+Dr. Grumball now coughed, ‘shook his ambrosial curls,’ and addressed the
+assembly.
+
+‘The principles of Oxford,’ he said,’ are well understood, since she
+was the last to resign herself to the Arch-Usurper,--since she has
+condemned, by her sovereign authority, the blasphemous, atheistical,
+and anarchical tenets of Locke, and other deluders of the public
+mind. Oxford will give men, money and countenance, to the cause of the
+rightful monarch. But we have, been often deluded by foreign powers,
+who have availed themselves of our zeal to stir up civil dissensions, in
+Britain, not for the advantage of our blessed though banished monarch,
+but to stir up disturbances by which they might profit, while we, their
+tools, are sure to be ruined. Oxford, therefore, will not rise, unless
+our sovereign comes in person to claim our allegiance, in which case,
+God forbid we should refuse him our best obedience.’
+
+‘It is a very cood advice,’ said Mr. Meredith.
+
+‘In troth,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, ‘it is the very keystone of our
+enterprise, and the only condition upon which I myself and others
+could ever have dreamt of taking up arms. No insurrection which has not
+Charles Edward himself at its head, will, ever last longer than till a
+single foot company of redcoats march to disperse it.’
+
+‘This is my own opinion, and that of all my family,’ said the young
+nobleman already mentioned; ‘and I own I am somewhat surprised at being
+summoned to attend a dangerous rendezvous such as this, before something
+certain could have been stated to us on this most important preliminary
+point.’
+
+‘Pardon me, my lord,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘I have not been so unjust
+either to myself or my friends--I had no means of communicating to our
+distant confederates (without the greatest risk of discovery) what is
+known to some of my honourable friends. As courageous, and as resolved,
+as when, twenty years since, he threw himself into the wilds of Moidart,
+Charles Edward has instantly complied with the wishes of his faithful
+subjects. Charles Edward is in this country--Charles Edward is in this
+house!--Charles Edward waits but your present decision, to receive the
+homage of those who have ever called themselves his loyal liegemen. He
+that would now turn his coat, and change his note, must do so under the
+eye of his sovereign.’
+
+There was a deep pause. Those among the conspirators whom mere habit, or
+a desire of preserving consistency, had engaged in the affair, now saw
+with terror their retreat cut off; and others, who at a distance had
+regarded the proposed enterprise as hopeful, trembled when the moment
+of actually embarking in it was thus unexpectedly and almost inevitably
+precipitated.
+
+‘How now, my lords and gentlemen!’ said Redgauntlet; is it delight and
+rapture that keep you thus silent? where are the eager welcomes that
+should be paid to your rightful king, who a second time confides his
+person to the care of his subjects, undeterred by the hairbreadth
+escapes and severe privations of his former expedition? I hope there is
+no gentleman here that is not ready to redeem, in his prince’s presence,
+the pledge of fidelity which he offered in his absence.’
+
+‘I, at least,’ said the young nobleman resolutely, and laying his hand
+on his sword, ‘will not be that coward. If Charles is come to these
+shores, I will be the first to give him welcome, and to devote my life
+and fortune to his service.’
+
+‘Before Cot,’ said Mr. Meredith, ‘I do not see that Mr. Redgauntlet has
+left us anything else to do.’
+
+‘Stay,’ said Summertrees, ‘there is yet one other question. Has he
+brought any of those Irish rapparees with him, who broke the neck of our
+last glorious affair?’
+
+‘Not a man of them,’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+‘I trust,’ said Dr. Grumball, ‘that there are no Catholic priests in his
+company. I would not intrude on the private conscience of my sovereign,
+but, as an unworthy son of the Church of England, it is my duty to
+consider her security.’
+
+‘Not a Popish dog or cat is there, to bark or mew about his Majesty,’
+said Redgauntlet. ‘Old Shaftesbury himself could not wish a prince’s
+person more secure from Popery--which may not be the worst religion
+in the world, notwithstanding. Any more doubts, gentlemen? can no more
+plausible reasons be discovered for postponing the payment of our duty,
+and discharge of our oaths and engagements? Meantime your king waits
+your declaration--by my faith he hath but a frozen reception!’
+
+‘Redgauntlet,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, calmly, ‘your reproaches shall
+not goad me into anything of which my reason disapproves. That I respect
+my engagement as much as you do, is evident, since I am here, ready to
+support it with the best blood in my veins. But has the king really come
+hither entirely unattended?’
+
+‘He has no man with him but young ------, as aide de camp, and a single
+valet de chambre.’
+
+‘No MAN--but, Redgauntlet, as you are a gentleman, has he no woman with
+him?’
+
+Redgauntlet cast his eyes on the ground and replied, ‘I am sorry to
+say--he has.’
+
+The company looked at each other, and remained silent for a moment.
+At length Sir Richard proceeded. ‘I need not repeat to you, Mr.
+Redgauntlet, what is the well-grounded opinion of his Majesty’s friends
+concerning that most unhappy connexion there is but one sense and
+feeling amongst us upon the subject. I must conclude that our humble
+remonstrances were communicated by you, sir, to the king?’
+
+‘In the same strong terms in which they were couched,’ replied
+Redgauntlet. ‘I love his Majesty’s cause more than I fear his
+displeasure.’
+
+‘But, apparently, our humble expostulation has produced no effect.
+This lady, who has crept into his bosom, has a sister in the Elector
+of Hanover’s court, and yet we are well assured that our most private
+communication is placed in her keeping.’
+
+‘VARIUM ET MUTABILE SEMPER FEMINA,’ said Dr. Grumball.
+
+‘She puts his secrets into her work-bag,’ said Maxwell; ‘and out they
+fly whenever she opens it. If I must hang, I would wish it to be in
+somewhat a better rope than the string of a lady’s hussey.’
+
+‘Are you, too, turning dastard, Maxwell?’ said Redgauntlet, in a
+whisper.
+
+‘Not I,’ said Maxwell; ‘let us fight for it, and let them win and wear
+us; but to be betrayed by a brimstone like that’--
+
+‘Be temperate, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘the foible of which you
+complain so heavily has always been that of kings and heroes; which I
+feel strongly confident the king will surmount, upon the humble entreaty
+of his best servants, and when he sees them ready to peril their all in
+his cause, upon the slight condition of his resigning the society of
+a female favourite, of whom I have seen reason to think he hath been
+himself for some time wearied. But let us not press upon him rashly
+with our well-meant zeal. He has a princely will as becomes his princely
+birth, and we, gentlemen, who are royalists, should be the last to take
+advantage of circumstances to limit its exercise. I am as much surprised
+and hurt as you can be, to find that he has made her the companion of
+this journey, increasing every chance of treachery and detection. But do
+not let us insist upon a sacrifice so humiliating, while he has scarce
+placed a foot upon the beach of his kingdom. Let us act generously by
+our sovereign; and when we have shown what we will do for him, we
+shall be able, with better face, to state what it is we expect him to
+concede.’
+
+‘Indeed, I think it is but a pity,’ said MacKellar, ‘when so many pretty
+gentlemen are got together, that they should part without the flash of a
+sword among them.’
+
+‘I should be of that gentleman’s opinion,’ said Lord ------, ‘had I
+nothing to lose but my life; but I frankly own, that the conditions
+on which our family agreed to join having been, in this instance, left
+unfulfilled, I will not peril the whole fortunes of our house on the
+doubtful fidelity of an artful woman.’
+
+‘I am sorry to see your lordship,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘take a course
+which is more likely to secure your house’s wealth than to augment its
+honours.’
+
+‘How am I to understand your language, sir?’ said the young nobleman,
+haughtily.
+
+‘Nay, gentlemen,’ said Dr Grumball, interposing, ‘do not let friends
+quarrel; we are all zealous for the cause--but truly, although I know
+the license claimed by the great in such matters, and can, I hope, make
+due allowance, there is, I may say, an indecorum in a prince who comes
+to claim the allegiance of the Church of England, arriving on such an
+errand with such a companion--SI NON CASTE, CAUTE TAMEN.’
+
+‘I wonder how the Church of England came to be so heartily attached to
+his merry old namesake,’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+Sir Richard Glendale then took up the question, as one whose authority
+and experience gave him right to speak with much weight.
+
+‘We have no leisure for hesitation,’ he said; ‘it is full time that
+we decide what course we are to hold. I feel as much as you, Mr.
+Redgauntlet, the delicacy of capitulating with our sovereign in his
+present condition. But I must also think of the total ruin of the
+cause, the confiscation and bloodshed which will take place among his
+adherents, and all through the infatuation with which he adheres to
+a woman who is the pensionary of the present minister, as she was
+for years Sir Robert Walpole’s. Let his Majesty send her back to the
+continent, and the sword on which I now lay my hand shall instantly be
+unsheathed, and, I trust, many hundred others at the same moment.’
+
+The other persons present testified their unanimous acquiescence in what
+Sir Richard Glendale had said.
+
+‘I see you have taken your resolutions, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet;
+‘unwisely I think, because I believe that, by softer and more generous
+proceedings, you would have been more likely to carry a point which I
+think as desirable as you do. But what is to be done if Charles should
+refuse, with the inflexibility of his grandfather, to comply with this
+request of yours? Do you mean to abandon him to his fate?’
+
+‘God forbid!’ said Sir Richard, hastily; ‘and God forgive you, Mr.
+Redgauntlet, for breathing such a thought. No! I for one will, with all
+duty and humility, see him safe back to his vessel, and defend him with
+my life against whosoever shall assail him. But when I have seen his
+sails spread, my next act will be to secure, if I can, my own safety, by
+retiring to my house; or, if I find our engagement, as is too probable,
+has taken wind, by surrendering myself to the next Justice of Peace,
+and giving security that hereafter I shall live quiet, and submit to the
+ruling powers.’
+
+Again the rest of the persons present intimated their agreement in
+opinion with the speaker.
+
+‘Well, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘it is not for me to oppose the
+opinion of every one; and I must do you the justice to say, that
+the king has, in the present instance, neglected a condition of your
+agreement which was laid before him in very distinct terms. The question
+now is, who is to acquaint him with the result of this conference; for I
+presume you would not wait on him in a body to make the proposal that
+he should dismiss a person from his family as the price of your
+allegiance.’
+
+‘I think Mr. Redgauntlet should make the explanation, said Lord--. ‘As
+he has, doubtless, done justice to our remonstrances by communicating
+them to the king, no one can, with such propriety and force, state the
+natural and inevitable consequence of their being neglected.’
+
+‘Now, I think,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘that those who make the objection
+should state it, for I am confident the king will hardly believe, on
+less authority than that of the heir of the loyal House of B--, that he
+is the first to seek an evasion of his pledge to join him.’
+
+‘An evasion, sir!’ repeated Lord ------, fiercely, ‘I have borne too
+much from you already, and this I will not endure. Favour me with your
+company to the downs.’
+
+Redgauntlet laughed scornfully, and was about to follow the fiery young
+man, when Sir Richard again interposed. ‘Are we to exhibit,’ he said,
+‘the last symptoms of the dissolution of our party, by turning our
+swords against each other? Be patient, Lord ------; in such conferences
+as this, much must pass unquestioned which might brook challenge
+elsewhere. There is a privilege of party as of parliament--men cannot,
+in emergency, stand upon picking phrases. Gentlemen, if you will extend
+your confidence in me so far, I will wait upon his Majesty, and I
+hope my Lord ------ and Mr. Redgauntlet will accompany me. I trust the
+explanation of this unpleasant matter will prove entirely satisfactory,
+and that we shall find ourselves at liberty to render our homage to our
+sovereign without reserve, when I for one will be the first to peril all
+in his just quarrel.’
+
+Redgauntlet at once stepped forward. ‘My lord,’ he said, ‘if my zeal
+made me say anything in the slightest degree offensive, I wish it
+unsaid, and ask your pardon. A gentleman can do no more.’
+
+‘I could not have asked Mr. Redgauntlet to do so much,’ said the young
+nobleman, willingly accepting the hand which Redgauntlet offered. ‘I
+know no man living from whom I could take so much reproof without a
+sense of degradation as from himself.’
+
+‘Let me then hope, my lord, that you will go with Sir Richard and me to
+the presence. Your warm blood will heat our zeal--our colder resolves
+will temper yours.
+
+The young lord smiled, and shook his head. ‘Alas! Mr. Redgauntlet,’ he
+said, ‘I am ashamed to say, that in zeal you surpass us all. But I
+will not refuse this mission, provided you will permit Sir Arthur, your
+nephew, also to accompany us.’
+
+‘My nephew?’ said Redgauntlet, and seemed to hesitate, then added, ‘Most
+certainly. I trust,’ he said, looking at Darsie, ‘he will bring to his
+prince’s presence such sentiments as fit the occasion.’
+
+It seemed however to Darsie, that his uncle would rather have left
+him behind, had he not feared that he might in that case have been
+influenced by, or might perhaps himself influence, the unresolved
+confederates with whom he must have associated during his absence.
+
+‘I will go,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘and request admission.’
+
+In a moment after he returned, and without speaking, motioned for the
+young nobleman to advance. He did so, followed by Sir Richard Glendale
+and Darsie, Redgauntlet himself bringing up the rear. A short
+passage, and a few steps, brought them to the door of the temporary
+presence-chamber, in which the Royal Wanderer was to receive their
+homage. It was the upper loft of one of those cottages which made
+additions to the old inn, poorly furnished, dusty, and in disorder; for,
+rash as the enterprise might be considered, they had been still careful
+not to draw the attention of strangers by any particular attentions
+to the personal accommodation of the prince. He was seated, when the
+deputies, as they might be termed, of his remaining adherents entered;
+and as he rose, and came forward and bowed, in acceptance of their
+salutation, it was with a dignified courtesy which at once supplied
+whatever was deficient in external pomp, and converted the wretched
+garret into a saloon worthy of the occasion.
+
+It is needless to add that he was the same personage already introduced
+in the character of Father Buonaventure, by which name he was
+distinguished at Fairladies. His dress was not different from what he
+then wore, excepting that he had a loose riding-coat of camlet, under
+which he carried an efficient cut-and-thrust sword, instead of his
+walking rapier, and also a pair of pistols.
+
+Redgauntlet presented to him successively the young Lord ------, and
+his kinsman, Sir Arthur Darsie Redgauntlet, who trembled as, bowing
+and kissing his hand, he found himself surprised into what might be
+construed an act of high treason, which yet he saw no safe means to
+avoid.
+
+Sir Richard Glendale seemed personally known to Charles Edward, who
+received him with a mixture of dignity and affection, and seemed to
+sympathize with the tears which rushed into that gentleman’s eyes as he
+bade his Majesty welcome to his native kingdom.
+
+‘Yes, my good Sir Richard,’ said the unfortunate prince in a tone
+melancholy, yet resolved, ‘Charles Edward is with his faithful friends
+once more--not, perhaps, with his former gay hopes which undervalued
+danger, but with the same determined contempt of the worst which can
+befall him, in claiming his own rights and those of his country.’
+
+‘I rejoice, sire--and yet, alas! I must also grieve, to see you once
+more on the British shores,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, and stopped
+short--a tumult of contradictory feelings preventing his further
+utterance.
+
+‘It is the call of my faithful and suffering people which alone could
+have induced me to take once more the sword in my hand. For my own part,
+Sir Richard, when I have reflected how many of my loyal and devoted
+friends perished by the sword and by proscription, or died indigent
+and neglected in a foreign land, I have often, sworn that no view to my
+personal aggrandizement should again induce me to agitate a title which
+has cost my followers so dear. But since so many men of worth and honour
+conceive the cause of England and Scotland to be linked with that of
+Charles Stuart, I must follow their brave example, and, laying aside all
+other considerations, once more stand forward as their deliverer. I am,
+however, come hither upon your invitation; and as you are so completely
+acquainted with circumstances to which my absence must necessarily
+have rendered me a stranger, I must be a mere tool in the hands of my
+friends. I know well I never can refer myself implicitly to more
+loyal hearts or wiser heads, than Herries Redgauntlet, and Sir Richard
+Glendale. Give me your advice, then, how we are to proceed, and decide
+upon the fate of Charles Edward.’
+
+Redgauntlet looked at Sir Richard, as if to say, ‘Can you press any
+additional or unpleasant condition at a moment like this?’ And the other
+shook his head and looked down, as if his resolution was unaltered, and
+yet as feeling all the delicacy of the situation.
+
+There was a silence, which was broken by the unfortunate representative
+of an unhappy dynasty, with some appearance of irritation. ‘This is
+strange, gentlemen,’ he said; ‘you have sent for me from the bosom of my
+family, to head an adventure of doubt and danger; and when I come, your
+own minds seem to be still irresolute. I had not expected this on the
+part of two such men.’
+
+‘For me, sire,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘the steel of my sword is not truer
+than the temper of my mind.’
+
+‘My Lord ------‘s and mine are equally so,’ said Sir Richard; ‘but you
+had in charge, Mr. Redgauntlet, to convey our request to his Majesty,
+coupled with certain conditions.’
+
+‘And I discharged my duty to his Majesty and to you,’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+‘I looked at no condition, gentlemen,’ said their king, with dignity,’
+save that which called me here to assert my rights in person. That I
+have fulfilled at no common risk. Here I stand to keep my word, and I
+expect of you to be true to yours.’
+
+‘There was, or should have been, something more than that in our
+proposal, please your Majesty,’ said Sir Richard. ‘There was a condition
+annexed to it.’
+
+‘I saw it not,’ said Charles, interrupting him. ‘Out of tenderness
+towards the noble hearts of whom I think so highly, I would neither
+see nor read anything which could lessen them in my love and my esteem.
+Conditions can have no part betwixt prince and subject.’
+
+‘Sire,’ said Redgauntlet, kneeling on one knee, ‘I see from Sir
+Richard’s countenance he deems it my fault that your Majesty seems
+ignorant of what your subjects desired that I should communicate to your
+Majesty. For Heaven’s sake! for the sake of all my past services and
+sufferings, leave not such a stain upon my honour! The note, Number D,
+of which this is a copy, referred to the painful subject to which Sir
+Richard again directs your attention.’
+
+‘You press upon me, gentlemen,’ said the prince, colouring highly,’
+recollections, which, as I hold them most alien to your character, I
+would willingly have banished from my memory. I did not suppose that
+my loyal subjects would think so poorly of me, as to use my depressed
+circumstances as a reason for forcing themselves into my domestic
+privacies, and stipulating arrangements with their king regarding
+matters in which the meanest minds claim the privilege of thinking for
+themselves. In affairs of state and public policy, I will ever be guided
+as becomes a prince, by the advice of my wisest counsellors; in those
+which regard my private affections and my domestic arrangements, I claim
+the same freedom of will which I allow to all my subjects, and without
+which a crown were less worth wearing than a beggar’s bonnet.’
+
+‘May it please your Majesty,’ said Sir Richard Glendale, ‘I see it must
+be my lot to speak unwilling truths; but believe me, I do so with as
+much profound respect as deep regret. It is true, we have called you to
+head a mighty undertaking, and that your Majesty, preferring honour to
+safety, and the love of your country to your own ease, has condescended
+to become our leader. But we also pointed out as a necessary and
+indispensable preparatory step to the achievement of our purpose--and,
+I must say, as a positive condition of our engaging in it--that an
+individual, supposed,--I presume not to guess how truly,--to have your
+Majesty’s more intimate confidence, and believed, I will not say on
+absolute proof but upon the most pregnant suspicion, to be capable of
+betraying that confidence to the Elector of Hanover, should be removed
+from your royal household and society.’
+
+‘This is too insolent, Sir Richard!’ said Charles Edward. ‘Have you
+inveigled me into your power to bait me in this unseemly manner? And
+you, Redgauntlet, why did you suffer matters to come to such a point as
+this, without making me more distinctly aware what insults were to be
+practised on me?’
+
+‘My gracious prince,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘I am so far to blame in this,
+that I did not think so slight an impediment as that of a woman’s
+society could have really interrupted an undertaking of this magnitude.
+I am a plain man, sire, and speak but bluntly; I could not have dreamt
+but what, within the first five minutes of this interview, either Sir
+Richard and his friends would have ceased to insist upon a condition so
+ungrateful to your Majesty, or that your Majesty would have sacrificed
+this unhappy attachment to the sound advice, or even to the over-anxious
+suspicions, of so many faithful subjects. I saw no entanglement in such
+a difficulty which on either side might not have been broken through
+like a cobweb.’
+
+‘You were mistaken, sir,’ said Charles Edward, ‘entirely mistaken--as
+much so as you are at this moment, when you think in your heart my
+refusal to comply with this insolent proposition is dictated by a
+childish and romantic passion for an individual, I tell you, sir, I
+could part with that person to-morrow, without an instant’s regret--that
+I have had thoughts of dismissing her from my court, for reasons known
+to myself; but that I will never betray my rights as a sovereign and a
+man, by taking this step to secure the favour of any one, or to purchase
+that allegiance which, if you owe it to me at all, is due to me as my
+birthright.’
+
+‘I am sorry for this,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘I hope both your Majesty
+and Sir Richard will reconsider your resolutions, or forbear this
+discussion, in a conjuncture so pressing. I trust your Majesty will
+recollect that you are on hostile ground; that our preparations cannot
+have so far escaped notice as to permit us now with safety to retreat
+from our purpose; insomuch, that it is with the deepest anxiety of
+heart I foresee even danger to your own royal person, unless you can
+generously give your subjects the satisfaction, which Sir Richard seems
+to think they are obstinate in demanding.’
+
+‘And deep indeed your anxiety ought to be,’ said the prince. ‘Is it in
+these circumstances of personal danger in which you expect to overcome a
+resolution, which is founded on a sense of what is due to me as a man
+or a prince? If the axe and scaffold were ready before the windows of
+Whitehall, I would rather tread the same path with my great-grandfather,
+than concede the slightest point in which my honour is concerned.’
+
+He spoke these words with a determined accent, and looked around him on
+the company, all of whom (excepting Darsie, who saw, he thought, a
+fair period to a most perilous enterprise) seemed in deep anxiety and
+confusion. At length, Sir Richard spoke in a solemn and melancholy tone.
+‘If the safety,’ he said, ‘of poor Richard Glendale were alone concerned
+in this matter, I have never valued my life enough to weigh it
+against the slightest point of your Majesty’s service. But I am only a
+messenger--a commissioner, who must execute my trust, and upon whom a
+thousand voices will cry, Curse and woe, if I do it not with fidelity.
+All of your adherents, even Redgauntlet himself, see certain ruin to
+this enterprise--the greatest danger to your Majesty’s person--the utter
+destruction of all your party and friends, if they insist not on the
+point, which, unfortunately, your Majesty is so unwilling to concede. I
+speak it with a heart full of anguish--with a tongue unable to utter
+my emotions--but it must be spoken--the fatal truth--that if your
+royal goodness cannot yield to us a boon which we hold necessary to our
+security and your own, your Majesty with one word disarms ten thousand
+men, ready to draw their swords in your behalf; or, to speak yet more
+plainly, you annihilate even the semblance of a royal party in Great
+Britain.’
+
+‘And why do you not add,’ said the prince, scornfully, ‘that the men
+who have been ready to assume arms in my behalf, will atone for their
+treason to the Elector, by delivering me up to the fate for which so
+many proclamations have destined me? Carry my head to St. James’s,
+gentlemen; you will do a more acceptable and a more honourable action,
+than, having inveigled me into a situation which places me so completely
+in your power, to dishonour yourselves by propositions which dishonour
+me.
+
+‘My God, sire!’ exclaimed Sir Richard, clasping his hands together,
+in impatience, ‘of what great and inexpiable crime can your Majesty’s
+ancestors have ‘been guilty, that they have been punished by the
+infliction of judicial blindness on their whole generation!--Come, my
+Lord ------, we must to our friends.’
+
+‘By your leave, Sir Richard,’ said the young nobleman, ‘not till we,
+have learned what measures can be taken for his Majesty’s personal
+safety.’
+
+‘Care not for me, young man,’ said Charles Edward; ‘when I was in the
+society of Highland robbers and cattle-drovers, I was safer than I now
+hold myself among the representatives of the best blood in England.
+Farewell, gentlemen--I will shift for myself.’
+
+‘This must never be,’ said Redgauntlet. ‘Let me that brought you to the
+point of danger, at least provide for your safe retreat.’
+
+So saying, he hastily left the apartment, followed by his nephew. The
+Wanderer, averting his eyes from Lord ------ and Sir Richard Glendale,
+threw himself into a seat at the upper end of the apartment, while they,
+in much anxiety, stood together, at a distance from him, and conversed
+in whispers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+NARRATIVE CONTINUED
+
+When Redgauntlet left the room, in haste and discomposure, the first
+person he met on the stair, and indeed so close by the door of the
+apartment that Darsie thought he must have been listening there, was his
+attendant Nixon.
+
+‘What the devil do you here?’ he said, abruptly and sternly.
+
+‘I wait your orders,’ said Nixon. ‘I hope all’s right!--excuse my zeal.’
+
+‘All is wrong, sir. Where is the seafaring fellow--Ewart--what do you
+call him?’
+
+‘Nanty Ewart, sir. I will carry your commands,’ said Nixon.
+
+‘I will deliver them myself to him,’ said Redgauntlet; call him hither.’
+
+‘But should your honour leave the presence?’ said Nixon, still
+lingering.
+
+‘‘Sdeath, sir, do you prate to me?’ said Redgauntlet, bending his brows.
+‘I, sir, transact my own business; you, I am told, act by a ragged
+deputy.’
+
+Without further answer, Nixon departed, rather disconcerted, as it
+seemed to Darsie.
+
+‘That dog turns insolent and lazy,’ said Redgauntlet; but I must bear
+with him for a while.’
+
+A moment after, Nixon returned with Ewart.
+
+‘Is this the smuggling fellow?’ demanded Redgauntlet. Nixon nodded.
+
+‘Is he sober now? he was brawling anon.’
+
+‘Sober enough for business,’ said Nixon.
+
+‘Well then, hark ye, Ewart;--man your boat with your best hands, and
+have her by the pier--get your other fellows on board the brig--if you
+have any cargo left, throw it overboard; it shall be all paid, five
+times over--and be ready for a start to Wales or the Hebrides, or
+perhaps for Sweden or Norway.’
+
+Ewart answered sullenly enough, ‘Aye, aye, sir.’
+
+‘Go with him, Nixon,’ said Redgauntlet, forcing himself to speak with
+some appearance of cordiality to the servant with whom he was offended;
+‘see he does his duty.’
+
+Ewart left the house sullenly, followed by Nixon. The sailor was just in
+that species of drunken humour which made him jealous, passionate,
+and troublesome, without showing any other disorder than that of
+irritability. As he walked towards the beach he kept muttering to
+himself, but in such a tone that his companion lost not a word,
+‘Smuggling fellow--Aye, smuggler--and, start your cargo into the
+sea--and be ready to start for the Hebrides, or Sweden--or the devil,
+I suppose. Well, and what if I said in answer--Rebel, Jacobite--traitor;
+I’ll make you and your d----d confederates walk the plank--I have seen
+better men do it--half a score of a morning--when I was across the
+Line.’
+
+‘D--d unhandsome terms those Redgauntlet used to you, brother.’ said
+Nixon.
+
+‘Which do you mean?’ said Ewart, starting, and recollecting himself. ‘I
+have been at my old trade of thinking aloud, have I?’
+
+‘No matter,’ answered Nixon, ‘none but a friend heard you. You cannot
+have forgotten how Redgauntlet disarmed you this morning.’
+
+‘Why, I would bear no malice about that--only he is so cursedly high and
+saucy,’ said Ewart.
+
+‘And then,’ said Nixon, ‘I know you for a true-hearted Protestant.’
+
+‘That I am, by G--,’ said Ewart. ‘No, the Spaniards could never get my
+religion from me.’
+
+‘And a friend to King George, and the Hanover line of succession,’ said
+Nixon, still walking and speaking very slow.
+
+‘You may swear I am, excepting in the way of business, as Turnpenny
+says. I like King George, but I can’t afford to pay duties.’
+
+‘You are outlawed, I believe,’ said Nixon.
+
+‘Am I?--faith, I believe I am,’ said Ewart. ‘I wish I were INLAWED
+again with all my heart. But come along, we must get all ready for our
+peremptory gentleman, I suppose.’
+
+‘I will teach you a better trick,’ said Nixon. ‘There is a bloody pack
+of rebels yonder.’
+
+‘Aye, we all know that,’ said the smuggler; ‘but the snowball’s melting,
+I think.’
+
+‘There is some one yonder, whose head is worth--thirty
+thousand--pounds--of sterling money,’ said Nixon, pausing between each
+word, as if to enforce the magnificence of the sum.
+
+‘And what of that?’ said Ewart, quickly.
+
+‘Only that, instead of lying by the pier with your men on their oars, if
+you will just carry your boat on board just now, and take no notice of
+any signal from the shore, by G--d, Nanty Ewart. I will make a man of
+you for life!’
+
+‘Oh ho! then the Jacobite gentry are not so safe as they think
+themselves?’ said Nanty.
+
+‘In an hour or two,’ replied Nixon, ‘they will be made safer in Carlisle
+Castle.’
+
+‘The devil they will!’ said Ewart; ‘and you have been the informer, I
+suppose?’
+
+‘Yes; I have been ill paid for my service among the Redgauntlets--have
+scarce got dog’s wages--and been treated worse than ever dog was used. I
+have the old fox and his cubs in the same trap now, Nanty; and we’ll see
+how a certain young lady will look then. You see I am frank with you,
+Nanty.’
+
+‘And I will be as frank with you,’ said the smuggler. ‘You are a d--d
+old scoundrel--traitor to the man whose bread you eat! Me help to betray
+poor devils, that have been so often betrayed myself! Not if they were
+a hundred Popes, Devils, and Pretenders. I will back and tell them their
+danger--they are part of cargo--regularly invoiced--put under my charge
+by the owners--I’ll back’--
+
+‘You are not stark mad?’ said Nixon, who now saw he had miscalculated in
+supposing Nanty’s wild ideas of honour and fidelity could be shaken
+even by resentment, or by his Protestant partialities. ‘You shall not go
+back--it is all a joke.’
+
+‘I’ll back to Redgauntlet, and see whether it is a joke he will laugh
+at.’
+
+‘My life is lost if you do,’ said Nixon--‘hear reason.’
+
+They were in a clump or cluster of tall furze at the moment they were
+speaking, about half-way between the pier and the house, but not in a
+direct line, from which Nixon, whose object it was to gain time, had
+induced Ewart to diverge insensibly.
+
+He now saw the necessity of taking a desperate resolution. ‘Hear
+reason,’ he said; and added, as Nanty still endeavoured to pass him, ‘Or
+else hear this!’ discharging a pocket-pistol into the unfortunate man’s
+body.
+
+Nanty staggered, but kept his feet. ‘It has cut my back-bone asunder,’
+he said; ‘you have done me the last good office, and I will not die
+ungrateful.’
+
+As he uttered the last words, he collected his remaining strength, stood
+firm for an instant, drew his hanger, and, fetching a stroke with both
+hands, cut Cristal Nixon down. The blow, struck with all the energy of
+a desperate and dying man, exhibited a force to which Ewart’s exhausted
+frame might have seemed inadequate;--it cleft the hat which the wretch
+wore, though secured by a plate of iron within the lining, bit deep into
+his skull, and there left a fragment of the weapon, which was broke by
+the fury of the blow.
+
+One of the seamen of the lugger, who strolled up attracted by the firing
+of the pistol, though being a small one the report was very trifling,
+found both the unfortunate men stark dead. Alarmed at what he saw,
+which he conceived to have been the consequence of some unsuccessful
+engagement betwixt his late commander and a revenue officer (for Nixon
+chanced not to be personally known to him) the sailor hastened back
+to the boat, in order to apprise his comrades of Nanty’s fate, and to
+advise them to take off themselves and the vessel.
+
+Meantime Redgauntlet, having, as we have seen, dispatched Nixon for the
+purpose of securing a retreat for the unfortunate Charles, in case of
+extremity, returned to the apartment where he had left the Wanderer. He
+now found him alone.
+
+‘Sir Richard Glendale,’ said the unfortunate prince, ‘with his
+young friend, has gone to consult their adherents now in the house.
+Redgauntlet, my friend, I will not blame you for the circumstances in
+which I find myself, though I am at once placed in danger, and rendered
+contemptible. But you ought to have stated to me more strongly the
+weight which these gentlemen attached to their insolent proposition. You
+should have told me that no compromise would have any effect--that they
+desire not a prince to govern them, but one, on the contrary, over
+whom they were to exercise restraint on all occasions, from the highest
+affairs of the state, down to the most intimate and private concerns of
+his own privacy, which the most ordinary men desire to keep secret and
+sacred from interference.’
+
+‘God knows,’ said Redgauntlet, in much agitation, ‘I acted for the best
+when I pressed your Majesty to come hither--I never thought that your
+Majesty, at such a crisis, would have scrupled, when a kingdom was in
+view, to sacrifice an attachment, which’--
+
+‘Peace, sir!’ said Charles; ‘it is not for you to estimate my feelings
+upon such a subject.’
+
+Redgauntlet coloured high, and bowed profoundly. ‘At least,’ he
+resumed, ‘I hoped that some middle way might be found, and it shall--and
+must.--Come with me, nephew. We will to these gentlemen, and I am
+confident I will bring back heart-stirring tidings.’
+
+‘I will do much to comply with them, Redgauntlet. I am loath, having
+again set my foot on British land, to quit it without a blow for my
+right. But this which they demand of me is a degradation, and compliance
+is impossible.’
+
+Redgauntlet, followed by his nephew, the unwilling spectator of this
+extraordinary scene, left once more the apartment of the adventurous
+Wanderer, and was met on the top of the stairs by Joe Crackenthorp.
+‘Where are the other gentlemen?’ he said.
+
+‘Yonder, in the west barrack,’ answered Joe; ‘but Master
+Ingoldsby,’--that was the name by which Redgauntlet was most generally
+known in Cumberland,--‘I wish to say to you that I must put yonder folk
+together in one room.’
+
+‘What folk?’ said Redgauntlet, impatiently.
+
+‘Why, them prisoner stranger folk, as you bid Cristal Nixon look after.
+Lord love you! this is a large house enow, but we cannot have separate
+lock-ups for folk, as they have in Newgate or in Bedlam. Yonder’s a
+mad beggar, that is to be a great man when he wins a lawsuit, Lord help
+him!--Yonder’s a Quaker and a lawyer charged with a riot; and, ecod, I
+must make one key and one lock keep them, for we are chokeful, and you
+have sent off old Nixon that could have given one some help in this
+confusion. Besides, they take up every one a room, and call for naughts
+on earth,--excepting the old man, who calls lustily enough,--but he has
+not a penny to pay shot.’
+
+‘Do as thou wilt with them,’ said Redgauntlet, who had listened
+impatiently to his statement; ‘so thou dost but keep them from getting
+out and making some alarm in the country, I care not.’
+
+‘A Quaker and a lawyer!’ said Darsie. ‘This must be Fairford and
+Geddes.--Uncle, I must request of you’--
+
+‘Nay, nephew,’ interrupted Redgauntlet, ‘this is no time for asking
+questions. You shall yourself decide upon their fate in the course of an
+hour--no harm whatever is designed them.’
+
+So saying, he hurried towards the place where the Jacobite gentlemen
+were holding their council, and Darsie followed him, in the hope that
+the obstacle which had arisen to the prosecution of their desperate
+adventure would prove insurmountable and spare him the necessity of a
+dangerous and violent rupture with his uncle. The discussions among
+them were very eager; the more daring part of the conspirators, who had
+little but life to lose, being desirous to proceed at all hazards;
+while the others, whom a sense of honour and a hesitation to disavow
+long-cherished principles had brought forward, were perhaps not ill
+satisfied to have a fair apology for declining an adventure, into which
+they had entered with more of reluctance than zeal.
+
+Meanwhile Joe Crackenthorp, availing himself of the hasty permission
+attained from Redgauntlet, proceeded to assemble in one apartment
+those whose safe custody had been thought necessary; and, without much
+considering the propriety of the matter, he selected for the common
+place of confinement, the room which Lilias had, since her brother’s
+departure, occupied alone. It had a strong lock, and was double-hinged,
+which probably led to the preference assigned to it, as a place of
+security.
+
+Into this, Joe, with little ceremony, and a good deal of noise,
+introduced the Quaker and Fairford; the first descanting on the
+immorality, the other on the illegality, of his proceedings; and he
+turned a deaf ear both to the one and the other. Next he pushed in,
+almost in headlong fashion, the unfortunate litigant, who, having made
+some resistance at the threshold, had received a violent thrust
+in consequence, and came rushing forward, like a ram in the act of
+charging, with such impetus as must have carried him to the top of the
+room, and struck the cocked hat which sat perched on the top of his
+tow wig against Miss Redgauntlet’s person, had not the honest Quaker
+interrupted his career by seizing him by the collar, and bringing him to
+a stand. ‘Friend,’ said he, with the real good-breeding which so often
+subsists independently of ceremony, ‘thou art no company for that young
+person; she is, thou seest, frightened at our being so suddenly thrust
+in hither; and although that be no fault of ours, yet it will become
+us to behave civilly towards her. Wherefore come thou with me to this
+window, and I will tell thee what it concerns thee to know.’
+
+‘And what for should I no speak to the Leddy, friend?’ said Peter, who
+was now about half seas over. ‘I have spoke to leddies before now, man.
+What for should she be frightened at me? I am nae bogle, I ween. What
+are ye pooin’ me that gate for? Ye will rive my coat, and I will have
+a good action for having myself made SARTUM ATQUE TECTUM at your
+expenses.’
+
+Notwithstanding this threat, Mr. Geddes, whose muscles were as strong as
+his judgement was sound and his temper sedate, led Poor Peter under the
+sense of a control against which he could not struggle, to the farther
+corner of the apartment, where, placing him, whether he would or no, in
+a chair, he sat down beside him, and effectually prevented his annoying
+the young lady, upon whom he had seemed bent upon conferring the
+delights of his society.
+
+If Peter had immediately recognized his counsel learned in the law, it
+is probable that not even the benevolent efforts of the Quaker could
+have kept him in a state of restraint; but Fairford’s back was turned
+towards his client, whose optics, besides being somewhat dazzled with
+ale and brandy, were speedily engaged in contemplating a half-crown
+which Joshua held between his finger and his thumb, saying, at the
+same time, ‘Friend, thou art indigent and improvident. This will, well
+employed, procure thee sustentation of nature for more than a single
+day; and I will bestow it on thee if thou wilt sit here and keep me
+company; for neither thou nor I, friend, are fit company for ladies.’
+
+‘Speak for yourself, friend,’ said Peter, scornfully; ‘I was ay kend to
+be agreeable to the fair sex; and when I was in business I served the
+ladies wi’ anither sort of decorum than Plainstanes, the d--d awkward
+scoundrel! It was one of the articles of dittay between us.’
+
+‘Well, but, friend,’ said the Quaker, who observed that the young lady
+still seemed to fear Peter’s intrusion, ‘I wish to hear thee speak about
+this great lawsuit of thine, which has been matter of such celebrity.’
+
+‘Celebrity! Ye may swear that,’ said Peter, for the string was touched
+to which his crazy imagination always vibrated. ‘And I dinna wonder
+that folk that judge things by their outward grandeur, should think me
+something worth their envying. It’s very true that it is grandeur upon
+earth to hear ane’s name thunnered out along the long-arched roof of the
+Outer House,--“Poor Peter Peebles against Plainstanes ET PER CONTRA;”
+ a’ the best lawyers in the house fleeing like eagles to the prey; some
+because they are in the cause, and some because they want to be thought
+engaged (for there are tricks in other trades by selling muslins)--to
+see the reporters mending their pens to take down the debate--the Lords
+themselves pooin’ in their chairs, like folk sitting down to a gude
+dinner, and crying on the clerks for parts and pendicles of the process,
+who, puir bodies, can do little mair than cry on their closet-keepers
+to help them. To see a’ this,’ continued Peter, in a tone of sustained
+rapture, ‘and to ken that naething will be said or dune amang a’ thae
+grand folk, for maybe the feck of three hours, saving what concerns you
+and your business--Oh, man, nae wonder that ye judge this to be earthly
+glory! And yet, neighbour, as I was saying, there be unco drawbacks--I
+whiles think of my bit house, where dinner, and supper, and breakfast,
+used to come without the crying for, just as if fairies had brought
+it--and the gude bed at e’en--and the needfu’ penny in the pouch. And
+then to see a’ ane’s warldly substance capering in the air in a pair of
+weighbauks, now up, now down, as the breath of judge or counsel inclines
+it for pursuer or defender,--troth, man, there are times I rue having
+ever begun the plea wark, though, maybe, when ye consider the renown and
+credit I have by it, ye will hardly believe what I am saying.’
+
+‘Indeed, friend,’ said Joshua, with a sigh, ‘I am glad thou hast found
+anything in the legal contention which compensates thee for poverty and
+hunger; but I believe, were other human objects of ambition looked
+upon as closely, their advantages would be found as chimerical as those
+attending thy protracted litigation.’
+
+‘But never mind, friend,’ said Peter, ‘I’ll tell you the exact state of
+the conjunct processes, and make you sensible that I can bring mysell
+round with a wet finger, now I have my finger and my thumb on this
+loup-the-dike loon, the lad Fairford.’
+
+Alan Fairford was in the act of speaking to the masked lady (for Miss
+Redgauntlet had retained her riding vizard) endeavouring to assure her,
+as he perceived her anxiety, of such protection as he could afford, when
+his own name, pronounced in a loud tone, attracted his attention. He
+looked round, and seeing Peter Peebles, as hastily turned to avoid his
+notice, in which he succeeded, so earnest was Peter upon his colloquy
+with one of the most respectable auditors whose attention he had ever
+been able to engage. And by this little motion, momentary as it was,
+Alan gained an unexpected advantage; for while he looked round, Miss
+Lilias, I could never ascertain why, took the moment to adjust her mask,
+and did it so awkwardly, that when her companion again turned his head,
+he recognized as much of her features as authorized him to address her
+as his fair client, and to press his offers of protection and assistance
+with the boldness of a former acquaintance.
+
+Lilias Redgauntlet withdrew the mask from her crimsoned cheek. ‘Mr.
+Fairford,’ she said, in a voice almost inaudible, ‘you have the
+character of a young gentleman of sense and generosity; but we have
+already met in one situation which you must think singular; and I must
+be exposed to misconstruction, at least, for my forwardness, were it not
+in a cause in which my dearest affections were concerned.’
+
+‘Any interest in my beloved friend Darsie Latimer,’ said Fairford,
+stepping a little back, and putting a marked restraint upon his former
+advances, ‘gives me a double right to be useful to’--He stopped short.
+
+‘To his sister, your goodness would say,’ answered Lilias.
+
+‘His sister, madam!’ replied Alan, in the extremity of
+astonishment--‘Sister, I presume, in affection only?’
+
+‘No, sir; my dear brother Darsie and I are connected by the bonds of
+actual relationship; and I am not sorry to be the first to tell this to
+the friend he most values.’
+
+Fairford’s first thought was on the violent passion which Darsie had
+expressed towards the fair unknown. ‘Good God!’ he exclaimed, ‘how did
+he bear the discovery?’
+
+‘With resignation, I hope,’ said Lilias, smiling. ‘A more accomplished
+sister he might easily have come by, but scarcely could have found one
+who could love him more than I do.’
+
+‘I meant--I only meant to say,’ said the young counsellor, his presence
+of mind failing him for an instant--‘that is, I meant to ask where
+Darsie Latimer is at this moment.’
+
+‘In this very house, and under the guardianship of his uncle, whom I
+believe you knew as a visitor of your father, under the name of Mr.
+Herries of Birrenswork.’
+
+‘Let me hasten to him,’ said Fairford; ‘I have sought him through
+difficulties and dangers--I must see him instantly.’
+
+‘You forget you are a prisoner,’ said the young lady.
+
+‘True--true; but I cannot be long detained--the cause alleged is too
+ridiculous.’
+
+‘Alas!’ said Lilias, ‘our fate--my brother’s and mine, at least--must
+turn on the deliberations perhaps of less than an hour. For you, sir, I
+believe and apprehend nothing; but some restraint; my uncle is neither
+cruel nor unjust, though few will go further in the cause which he has
+adopted.’
+
+‘Which is that of the Pretend’--
+
+‘For God’s sake speak lower!’ said Lilias, approaching her hand, as if
+to stop him. ‘The word may cost you your life. You do not know--indeed
+you do not--the terrors of the situation in which we at present stand,
+and in which I fear you also are involved by your friendship for my
+brother.’
+
+‘I do not indeed know the particulars of our situation,’ said Fairford;
+‘but, be the danger what it may, I shall not grudge my share of it
+for the sake of my friend; or,’ he added, with more timidity, ‘of my
+friend’s sister. Let me hope,’ he said, ‘my dear Miss Latimer, that
+my presence may be of some use to you; and that it may be so, let
+me entreat a share of your confidence, which I am conscious I have
+otherwise no right to ask.’
+
+He led her, as he spoke, towards the recess of the farther window of the
+room, and observing to her that, unhappily, he was particularly exposed
+to interruption from the mad old man whose entrance had alarmed her, he
+disposed of Darsie Latimer’s riding-skirt, which had been left in the
+apartment, over the back of two chairs, forming thus a sort of screen,
+behind which he ensconced himself with the maiden of the green mantle;
+feeling at the moment, that the danger in which he was placed was almost
+compensated by the intelligence which permitted those feelings towards
+her to revive, which justice to his friend had induced him to stifle in
+the birth.
+
+The relative situation of adviser and advised, of protector and
+protected, is so peculiarly suited to the respective condition of man
+and woman, that great progress towards intimacy is often made in very
+short space; for the circumstances call for confidence on the part of
+the gentleman, and forbid coyness on that of the lady, so that the usual
+barriers against easy intercourse are at once thrown down.
+
+Under these circumstances, securing themselves as far as possible from
+observation, conversing in whispers, and seated in a corner, where they
+were brought into so close contact that their faces nearly touched each
+other, Fairford heard from Lilias Redgauntlet the history of her family,
+particularly of her uncle; his views upon her brother, and the agony
+which she felt, lest at that very moment he might succeed in engaging
+Darsie in some desperate scheme, fatal to his fortune and perhaps to his
+life.
+
+Alan Fairford’s acute understanding instantly connected what he had
+heard with the circumstances he had witnessed at Fairladies. His first
+thought was, to attempt, at all risks, his instant escape, and procure
+assistance powerful enough to crush, in the very cradle, a conspiracy of
+such a determined character. This he did not consider as difficult; for,
+though the door was guarded on the outside, the window, which was not
+above ten feet from the ground, was open for escape, the common on which
+it looked was unenclosed, and profusely covered with furze. There
+would, he thought, be little difficulty in effecting his liberty, and in
+concealing his course after he had gained it.
+
+But Lilias exclaimed against this scheme. Her uncle, she said, was a man
+who, in his moments of enthusiasm, knew neither remorse nor fear. He
+was capable of visiting upon Darsie any injury which he might conceive
+Fairford had rendered him--he was her near kinsman also, and not an
+unkind one, and she deprecated any effort, even in her brother’s favour,
+by which his life must be exposed to danger. Fairford himself remembered
+Father Buonaventure, and made little question but that he was one of
+the sons of the old Chevalier de Saint George; and with feelings which,
+although contradictory of his public duty, can hardly be much censured,
+his heart recoiled from being the agent by whom the last scion of such
+a long line of Scottish princes should be rooted up. He then thought
+of obtaining an audience, if possible, of this devoted person, and
+explaining to him the utter hopelessness of his undertaking, which he
+judged it likely that the ardour of his partisans might have concealed
+from him. But he relinquished this design as soon as formed. He had no
+doubt, that any light which he could throw on the state of the country,
+would come too late to be serviceable to one who was always reported to
+have his own full share of the hereditary obstinacy which had cost his
+ancestors so dear, and who, in drawing the sword, must have thrown from
+him the scabbard.
+
+Lilias suggested the advice which, of all others, seemed most suited
+to the occasion, that, yielding, namely, to the circumstances of their
+situation, they should watch carefully when Darsie should obtain any
+degree of freedom, and endeavour to open a communication with him, in
+which case their joint flight might be effected, and without endangering
+the safety of any one.
+
+Their youthful deliberation had nearly fixed in this point, when
+Fairford, who was listening to the low sweet whispering tones of Lilias
+Redgauntlet, rendered yet more interesting by some slight touch of
+foreign accent, was startled by a heavy hand which descended with full
+weight on his shoulder, while the discordant voice of Peter Peebles, who
+had at length broke loose from the well-meaning Quaker, exclaimed in the
+ear of his truant counsel--‘Aha, lad! I think ye are catched--An’ so ye
+are turned chamber-counsel, are ye? And ye have drawn up wi’ clients
+in scarfs and hoods? But bide a wee, billie, and see if I dinna sort ye
+when my petition and complaint comes to be discussed, with or without
+answers, under certification.’
+
+Alan Fairford had never more difficulty in his life to subdue a first
+emotion, than he had to refrain from knocking down the crazy blockhead
+who had broken in upon him at such a moment. But the length of Peter’s
+address gave him time, fortunately perhaps for both parties, to reflect
+on the extreme irregularity of such a proceeding. He stood silent,
+however, with vexation, while Peter went on.
+
+‘Weel, my bonnie man, I see ye are thinking shame o’ yoursell, and nae
+great wonder. Ye maun leave this quean--the like of her is ower light
+company for you. I have heard honest Mr. Pest say, that the gown grees
+ill wi’ the petticoat. But come awa hame to your puir father, and I’ll
+take care of you the haill gate, and keep you company, and deil a word
+we will speak about, but just the state of the conjoined processes of
+the great cause of Poor Peter Peebles against Plainstanes.’
+
+‘If thou canst; endure to hear as much of that suit, friend,’ said
+the Quaker, ‘as I have heard out of mere compassion for thee, I think
+verily thou wilt soon be at the bottom of the matter, unless it be
+altogether bottomless.’
+
+Fairford shook off, rather indignantly, the large bony hand which Peter
+had imposed upon his shoulder, and was about to say something peevish,
+upon so unpleasant and insolent a mode of interruption, when the door
+opened, a treble voice saying to the sentinel, ‘I tell you I maun be in,
+to see if Mr. Nixon’s here;’ and little Benjie thrust in his mop-head
+and keen black eyes. Ere he could withdraw it, Peter Peebles sprang to
+the door, seized on the boy by the collar, and dragged him forward into
+the room.
+
+‘Let me see it,’ he said, ‘ye ne’er-do-weel limb of Satan--I’ll gar
+you satisfy the production, I trow--I’ll hae first and second diligence
+against you, ye deevil’s buckie!’
+
+‘What dost thou want?’ said the Quaker, interfering; ‘why dost thou
+frighten the boy, friend Peebles?’
+
+‘I gave the bastard a penny to buy me snuff,’ said the pauper, ‘and he
+has rendered no account of his intromissions; but I’ll gar him as gude.’
+
+So saying, he proceeded forcibly to rifle the pockets of Benjie’s ragged
+jacket of one or two snares for game, marbles, a half-bitten apple, two
+stolen eggs (one of which Peter broke in the eagerness of his research),
+and various other unconsidered trifles, which had not the air of being
+very honestly come by. The little rascal, under this discipline, bit and
+struggled like a fox-cub, but, like that vermin, uttered neither cry nor
+complaint, till a note, which Peter tore from his bosom, flew as far as
+Lilias Redgauntlet, and fell at her feet. It was addressed to C. N.
+
+‘It is for the villain Nixon.’ she said to Alan Fairford; ‘open it
+without scruple; that boy is his emissary; we shall now see what the
+miscreant is driving at.’
+
+Little Benjie now gave up all further struggle, and suffered Peebles
+to take from him, without resistance, a shilling, out of which Peter
+declared he would pay himself principal and interest, and account for
+the balance. The boy, whose attention seemed fixed on something very
+different, only said, ‘Maister Nixon will murder me!’
+
+Alan Fairford did not hesitate to read the little scrap of paper, on
+which was written, ‘All is prepared--keep them in play until I come up.
+You may depend on your reward.--C. C.’
+
+‘Alas, my uncle--my poor uncle!’ said Lilias; ‘this is the result of
+his confidence. Methinks, to give him instant notice of his confidant’s
+treachery, is now the best service we can render all concerned--if
+they break up their undertaking, as they must now do, Darsie will be at
+liberty.’
+
+In the same breath, they were both at the half-opened door of the room,
+Fairford entreating to speak with the Father Buonaventure, and Lilias,
+equally vehemently, requesting a moment’s interview with her uncle.
+While the sentinel hesitated what to do, his attention was called to a
+loud noise at the door, where a crowd had been assembled in consequence
+of the appalling cry, that the enemy were upon them, occasioned, as it
+afterwards proved, by some stragglers having at length discovered the
+dead bodies of Nanty Ewart and of Nixon.
+
+Amid the confusion occasioned by this alarming incident, the sentinel
+ceased to attend, to his duty; and accepting Alan Fairford’s arm, Lilias
+found no opposition in penetrating even to the inner apartment, where
+the principal persons in the enterprise, whose conclave had been
+disturbed by this alarming incident, were now assembled in great
+confusion, and had been joined by the Chevalier himself.
+
+‘Only a mutiny among these smuggling scoundrels,’ said Redgauntlet.
+
+ONLY a mutiny, do you say?’ said Sir Richard Glendale; ‘and the lugger,
+the last hope of escape for,’--he looked towards Charles,--‘stands out
+to sea under a press of sail!’
+
+‘Do not concern yourself about me,’ said the unfortunate prince; ‘this
+is not the worst emergency in which it has been my lot to stand; and if
+it were, I fear it not. Shift for yourselves, my lords and gentlemen.’
+
+‘No, never!’ said the young Lord ------. ‘Our only hope now is in an
+honourable resistance.’
+
+‘Most true,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘let despair renew the union amongst
+us which accident disturbed. I give my voice for displaying the royal
+banner instantly, and--How now!’ he concluded, sternly, as Lilias, first
+soliciting his attention by pulling his cloak, put into his hand the
+scroll, and added, it was designed for that of Nixon.
+
+Redgauntlet read--and, dropping it on the ground, continued to stare
+upon the spot where it fell, with raised hands and fixed eyes. Sir
+Richard Glendale lifted the fatal paper, read it, and saying, ‘Now all
+is indeed over,’ handed it to Maxwell, who said aloud, ‘Black Colin
+Campbell, by G--d! I heard he had come post from London last night.’
+
+As if in echo to his thoughts, the violin of the blind man was heard,
+playing with spirit, The Campbells are coming,’ a celebrated clan-march.
+
+‘The Campbells are coming in earnest,’ said MacKellar; they are upon us
+with the whole battalion from Carlisle.’
+
+There was a silence of dismay, and two or three of the company began to
+drop out of the room.
+
+Lord ------ spoke with the generous spirit of a young English nobleman.
+‘If we have been fools, do not let us be cowards. We have one here more
+precious than us all, and come hither on our warranty--let us save him
+at least.’
+
+‘True, most true,’ answered Sir Richard Glendale. ‘Let the king be first
+cared for.’
+
+‘That shall be my business,’ said Redgauntlet ‘if we have but time to
+bring back the brig, all will be well--I will instantly dispatch a party
+in a fishing skiff to bring her to.’ He gave his commands to two or
+three of the most active among his followers. ‘Let him be once on
+board,’ he said, ‘and there are enough of us to stand to arms and cover
+his retreat.’
+
+‘Right, right,’ said Sir Richard, ‘and I will look to points which can
+be made defensible; and the old powder-plot boys could not have made a
+more desperate resistance than we shall. Redgauntlet,’ continued he, ‘I
+see some of our friends are looking pale; but methinks your nephew has
+more mettle in his eye now than when we were in cold deliberation, with
+danger at a distance.’
+
+‘It is the way of our house,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘our courage ever
+kindles highest on the losing side. I, too, feel that the catastrophe
+I have brought on must not be survived by its author. Let me first,’
+he said, addressing Charles, ‘see your Majesty’s sacred person in such
+safety as can now be provided for it, and then’--
+
+‘You may spare all considerations concerning me, gentlemen,’ again
+repeated Charles; ‘yon mountain of Criffel shall fly as soon as I will.’
+
+Most threw themselves at his feet with weeping and entreaty; some one
+or two slunk in confusion from the apartment, and were heard riding
+off. Unnoticed in such a scene, Darsie, his sister, and Fairford, drew
+together, and held each other by the hands, as those who, when a vessel
+is about to founder in the storm, determine to take their chance of life
+and death together.
+
+Amid this scene of confusion, a gentleman, plainly dressed in a
+riding-habit, with a black cockade in his hat, but without any arms
+except a COUTEAU-DE-CHASSE, walked into the apartment without ceremony.
+He was a tall, thin, gentlemanly man, with a look and bearing decidedly
+military. He had passed through their guards, if in the confusion they
+now maintained any, without stop or question, and now stood, almost
+unarmed, among armed men, who nevertheless, gazed on him as on the angel
+of destruction.
+
+‘You look coldly on me, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Sir Richard Glendale--my
+Lord ------, we were not always such strangers. Ha, Pate-in-Peril, how
+is it with you? and you, too, Ingoldsby--I must not call you by any
+other name--why do you receive an old friend so coldly? But you guess my
+errand.’
+
+‘And are prepared for it, general,’ said Redgauntlet; ‘we are not men to
+be penned up like sheep for the slaughter.’
+
+‘Pshaw! you take it too seriously--let me speak but one word with you.’
+
+‘No words can shake our purpose,’ said Redgauntlet, were your whole
+command, as I suppose is the case, drawn round the house.’
+
+‘I am certainly not unsupported,’ said the general; ‘but if you would
+hear me’--
+
+‘Hear ME, sir,’ said the Wanderer, stepping forward; ‘I suppose I am the
+mark you aim at--I surrender myself willingly, to save these gentlemen’s
+danger--let this at least avail in their favour.’
+
+An exclamation of ‘Never, never!’ broke from the little body of
+partisans, who threw themselves round the unfortunate prince, and would
+have seized or struck down Campbell, had it not been that he remained
+with his arms folded, and a look, rather indicating impatience because
+they would not hear him, than the least apprehension of violence at
+their hand.
+
+At length he obtained a moment’s silence. ‘I do not,’ he said, ‘know
+this gentleman’--(making a profound bow to the unfortunate prince)--‘I
+do not wish to know him; it is a knowledge which would suit neither of
+us.’
+
+‘Our ancestors, nevertheless, have been well acquainted,’ said Charles,
+unable to suppress, even at that hour of dread and danger, the painful
+recollections of fallen royalty.
+
+‘In one word, General Campbell,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘is it to be peace or
+war? You are a man of honour, and we can trust you.’
+
+‘I thank you, sir,’ said the general; ‘and I reply, that the answer to
+your question rests with yourself. Come, do not be fools, gentlemen;
+there was perhaps no great harm meant or intended by your gathering
+together in this obscure corner, for a bear-bait or a cock-fight, or
+whatever other amusement you may have intended, but it was a little
+imprudent, considering how you stand with government, and it has
+occasioned some anxiety. Exaggerated accounts of your purpose have
+been laid before government by the information of a traitor in your own
+counsels; and I was sent down post to take the command of a sufficient
+number of troops, in case these calumnies should be found to have any
+real foundation. I have come here, of course, sufficiently supported
+both with cavalry and infantry, to do whatever might be necessary; but
+my commands are--and I am sure they agree with my inclination--to make
+no arrests, nay, to make no further inquiries of any kind, if this good
+assembly will consider their own interest so far as to give up their
+immediate purpose, and return quietly home to their own houses.’
+
+‘What!--all?’ exclaimed Sir Richard Glendale--‘all, without exception?’
+
+‘ALL, without one single exception’ said the general; ‘such are my
+orders. If you accept my terms, say so, and make haste; for things may
+happen to interfere with his Majesty’s kind purposes towards you all.’
+
+‘Majesty’s kind purposes!’ said the Wanderer. ‘Do I hear you aright,
+sir?’
+
+‘I speak the king’s very words, from his very lips,’ replied the
+general. ‘“I will,” said his Majesty, “deserve the confidence of my
+subjects by reposing my security in the fidelity of the millions who
+acknowledge my title--in the good sense and prudence of the few who
+continue, from the errors of education, to disown it.” His Majesty will
+not even believe that the most zealous Jacobites who yet remain can
+nourish a thought of exciting a civil war, which must be fatal to their
+families and themselves, besides spreading bloodshed and ruin through
+a peaceful land. He cannot even believe of his kinsman, that he would
+engage brave and generous though mistaken men, in an attempt which must
+ruin all who have escaped former calamities; and he is convinced,
+that, did curiosity or any other motive lead that person to visit this
+country, he would soon see it was his wisest course to return to the
+continent; and his Majesty compassionates his situation too much to
+offer any obstacle to his doing so.’
+
+‘Is this real?’ said Redgauntlet. ‘Can you mean this? Am I--are all, are
+any of these gentlemen at liberty, without interruption, to embark in
+yonder brig, which, I see, is now again approaching the shore?’
+
+‘You, sir--all--any of the gentlemen present,’ said the general,--‘all
+whom the vessel can contain, are at liberty to embark uninterrupted
+by me; but I advise none to go off who have not powerful reasons
+unconnected with the present meeting, for this will be remembered
+against no one.’
+
+‘Then, gentlemen,’ said Redgauntlet, clasping his hands together as the
+words burst from him, ‘the cause is lost for ever!’
+
+General Campbell turned away to the window, as if to avoid hearing what
+they said. Their consultation was but momentary; for the door of escape
+which thus opened was as unexpected as the exigence was threatening.
+
+‘We have your word of honour for our protection,’ said Sir Richard
+Glendale, ‘if we dissolve our meeting in obedience to your summons?’
+
+‘You have, Sir Richard,’ answered the general.
+
+‘And I also have your promise,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘that I may go on
+board yonder vessel, with any friend whom I may choose to accompany me?’
+
+Not only that, Mr. Ingoldsby--or I WILL call you Mr. Redgauntlet once
+more--you may stay in the offing for a tide, until you are joined by any
+person who may remain at Fairladies. After that, there will be a sloop
+of war on the station, and I need not say your condition will then
+become perilous.’
+
+‘Perilous it should not be, General Campbell,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘or
+more perilous to others than to us, if others thought as I do even in
+this extremity.’
+
+‘You forget yourself, my friend,’ said the unhappy Adventurer; you
+forget that the arrival of this gentleman only puts the cope-stone on
+our already adopted resolution to abandon our bull-fight or by whatever
+other wild name this headlong enterprise may be termed. I bid you
+farewell, unfriendly friends--I bid you farewell,’ (bowing to the
+general) ‘my friendly foe--I leave this strand as I landed upon it,
+alone and to return no more!’
+
+‘Not alone,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘while there is blood in the veins of my
+father’s son.’
+
+‘Not alone,’ said the other gentlemen present, stung with feelings which
+almost overpowered the better reasons under which they had acted. ‘We
+will not disown our principles, or see your person endangered.’
+
+‘If it be only your purpose to see the gentleman to the beach,’ said
+General Campbell, ‘I will myself go with you. My presence among you,
+unarmed, and in your power, will be a pledge of my friendly intentions,
+and will overawe, should such be offered, any interruption on the part
+of officious persons.’
+
+‘Be it so,’ said the Adventurer, with the air of a prince to a subject,
+not of one who complied with the request of an enemy too powerful to be
+resisted.
+
+They left the apartment--they left the house--an unauthenticated and
+dubious, but appalling, sensation of terror had already spread itself
+among the inferior retainers, who had so short time before strutted, and
+bustled, and thronged the doorway and the passages. A report had arisen,
+of which the origin could not be traced, of troops advancing towards the
+spot in considerable numbers; and men who, for one reason or other,
+were most of them amenable to the arm of power, had either shrunk into
+stables or corners, or fled the place entirely. There was solitude on
+the landscape excepting the small party which now moved towards the
+rude pier, where a boat lay manned, agreeably to Redgauntlet’s orders
+previously given.
+
+The last heir of the Stuarts leant on Redgauntlet’s arm as they walked
+towards the beach; for the ground was rough, and he no longer possessed
+the elasticity of limb and of spirit which had, twenty years before,
+carried him over many a Highland hill as light as one of their native
+deer. His adherents followed, looking on the ground, their feelings
+struggling against the dictates of their reason.
+
+General Campbell accompanied them with an air of apparent ease and
+indifference, but watching, at the same time, and no doubt with some
+anxiety, the changing features of those who acted in this extraordinary
+scene.
+
+Darsie and his sister naturally followed their uncle, whose violence
+they no longer feared, while his character attracted their respect, and
+Alan Fairford attended them from interest in their fate, unnoticed in
+a party where all were too much occupied with their own thoughts
+and feelings, as well as with the impending crisis, to attend to his
+presence.
+
+Half-way betwixt the house and the beach, they saw the bodies of Nanty
+Ewart and Cristal Nixon blackening in the sun.
+
+‘That was your informer?’ said Redgauntlet, looking back to General
+Campbell, who only nodded his assent.
+
+‘Caitiff wretch!’ exclaimed Redgauntlet;--‘and yet the name were better
+bestowed on the fool who could be misled by thee.’
+
+‘That sound broadsword cut,’ said the general, ‘has saved us the shame
+of rewarding a traitor.’
+
+They arrived at the place of embarkation. The prince stood a moment with
+folded arms, and looked around him in deep silence. A paper was then
+slipped into his hands--he looked at it, and said, ‘I find the two
+friends I have left at Fairladies are apprised of my destination,
+and propose to embark from Bowness. I presume this will not be an
+infringement of the conditions under which you have acted?’
+
+‘Certainly not,’ answered General Campbell; ‘they shall have all
+facility to join you.’
+
+‘I wish, then,’ said Charles, ‘only another companion. Redgauntlet, the
+air of this country is as hostile to you as it is to me. These gentlemen
+have made their peace, or rather they have done nothing to break it.
+But you--come you and share my home where chance shall cast it. We
+shall never see these shores again; but we will talk of them, and of our
+disconcerted bull-fight.’
+
+‘I follow you, sire, through life,’ said Redgauntlet, ‘as I would have
+followed you to death. Permit me one moment.’
+
+The prince then looked round, and seeing the abashed countenances of his
+other adherents bent upon the ground, he hastened to say, ‘Do not think
+that you, gentlemen, have obliged me less because your zeal was mingled
+with prudence, entertained, I am sure, more on my own account and on
+that of your country, than from selfish apprehensions.’
+
+He stepped from one to another, and, amid sobs and bursting tears,
+received the adieus of the last remnant which had hitherto supported
+his lofty pretensions, and addressed them individually with accents of
+tenderness and affection.
+
+The general drew a little aloof, and signed to Redgauntlet to speak
+with him while this scene proceeded. ‘It is now all over,’ he said, ‘and
+Jacobite will be henceforward no longer a party name. When you tire of
+foreign parts, and wish to make your peace, let me know. Your restless
+zeal alone has impeded your pardon hitherto.’
+
+‘And now I shall not need it,’ said Redgauntlet. ‘I leave England
+for ever; but I am not displeased that you should hear my family
+adieus.--Nephew, come hither. In presence of General Campbell, I tell
+you, that though to breed you up in my own political opinions has been
+for many years my anxious wish, I am now glad that it could not be
+accomplished. You pass under the service of the reigning monarch without
+the necessity of changing your allegiance--a change, however,’ he added,
+looking around him, which sits more easy on honourable men than I could
+have anticipated; but some wear the badge of their loyalty on their
+sleeve, and others in the heart. You will, from henceforth, be
+uncontrolled master of all the property of which forfeiture could not
+deprive your father--of all that belonged to him--excepting this, his
+good sword’ (laying his hand on the weapon he wore), ‘which shall never
+fight for the House of Hanover; and as my hand will never draw weapon
+more, I shall sink it forty fathoms deep in the wide ocean. Bless you,
+young man! If I have dealt harshly with you, forgive me. I had set my
+whole desires on one point,--God knows, with no selfish purpose; and
+I am justly punished by this final termination of my views, for having
+been too little scrupulous in the means by which I pursued them.--Niece,
+farewell, and may God bless you also!’
+
+‘No, sir,’ said Lilias, seizing his hand eagerly. ‘You have been
+hitherto my protector,--you are now in sorrow, let me be your attendant
+and your comforter in exile.’
+
+‘I thank you, my girl, for your unmerited affection; but it cannot and
+must not be. The curtain here falls between us. I go to the house of
+another. If I leave it before I quit the earth, it shall be only for the
+House of God. Once more, farewell both! The fatal doom,’ he said, with
+a melancholy smile, ‘will, I trust, now depart from the House of
+Redgauntlet, since its present representative has adhered to the winning
+side. I am convinced he will not change it, should it in turn become the
+losing one.’
+
+The unfortunate Charles Edward had now given his last adieus to his
+downcast adherents. He made a sign with his hand to Redgauntlet, who
+came to assist him into the skiff. General Campbell also offered his
+assistance, the rest appearing too much affected by the scene which had
+taken place to prevent him.
+
+‘You are not sorry, general, to do me this last act of courtesy,’ said
+the Chevalier; ‘and, on my part, I thank you for it. You have taught me
+the principle on which men on the scaffold feel forgiveness and kindness
+even for their executioner. Farewell!’
+
+They were seated in the boat, which presently pulled off from the land.
+The Oxford divine broke out into a loud benediction, in terms which
+General Campbell was too generous to criticize at the time, or to
+remember afterwards;--nay, it is said, that, Whig and Campbell as he
+was, he could not help joining in the universal Amen! which resounded
+from the shore.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION, BY DR. DRYASDUST
+
+IN A LETTER TO THE AUTHOR OF WAVERLEY
+
+I am truly sorry, my worthy and much-respected sir, that my anxious
+researches have neither, in the form of letters, nor of diaries or other
+memoranda, been able to discover more than I have hitherto transmitted,
+of the history of the Redgauntlet family. But I observe in an old
+newspaper called the WHITEHALL GAZETTE, of which I fortunately possess a
+file for several years, that Sir Arthur Darsie Redgauntlet was
+presented to his late Majesty at the drawing-room, by Lieut.-General
+Campbell--upon which the editor observes, in the way of comment, that
+we were going, REMIS ATQUE VELIS, into the interests of the Pretender,
+since a Scot had presented a Jacobite at Court. I am sorry I have not
+room (the frank being only uncial) for his further observations, tending
+to show the apprehensions entertained by many well-instructed persons of
+the period, that the young king might himself be induced to become one
+of the Stuarts’ faction,--a catastrophe from which it has pleased Heaven
+to preserve these kingdoms.
+
+I perceive also, by a marriage-contract in the family repositories, that
+Miss Lilias Redgauntlet of Redgauntlet, about eighteen months after the
+transactions you have commemorated, intermarried with Alan Fairford,
+Esq., Advocate, of Clinkdollar, who, I think, we may not unreasonably
+conclude to be the same person whose name occurs so frequently in
+the pages of your narration. In my last excursion to Edinburgh, I was
+fortunate enough to discover an old caddie, from whom, at the expense
+of a bottle of whisky and half a pound of tobacco, I extracted the
+important information, that he knew Peter Peebles very well, and had
+drunk many a mutchkin with him in Caddie Fraser’s time. He said ‘that
+he lived ten years after King George’s accession, in the momentary
+expectation of winning his cause every day in the session time, and
+every hour in the day, and at last fell down dead, in what my informer
+called a ‘perplexity fit,’ upon a proposal for a composition being made
+to him in the Outer House. I have chosen to retain my informer’s phrase,
+not being able justly to determine whether it is a corruption of the
+word apoplexy, as my friend Mr. Oldbuck supposes, or the name of some
+peculiar disorder incidental to those who have concern in the courts of
+law, as many callings and conditions of men have diseases appropriate to
+themselves. The same caddie also remembered Blind Willie Stevenson, who
+was called Wandering Willie, and who ended his days ‘unco beinly, in Sir
+Arthur Redgauntlet’s ha’ neuk.’ ‘He had done the family some good turn,’
+he said, ‘specially when ane of the Argyle gentlemen was coming down on
+a wheen of them that had the “auld leaven” about them, and wad hae taen
+every man of them, and nae less nor headed and hanged them. But Willie,
+and a friend they had, called Robin the Rambler, gae them warning, by
+playing tunes such as “The Campbells are coming” and the like, whereby
+they got timeous warning to take the wing.’ I need not point out to your
+acuteness, my worthy sir, that this seems to refer to some inaccurate
+account of the transactions in which you seem so much interested.
+
+Respecting Redgauntlet, about whose subsequent history you are more
+particularly inquisitive, I have learned from an excellent person
+who was a priest in the Scottish Monastery of Ratisbon, before its
+suppression, that he remained for two or three years in the family of
+the Chevalier, and only left it at last in consequence of some discords
+in that melancholy household. As he had hinted to General Campbell, he
+exchanged his residence for the cloister, and displayed in the latter
+part of his life, a strong sense of the duties of religion, which in
+his earlier days he had too much neglected, being altogether engaged in
+political speculations and intrigues. He rose to the situation of prior,
+in the house which he belonged to, and which was of a very strict order
+of religion. He sometimes received his countrymen, whom accident brought
+to Ratisbon, and curiosity induced to visit the Monastery of ------. But
+it was remarked, that though he listened with interest and attention,
+when Britain, or particularly Scotland, became the subject of
+conversation, yet he never either introduced or prolonged the subject,
+never used the English language, never inquired about English affairs,
+and, above all, never mentioned his own family. His strict observation
+of the rules of his order gave him, at the time of his death, some
+pretensions to be chosen a saint, and the brethren of the Monastery
+of ------ made great efforts for that effect, and brought forward some
+plausible proofs of miracles. But there was a circumstance which threw
+a doubt over the subject, and prevented the consistory from acceding
+to the wishes of the worthy brethren. Under his habit, and secured in
+a small silver box, he had worn perpetually around his neck a lock
+of-hair, which the fathers avouched to be a relic. But the Avvocato del
+Diabolo, in combating (as was his official duty) the pretensions of
+the candidate for sanctity, made it at least equally probable that the
+supposed relic was taken from the head of a brother of the deceased
+prior, who had been executed for adherence to the Stuart family in
+1745-6; and the motto, HAUD OBLIVISCENDUM, seemed to intimate a tone
+of mundane feeling and recollection of injuries, which made it at least
+doubtful whether, even in the quiet and gloom of the cloister,
+Father Hugo had forgotten the sufferings and injuries of the House of
+Redgauntlet.
+
+June 10, 1824,
+
+
+
+
+NOTES
+
+NOTE 1.--THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS
+
+In explanation of this circumstance, I cannot help adding a note not
+very necessary for the reader, which yet I record with pleasure, from
+recollection of the kindness which it evinces. In early youth I resided
+for a considerable time in the vicinity of the beautiful village
+of Kelso, where my life passed in a very solitary manner. I had few
+acquaintances, scarce any companions, and books, which were at the time
+almost essential to my happiness, were difficult to come by. It was then
+that I was particularly indebted to the liberality and friendship of
+an old lady of the Society of Friends, eminent for her benevolence and
+charity. Her deceased husband had been a medical man of eminence,
+and left her, with other valuable property, a small and well-selected
+library. This the kind old lady permitted me to rummage at pleasure, and
+carry home what volumes I chose, on condition that I should take, at the
+same time, some of the tracts printed for encouraging and extending the
+doctrines of her own sect. She did not even exact any promise that I
+would read these performances, being too justly afraid of involving me
+in a breach of promise, but was merely desirous that I should have
+the chance of instruction within my reach, in case whim, curiosity, or
+accident, might induce me to have recourse to it.
+
+
+NOTE 2.--THE PERSECUTORS
+
+The personages here mentioned are most of them characters of historical
+fame; but those less known and remembered may be found in the tract
+entitled, ‘The Judgment and Justice of God Exemplified, or, a Brief
+Historical Account of some of the Wicked Lives and Miserable Deaths of
+some of the most remarkable Apostates and Bloody Persecutors, from
+the Reformation till after the Revolution.’ This constitutes a sort of
+postscript or appendix to John Howie of Lochgoin’s ‘Account of the Lives
+of the most eminent Scots Worthies.’ The author has, with considerable
+ingenuity, reversed his reasoning upon the inference to be drawn from
+the prosperity or misfortunes which befall individuals in this world,
+either in the course of their lives or in the hour of death. In the
+account of the martyrs’ sufferings, such inflictions are mentioned only
+as trials permitted by providence, for the better and brighter display
+of their faith, and constancy of principle. But when similar afflictions
+befell the opposite party, they are imputed to the direct vengeance of
+Heaven upon their impiety. If, indeed, the life of any person obnoxious
+to the historian’s censures happened to have passed in unusual
+prosperity, the mere fact of its being finally concluded by death,
+is assumed as an undeniable token of the judgement of Heaven, and, to
+render the conclusion inevitable, his last scene is generally garnished
+with some singular circumstances. Thus the Duke of Lauderdale is said,
+through old age but immense corpulence, to have become so sunk in
+spirits, ‘that his heart was not the bigness of a walnut.’
+
+
+NOTE 3.--LAMENTATION FOR THE DEAD
+
+I have heard in my youth some such wild tale as that placed in the
+mouth of the blind fiddler, of which, I think, the hero was Sir Robert
+Grierson of Lagg, the famous persecutor. But the belief was general
+throughout Scotland that the excessive lamentation over the loss of
+friends disturbed the repose of the dead, and broke even the rest of the
+grave. There are several instances of this in tradition, but one struck
+me particularly, as I heard it from the lips of one who professed
+receiving it from those of a ghost-seer. This was a Highland lady, named
+Mrs. C---- of B------, who probably believed firmly in the truth of an
+apparition which seems to have originated in the weakness of her nerves
+and strength of her imagination. She had been lately left a widow by her
+husband, with the office of guardian to their only child. The young man
+added to the difficulties of his charge by an extreme propensity for a
+military life, which his mother was unwilling to give way to, while
+she found it impossible to repress it. About this time the Independent
+Companies, formed for the preservation of the peace of the Highlands,
+were in the course of being levied; and as a gentleman named Cameron,
+nearly connected with Mrs. C--, commanded one of those companies,
+she was at length persuaded to compromise the matter with her son, by
+permitting him to enter this company in the capacity of a cadet, thus
+gratifying his love of a military life without the dangers of foreign
+service, to which no one then thought these troops were at all liable to
+be exposed, while even their active service at home was not likely to
+be attended with much danger. She readily obtained a promise from her
+relative that he would be particular in his attention to her son and
+therefore concluded she had accommodated matters between her son’s
+wishes and his safety in a way sufficiently attentive to both. She set
+off to Edinburgh to get what was awanting for his outfit, and shortly
+afterwards received melancholy news from the Highlands. The Independent
+Company into which her son was to enter had a skirmish with a party of
+caterans engaged in some act of spoil, and her friend the captain
+being wounded, and out of the reach of medical assistance, died in
+consequence. This news was a thunderbolt to the poor mother, who was at
+once deprived of her kinsman’s advice and assistance, and instructed by
+his fate of the unexpected danger to which her son’s new calling exposed
+him. She remained also in great sorrow for her relative, whom she loved
+with sisterly affection. These conflicting causes of anxiety,
+together with her uncertainty, whether to continue or change her son’s
+destination, were terminated in the following manner:--
+
+The house in which Mrs. C---- resided in the old town of Edinburgh, was
+a flat or story of a land accessible, as was then universal, by a common
+stair. The family who occupied the story beneath were her acquaintances,
+and she was in the habit of drinking tea with them every evening. It was
+accordingly about six o’clock, when, recovering herself from a deep fit
+of anxious reflection, she was about to leave the parlour in which she
+sat in order to attend this engagement. The door through which she was
+to pass opened, as was very common in Edinburgh, into a dark passage. In
+this passage, and within a yard of her when she opened the door,
+stood the apparition of her kinsman, the deceased officer, in his full
+tartans, and wearing his bonnet. Terrified at what she saw, or thought
+she saw, she closed the door hastily, and, sinking on her knees by
+a chair, prayed to be delivered from the horrors of the vision. She
+remained in that posture till her friends below tapped on the door,
+to intimate that tea was ready. Recalled to herself by the signal, she
+arose, and, on opening the apartment door, again was confronted by
+the visionary Highlander, whose bloody brow bore token, on this second
+appearance, to the death he had died. Unable to endure this repetition
+of her terrors, Mrs. C---- sank on the door in a swoon. Her friends
+below, startled with the noise, came upstairs, and, alarmed at the
+situation in which they found her, insisted on her going to bed and
+taking some medicine, in order to compose what they took for a nervous
+attack. They had no sooner left her in quiet, than the apparition of
+the soldier was once more visible in the apartment. This time she took
+courage and said, ‘In the name of God, Donald, why do you haunt one who
+respected and loved you when living?’ To which he answered readily, in
+Gaelic, ‘Cousin, why did you not speak sooner? My rest is disturbed by
+your unnecessary lamentation--your tears scald me in my shroud. I come
+to tell you that my untimely death ought to make no difference in your
+views for your son; God will raise patrons to supply my place and he
+will live to the fullness of years, and die honoured and at peace.’ The
+lady of course followed her kinsman’s advice and as she was accounted
+a person of strict veracity, we may conclude the first apparition an
+illusion of the fancy, the final one a lively dream suggested by the
+other two.
+
+
+NOTE 4.--PETER PEEBLES
+
+This unfortunate litigant (for a person named Peter Peebles actually
+flourished) frequented the courts of justice in Scotland about the year
+1792, and the sketch of his appearance is given from recollection. The
+author is of opinion that he himself had at one time the honour to be
+counsel for Peter Peebles, whose voluminous course of litigation served
+as a sort of assay-pieces to most young men who were called to the bar.
+The scene of the consultation is entirely imaginary.
+
+
+NOTE 5.--JOHN’S COFFEE-HOUSE
+
+This small dark coffee-house, now burnt down, was the resort of such
+writers and clerks belonging to the Parliament House above thirty years
+ago as retained the ancient Scottish custom of a meridian, as it was
+called, or noontide dram of spirits. If their proceedings were watched,
+they might be seen to turn fidgety about the hour of noon, and exchange
+looks with each other from their separate desks, till at length some one
+of formal and dignified presence assumed the honour of leading the band,
+when away they went, threading the crowd like a string of wild
+fowl, crossed the square or close, and following each other into
+the coffee-house, received in turn from the hand of the waiter, the
+meridian, which was placed ready at the bar. This they did, day by day:
+and though they did not speak to each other, they seemed to attach a
+certain degree of sociability to performing the ceremony in company.
+
+
+NOTE 6.--FISHING RIGHTS
+
+It may be here mentioned, that a violent and popular attack upon what
+the country people of this district considered as an invasion of their
+fishing right is by no means an improbable fiction. Shortly after the
+close of the American war, Sir James Graham of Netherby constructed a
+dam-dyke, or cauld, across the Esk, at a place where it flowed through
+his estate, though it has its origin, and the principal part of its
+course, in Scotland. The new barrier at Netherby was considered as
+an encroachment calculated to prevent the salmon from ascending into
+Scotland, and the right of erecting it being an international question
+of law betwixt the sister kingdoms, there was no court in either
+competent to its decision. In this dilemma, the Scots people assembled
+in numbers by signal of rocket lights, and, rudely armed with
+fowling-pieces, fish-spears, and such rustic weapons, marched to the
+banks of the river for the purpose of pulling down the dam-dyke objected
+to. Sir James Graham armed many of his own people to protect his
+property, and had some military from Carlisle for the same purpose.
+A renewal of the Border wars had nearly taken place in the eighteenth
+century, when prudence and moderation on both sides saved much tumult,
+and perhaps some bloodshed. The English proprietor consented that a
+breach should be made in his dam-dyke sufficient for the passage of the
+fish, and thus removed the Scottish grievance. I believe the river has
+since that time taken the matter into its own disposal, and entirely
+swept away the dam-dyke in question.
+
+
+NOTE 7.--STATE OF SCOTLAND
+
+Scotland, in its half-civilized state, exhibited too many examples
+of the exertion of arbitrary force and violence, rendered easy by the
+dominion which lairds exerted over their tenants and chiefs over their
+clans. The captivity of Lady Grange, in the desolate cliffs of Saint
+Kilda, is in the recollection of every one. At the supposed date of the
+novel also a man of the name of Merrilees, a tanner in Leith, absconded
+from his country to escape his creditors; and after having slain his own
+mastiff dog, and put a bit of red cloth in its mouth, as if it had died
+in a contest with soldiers, and involved his own existence in as
+much mystery as possible, made his escape into Yorkshire. Here he was
+detected by persons sent in search of him, to whom he gave a portentous
+account of his having been carried off and concealed in various places.
+Mr. Merrilees was, in short, a kind of male Elizabeth Canning, but did
+not trespass on the public credulity quite so long.
+
+
+NOTE 8.--CONCEALMENTS FOR THEFT AND SMUGGLING
+
+I am sorry to say that the modes of concealment described in the
+imaginary premises of Mr. Trumbull, are of a kind which have been common
+on the frontiers of late years. The neighbourhood of two nations having
+different laws, though united in government, still leads to a multitude
+of transgressions on the Border, and extreme difficulty in apprehending
+delinquents. About twenty years since, as far as my recollection serves,
+there was along the frontier an organized gang of coiners, forgers,
+smugglers, and other malefactors, whose operations were conducted on a
+scale not inferior to what is here described. The chief of the party was
+one Richard Mendham a carpenter, who rose to opulence, although ignorant
+even of the arts of reading and writing. But he had found a short
+road to wealth, and had taken singular measures for conducting his
+operations. Amongst these, he found means to build, in a suburb
+of Berwick called Spittal, a street of small houses, as if for the
+investment of property. He himself inhabited one of these; another, a
+species of public-house, was open to his confederates, who held secret
+and unsuspected communication with him by crossing the roofs of the
+intervening houses, and descending by a trap-stair, which admitted them
+into the alcove of the dining-room of Dick Mendham’s private mansion.
+A vault, too, beneath Mendham’s stable, was accessible in the manner
+mentioned in the novel. The post of one of the stalls turned round on
+a bolt being withdrawn, and gave admittance to a subterranean place of
+concealment for contraband and stolen goods, to a great extent. Richard
+Mendham, the head of this very formidable conspiracy, which involved
+malefactors of every kind, was tried and executed at Jedburgh, where the
+author was present as Sheriff of Selkirkshire. Mendham had previously
+been tried, but escaped by want of proof and the ingenuity of his
+counsel.
+
+
+NOTE 9--CORONATION OF GEORGE III
+
+In excuse of what may be considered as a violent infraction of
+probability in this chapter, the author is under the necessity of
+quoting a tradition which many persons may recollect having heard. It
+was always said, though with very little appearance of truth, that upon
+the Coronation of the late George III, when the champion of England,
+Dymock, or his representative, appeared in Westminster Hall, and in
+the language of chivalry solemnly wagered his body to defend in single
+combat the right of the young King to the crown of these realms, at the
+moment when he flung down his gauntlet as the gage of battle, an unknown
+female stepped from the crowd and lifted the pledge, leaving another
+gage in room of it, with a paper expressing, that if a fair field of
+combat should be allowed, a champion of rank and birth would appear with
+equal arms to dispute the claim of King George to the British kingdoms.
+The story is probably one of the numerous fictions which were circulated
+to keep up the spirits of a sinking faction, The incident was, however,
+possible, if it could be supposed to be attended by any motive adequate
+to the risk, and might be imagined to occur to a person of Redgauntlet’s
+enthusiastic character. George III, it is said, had a police of his own,
+whose agency was so efficient, that the sovereign was able to tell
+his prime minister upon one occasion, to his great surprise, that the
+Pretender was in London. The prime minister began immediately to talk of
+measures to be taken, warrants to be procured, messengers and guards
+to be got in readiness. ‘Pooh, pooh,’ said the good-natured sovereign,
+since I have found him out, leave me alone to deal with him.’--‘And
+what,’ said the minister, ‘is your Majesty’s purpose, in so important a
+case?’--‘To leave the young man to himself,’ said George III; ‘and when
+he tires he will go back again.’ The truth of this story does not depend
+on that of the lifting of the gauntlet; and while the latter could be
+but an idle bravado, the former expresses George Ill’s goodness of heart
+and soundness of policy.
+
+
+NOTE 10.--COLLIER AND SALTER
+
+The persons engaged in these occupations were at this time bondsmen; and
+in case they left the ground of the farm to which they belonged, and as
+pertaining to which their services were bought or sold, they were liable
+to be brought back by a summary process. The existence of this species
+of slavery being thought irreconcilable with the spirit of liberty,
+colliers and salters were declared free, and put upon the same footing
+with other servants, by the Act 15 Geo. III chapter 28th. They were so
+far from desiring or prizing the blessing conferred on them, that they
+esteemed the interest taken in their freedom to be a mere decree on the
+part of the proprietors to get rid of what they called head and harigald
+money, payable to them when a female of their number, by bearing a
+child, made an addition to the live stock of their master’s property.
+
+
+
+
+GLOSSARY
+
+   ABOON, above.
+   AD LITEM, in law.
+   AD VINDICTAM PUBLICAM, for the public defence.
+   ADUST, looking as if burned or scorched.
+   AE, one.
+   AFFLATUS, breath, inspiration.
+   AIRT, direct.
+   ALCANDER, a Greek soothsayer.
+   ALDEBORONTIPHOSCOPHORNIO, a courtier in H. Carey’s burlesque,
+       CHRONONHOTONTHOLOGOS.
+   ALIMENTARY, nourishing.
+   ALQUIFE, an enchanter in the mediaeval romances of knight-errantry.
+   AMADIS, a hero of the romances, especially in Amadis of Gaul.
+   ANENT, about.
+   ANES, once.
+   ANNO DOMINI, in the year of the Lord.
+   ARGUMENTUM AD HOMINEM, AD FEMINAM, lit. ‘the argument to a man,
+       to a woman,’ refutation of a man’s argument by an example
+       drawn from his own conduct.
+   ARIES, earnest-money, a gift.
+   ARS LONGA, VITA BREVIS, art is long, life short.
+   ARS MEDENDI, art of medicine.
+   APPROBATE, approve.
+   ATLANTES, a character in ORLANDO FURIOSO.
+   AULD REEKIE, Edinburgh.
+   ADVOCATO DEL DIABOLO, lit. ‘the devil’s advocate’, one whose duty
+       it is to oppose the canonization of a person on whose behalf
+       claims to sanctity are made.
+   AWSOME, awful, fearful.
+
+   BACK-GANGING, behind hand in paying.
+   BACKSPAUL, the back of the shoulder.
+   BALLANT, a ballad, a fable.
+   BANNOCK, a flat, round cake.
+   BARLEY-BROO, barley-broth.
+   BARON-OFFICER, the magistrate’s officer in a burgh of barony.
+   BARTIZAN, a small overhanging turret, the battlements.
+   BEAUFET, cupboard.
+   BEAVER, the lower part of the helmet.
+   BEIN, comfortable.
+   BELISARIUS, a general of the Eastern Empire ungratefully treated
+       by the Emperor Justinian.
+   BENEDICTE, bless you.
+   BETIMES THE MORN, early in the morning.
+   BICKER, a wooden vessel for holding drink; a quarrel.
+   BILLIE, a term of familiarity, comrade.
+   BIRKIE, a smart fellow.
+   BIRLING, merry-making.
+   BIT, small.
+   BLATE, shy, bashful.
+   BLAWING, flattering.
+   BLEEZING, bragging.
+   BLUE-CAP, a Scotsman.
+   BOGLE, a ghost, a scarecrow.
+   BON VIVANTS, lovers of good living.
+   BONA ROBA, a showy wanton.
+   BONUS SOCIUS, good comrade.
+   BORREL, common, rude.
+   BRAID, broad.
+   BRASH, a sudden storm, an attack.
+   BRATTLE, a clattering noise, as of a horse going at full speed.
+   BRAW, brave, fine.
+   BRENT BROO, high brow.
+   BROCARD, maxim.
+   BROSE, oatmeal which has had boiling water poured upon it.
+   BROWN, a famous landscape gardener.
+   BROWST, a brewing.
+   BUCEPHALUS, the favourite horse of Alexander the Great.
+   BUCKIE, an imp, a fellow with an evil twist in his character.
+   BUFF NOR STYE, neither one thing nor another.
+   BUFFERS, pistols.
+   BUSK, deck up.
+   BY ORDINAR, extraordinary, uncommon.
+   BYE AND ATTOUR, over and above.
+
+   CADGER, a travelling dealer.
+   CADDIE, a porter, an errand-boy.
+   CAETERA PRORSUS IGNORO, in short, I know nothing of the rest.
+   CALLANT, a young lad.
+   CALLER, cool, fresh.
+   CANNY, shrewd, prudent, quiet.
+   CANTLE, fragment.
+   CAPERNOITED, crabbed, foolish.
+   CAPRICCIOS, a fanciful composition.
+   CAPRIOLE, a leap made by a horse without advancing.
+   CARDINAL, a woman’s cloak.
+   CARLINES, old women.
+   CATILINA OMNIUM, ETC. Catilina had surrounded himself with the
+       most vile and criminal company.
+   CAUSEWAY, path, roadway.
+   CAVALIERE SERVENTE, gentleman in attendance.
+   CAVE NE LITERAS, ETC. take care that you are not carrying
+       Bellerophon’s letters (letters unfavourable to the bearer).
+   CHACK, a slight repast.
+   CHANCY, safe, auspicious.
+   CHANGE-HOUSE, a small inn or ale-house.
+   CHANTER, the tenor or treble pipe in a bag-pipe.
+   CHAPE, a thin metal blade at the end of a scabbard.
+   CHAPEAU BRAS, a low, three-cornered hat.
+   CHOUGH, a bird of the crow family.
+   CHUCKY, fowl.
+   CHUCKY-STONES, small stones, a child’s game.
+   CLAP AND HOPPER, signs of the mill.
+   CLAVERS, gossip, idle talk.
+   CLEEK, lay hold on.
+   CLEIK IN, to join company.
+   CLOSE, an alley, a narrow way.
+   CLOSE-HEADS, the entry to an alley, a meeting-place for gossips.
+   CLOUR, to strike, to bump.
+   COBLE, a little boat.
+   COCKERNONY, top-knot.
+   COGIE, small wooden bowl.
+   COMMUNE FORUM, ETC. the common court is the common dwelling-place.
+   CORDWAIN, Spanish leather.
+   CORIOLANUS, a Roman patrician, who, being driven from the city,
+       took refuge with Aufidius, the leader of the Volsci.
+   COUP, fall, upset.
+   COURIER DE L’EUROPE, a newspaper.
+   COVYNE, artifice.
+   CRACK, gossip.
+   CRAIG, throat, neck.
+   CRAWSTEP, the steplike edges of a gable seen in some old houses.
+   CREEL, basket carried on the back.
+   CREMONY, Cremona [where the best fiddles were made].
+   CROWDER, fiddler.
+   CUR ME EXAMINAS QUERELIS TUIS?, why do you wear me out with your
+       complaints.
+   CURN, a very little.
+
+   DAFT, crazy.
+   DAIS, a canopy, a table placed above the others, a room of state.
+   DARGLE, dell.
+   DAURG, day’s work.
+   DE APICIBUS JURIS, from the high places of the law.
+   DE PERICULO ET COMMODO REI VENDITAE, concerning the risk and
+       profit of sales.
+   DEAD-THRAW, death-thraw.
+   DEBOSHED, debauched.
+   DEFORCEMENT--SPULZIE--SOUTHRIEF, legal terms for resisting an
+       officer of law.
+   DEIL, devil.
+   DELATE, accuse.
+   DELICT, misdemeanour, QUASI DELICT, apparent offence.
+   DEPONE, to testify.
+   DERNIER RESORT, last resort.
+   DIABLERIE, sorcery, witchcraft.
+   DILIGENCE, writ of execution, coach.
+   DING, to knock, beat down.
+   DIRDUM, uproar, disturbance.
+   DITTAY, an indictment.
+   DIVOT, thin turf used for thatching cottages.
+   DOCH AN DORROCH, the stirrup cup.
+   DOMINUS LITIS, one of the principals in a law suit.
+   DOOL, sorrow, sad consequences.
+   DOOR-CHEEK, door-post.
+   DOUCE, respectable.
+   DRAMATIS PERSONAE, persons of the drama.
+   DRAPPIT, fried.
+   DRIBBLE, a drop.
+   DRIFT, drift-snow.
+   DULCINEA, Don Quixote’s imaginary mistress.
+   DUNSTABLE, something simple and matter-of-fact.
+   DYVOUR, bankrupt.
+
+   EKE, addition.
+   EMBONPOINT, plumpness.
+   EN CROUPE, riding behind one another.
+   ET PER CONTRA, and on the other side.
+   EVITE, avoid.
+   EX COMITATE, out of courtesy.
+   EX MISERICORDIA, out of pity.
+   EXCEPTIO FIRMAT REGULAM, the exception proves the rule.
+   EXOTIC, of foreign origin.
+
+   FACTOR LOCO TUTORIS, an agent acting in place of a guardian.
+   FARDEL, burden.
+   FASH, FASHERIE, trouble.
+   FECK, space.
+   FEMME DE CHAMBRE, chamber-maid.
+   FIERI, to be made.
+   FLACON, a smelling bottle.
+   FLAP, gust.
+   FLIP, a drink consisting of beer and spirit sweetened.
+   FLORY, frothy.
+   FORBY, besides.
+   FORENSIC, legal.
+   FORFOUGHEN, out of breath, distressed.
+   FORPIT, fourth part of a peck.
+   FORTALICE, a small outwork.
+   FRIST, to postpone, give credit,
+   FUGIE, fugitive.
+   FUNCTUS OFFICIO, having finished my duties, ‘out of office’.
+
+   GABERLUNZIE, a beggar.
+   GAEN, gone.
+   GALLOWAY, a strong Scotch cob.
+   GANGREL, wandering, a vagrant.
+   GAR, to force, make.
+   GATE, way, road.
+   GAUGER, an exciseman.
+   GENTRICE, gentle blood.
+   GIFF-GAFF, give and take.
+   GIRDED, hooped like a barrel.
+   GIRN, to grin, cry.
+   GLAIKET, giddy, rash.
+   GLIFF, glimpse, moment,
+   GOWFF BA’, golf ball.
+   GRAINED, groaned.
+   GRANA INVECTA ET ILLATA, grain brought and imported.
+   GRAT, wept.
+   GRILLADE, a broiled dish.
+   GRIT, great.
+   GROSSART, gooseberry.
+   GRUE, to creep, shiver,
+   GUDESIRE, grandfather.
+   GUIDE, to deal with, to employ.
+   GUMPLE-FOISTED, sulky, sullen.
+   GWAY, very.
+   GYTES, contemptuous name for a young child, a brat.
+
+   HAFFLINS, half-grown.
+   HAILL, all, the whole.
+   HAIRST, harvest.
+   HAMESUCKEN, assaulting a person in his own house.
+   HAMSHACKLE, to fasten.
+   HANK, a hold.
+   HAP, to hop, turn from.
+   HARPOCRATES, an Egyptian god, supposed by the Greeks to be the
+       god of silence.
+   HAUGH, holm, low-lying flat ground.
+   HAULD, place of abode.
+   HAVINGS, behaviour.
+   HEFTED, closed, as a knife in its haft.
+   HELLICAT, extravagant, light-headed.
+   HEMPEY, rogue.
+   HET, hot.
+   HEUCK, sickle.
+   HINC ILLAE LACRYMAE, hence these tears.
+   HINNY, honey, a term of endearment.
+   HIPPOGRIFF, a fabulous winged animal, half horse and half griffin.
+   HODDIN-GREY, cloth manufactured from undyed wool.
+   HOMOLOGATING, ratifying, approving.
+   HOOKS, OFF THE, light-headed.
+   HOSE-NET, a small net used for rivulet fishing.
+   HOW-COME-SO, light-headed.
+   HUMOURSOME, subject to moods.
+   HUSSEY, lady’s needle-case.
+   HYSON, green tea from China.
+
+   IGNIS FATUUS, will o’ the wisp.
+   ILK, each; of the same name, as Redgauntlet of that Ilk
+       =Redgauntlet of Redgauntlet.
+   ILL-DEEDIE, mischievous.
+   ILL-FAUR’D, ugly, ill-favoured.
+   IN CIVILIBUS or CRIMINALIBUS, in civil or criminal causes.
+   IN FORO CONSCIENTIAE, in the assize of conscience.
+   IN MEDITATIONE FUGAE, meditating flight.
+   IN PRESENTIA DOMINORUM, before the Lords.
+   INCEDIT SICUT LEO VORANS, goeth about like a roaring lion.
+   INCOGNITA, unknown.
+   INFRA DIG, beneath one’s dignity.
+   INSTANTER, at once.
+   INTROMIT, to medldle with.
+   INVITA MINERVA, against my bent.
+
+   JACK, a metal pitcher.
+   JAZY, wig.
+   JET D’EAU, jet of water.
+   JORUM, a drinking-vessel, or the liquor in it.
+   JOW, to toll.
+   JURIDICAL, pertaining to a judge or to the courts.
+
+   KATTERFELTO, a famous quack.
+   KEEK, to look.
+   KEFFEL, a bad horse.
+
+   LAIGH, low.
+   LAND-LOUPER, runagate, vagabond.
+   LARES, household gods, the special divinities of a family.
+   LAP, leaped; fold.
+   LAVE, rest, remainder.
+   LAWING, inn reckoning.
+   LEAL, loyal, true.
+   LEASING-MAKING, lies, slander, seditious words.
+   LEASOWES, the estate of the poet Shenstone.
+   LEE-SIDE, the side of a vessel farthest from the point where the
+       wind blows.
+   LEESOME LANE, his dear self alone.
+   LEEVIN, living.
+   LEE WAY, arrears of work.
+   LEG, TO MAKE A, to bow.
+   LETTRES DE CACHET, sealed letters issued by the King of France,
+       conferring power over the liberty of others.
+   LEX AQUARUM, the law of the waters.
+   LIMMER, a loose woman, a jade.
+   LING, thin long grass, heather.
+   LOANING, a meadow, pasture where the cows were milked,
+   LOE, love.
+   LOON, fellow, rogue.
+   LOOPY, crafty.
+   LOUIS-D’OR, a French gold coin worth from 16s, 6d. to 18s. 9d.
+   LOUP, leap.
+   LOUP-THE-DYKE, giddy, runaway.
+   LOUP THE TETHER, breaking loose from restraint.
+   LOVELACE AND BELFORD, characters in CLARISSA HARLOWE.
+   LUCKY, a name given to an elderly dame.
+   LUG, the ear.
+   LUM, chimney.
+
+   MACER, a court official.
+   MAILING, a small farm or rented property.
+   MAILS, rents.
+   MALVERSATION, fraudulent tricks.
+   MANUMISSION, liberty.
+   MARCH, border.
+   MARE MAGNUM, the great sea.
+   MARIUS, a Roman general, leader in the civil war against Sulla.
+   MEAR, mare.
+   MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN, the writing seen by Belshazzar
+       (Daniel V. 25).
+   MENYIE, retinue.
+   MERIDIAN, noon; a mid-day drink.
+   MERK, an old Scottish coin=1s. 1 1/2d. in English money.
+   MESSAN, a lap-dog, a little dog.
+   MICKLE, much.
+   MIFFED, piqued.
+   MILLAR, Philip Millar, author of several works on gardening.
+   MINOS, a law-giver of Crete, afterwards set as a judge in Hades.
+   MISHANTER, mischief.
+   MISPRISION OF TREASON, concealment of treason.
+   MOIDART, a loch in Inverness, where Prince Charles Stuart landed,
+       1745.
+   MOIDORE, a gold coin of Portugal worth about L1 7s. 0d.
+   MORE SOLITO, in the accustomed manner.
+   MORE TUO, in your own way.
+   MUILS, slippers.
+   MUISTED, scented.
+   MUTCHKIN, English pint.
+
+   NE QUID NIMIS, do nothing in excess.
+   NEGATUR, lit. ‘it is denied,’ I deny it.
+   NEGOTIORUM GESTOR, manager of affairs.
+   NEREID, a sea-nymph.
+   NIGRI SUNT HYACINTHI, irises are dark flowers.
+   NIHIL NOVIT IN CAUSA, nothing is known of the case.
+   NIPPERKIN, a small cup, a liquid measure.
+   NOM DE GUERRE, professional name.
+   NOMINE DAMNI, in the name of damages.
+   NONJURING, not swearing allegiance to the government, loyal to the
+       Stuarts.
+   NOSCITUR A SOCIO, he is known by his friend.
+   NOVITER REPERTUM, newly discovered.
+
+   OHE, JAM SATIS, oh, enough.
+   OMNE IGNOTUM PRO TERRIBILI, the unknown is always held in terror.
+   OMNI SUSPICIONE MAJOR, above all suspicion.
+   ORESTES AND PYLADES, DAMON AND PYTHIAS, classical examples of
+       friendship.
+   ORIGO MALI, cause of the evil.
+   ORNATURE, adornment, decoration.
+   ORRA, odd.
+   OVERTURE, opening.
+   OWERLAY, cravat.
+   OYE, a grandson.
+
+   PACK OR PEEL, to traffic.
+   PANDE MANUM, hold out your hand.
+   PANDECTS, a digest of Roman law.
+   PAR EXCELLENCE, above all, specially.
+   PAR ORDONNANCE DU MEDECIN, by the doctor’s orders.
+   PARMA NON BENE SELECTA, a shield, or defence, not well chosen.
+   PAROCHINE, parish.
+   PATER NOSTER, Our Father, the Lord’s Prayer.
+   PATRIA POTESTAS, paternal authority.
+   PAWMIE, a stroke on the palm of the hand.
+   PEACH, betray, speak out.
+   PEEL-HOUSE, a small fortified house, or tower.
+   PEGASUS, the winged horse of the Muses.
+   PENDENTE LITE, whilst the case is proceeding.
+   PENDICLES, articles, small parts.
+   PER AMBAGES, by circumlocution, in a roundabout way.
+   PER CONTRA, on the other side.
+   PERDU, concealed, lost.
+   PERIPATETIC, walking, wandering.
+   PESSIMI EXEMPLI, the worst possible example.
+   PETTLE, a plough-staff.
+   PHALARIS’S BULL, a furnace shaped like a bull into which the
+       tyrant Phalaris used to cast his victims.
+   PISCATOR, fisherman.
+   PISTOLE, a gold coin worth about 16s.
+   PLACK, a small copper coin, equal to one-third of an English penny.
+   PLEACH, interweave.
+   PLICATIONS, folds, wrinkles.
+   PLOY, a frolic.
+   POCK-PUDDING, a contemptuous term applied to Englishmen
+   POINT D’ESPAGNE, Spanish lace.
+   POKE, pocket.
+   PORT ROYAL, a monastery near Paris which became the headquarters
+       of the Jansenists, the opponents of the Jesuits.
+   POSSE COMITATUS, the civil force of a county.
+   POUND SCOTS, worth about 1s. 8d. English money.
+   PRACTIQUES, practices of the profession.
+   PRECOGNITION, examination prior to prosecution.
+   PRECOGNOSCED, to take precognition of.
+   PRETERMIT, omit, pass by.
+   PURSUIVANTS, an officer-at-arms, in rank below a herald.
+
+   QUAERE, query, a question.
+   QUEAN, a young woman, a wench.
+   QUI VIVE, alert, cautious.
+   QUID, piece of tobacco to chew.
+   QUID TIBI CUM LYRA, what hast thou to do with the lyre?
+   QUORUM, the body of justices, so called from a word used in the
+       commission appointing them.
+
+   RANT, a noisy dance-tune.
+   RAPPAREE, an Irish plunderer; a worthless fellow,
+   RATIONE OFFICII, by virtue of his position.
+   RATTLING, lively, brisk.
+   RAX, stretch.
+   REAMING, frothing, foaming.
+   REDD, clear up, tidy.
+   REGIAM MAJESTATEM, a collection of Scotch laws.
+   REIVER, robber.
+   REMEDIUM JURIS, legal remedy.
+   RIGDUM-FUNNIDOS, a courtier in H. Carey’s burlesque,
+        CHRONONHOTONTHOLOGOS.
+   RIPE, search.
+   RUDAS, a scold, a virago.
+   RUG, a share, a good mouthful.
+
+   SANCTA WINIFREDA, ORA PRO NOBIS, Saint Winifred, pray for us.
+   SARTUM ATQUE TECTUM, repaired and covered.
+   SAT EST, it is enough.
+   SAWNEY, a nickname for a Scotchman.
+   SCARBOROUGH WARNING, the blow before the threat.
+   SCOWP, quaff.
+   SCRUB, the name of a footman in the BEAUX’ STRATAGEM (Geo.
+       Farquhar, 1704).
+   SCULDUDDERY, loose, immoral.
+   SEALGH, seal,
+   SEA-MAWS, sea-mews.
+   SECUNDUM ARTEM, according to the rules of his art.
+   SEDERUNT, a sitting of the courts.
+   SEMPLE, simple, not of gentle birth,
+   SHILPIT, weak; poor, shabby.
+   SHINGLES, thin boards used for roofs.
+   SI NON CASTE, CAUTE TAMEN, if not for virtue’s sake, yet for
+       caution.
+   SIB, kin.
+   SIGMA, the Greek S.
+   SINE DIE, without a date, indefinitely.
+   SIS MEMOR MEI, be mindful of me.
+   SKELLOCH, screech.
+   SKINKER, a server of liquor.
+   SKIRL, to scream.
+   SKIVIE, harebrained.
+   SLEEKIT, smooth.
+   SLOKEN, quench.
+   SNEESHING, snuff.
+   SNELL, sharp, terrible.
+   SNICKERS, sniggers.
+   SOCIETAS EST MATER DISCORDIARUM, partnership is the mother of
+       quarrels.
+   SOLITAIRE, an ornament for the neck.
+   SOLON, the law-giver of Athens.
+   SONSY, good-humoured, sensible.
+   SORT, to chastise; to manage.
+   SORTES VIRGILIANAE, Virgilian lots; opening the works of Virgil at
+       random and taking the first passage read for counsel.
+   SOUGH, a breath, a chant.
+   SOUPLE, active; supple in mind or body.
+   SOUTER’S CLOD, a kind of coarse black bread.
+   SPATTERDASHES, coverings for the legs to protect them from mud.
+   SPEER, ask.
+   SPLICE THE MAIN BRACE, have an extra allowance of spirits.
+   SPLORE, a frolic, quarrel.
+   SPRATTLE, struggle, scramble.
+   SPRING, a merry tune.
+   SPRUSH, spruce.
+   SPULE-BLADE, shoulder blade,
+   SPUNK, courage, fire: SPUNKS, matches.
+   STEND, take long steps.
+   STEWARTRY, territory in Scotland administered by a steward.
+   STIBBLER, a divinity student, a probationer.
+   STILTS, plough-handles.
+   STUNKARD, sullen, obstinate.
+   SUA QUEMQUE TRAHIT VOLUPTAS, his own peculiar pleasure allures
+       each.
+   SURTOUT, a tight-fitting, broad-skirted outer coat.
+   SWIPES, small beer.
+
+   TAES, toes.
+   TALIS QUALIS, of some kind.
+   TAM MARTE QUAM MERCURIO, as much devoted to Mars as to Mercury (as
+       much a soldier as a pleader).
+   TASS, a glass.
+   TAU, the Greek: T.
+   TERRA FIRMA, firm earth.
+   TESTE ME PER TOTUM NOCTEM VIGILANTE, I am witness as I was awake
+       all night.
+   TETE-A-TETE, a private conversation.
+   THAIRM, catgut.
+   THEMIS, the goddess of law and justice.
+   THIRLAGE, mortgaging of property.
+   THREAP, aver.
+   THUMBIKINS, thumbscrews, instruments of torture.
+   TIMOTHEUS, a famous musician.
+   TIPPENY, twopenny ale,
+   TIRTEAFUERA, a character in DON QUIXOTE, the doctor in Sancho
+       Panza’s island government.
+   TITHER, the other.
+   TOD, a bush, a fox.
+   TOOM, empty.
+   TOUR OUT, to look about.
+   TOY, a linen cap; a head-dress hanging down over the shoulders.
+   TRANCES, passages.
+   TUPTOWING, beating, from the Greek verb ‘tupto’, to strike.
+   TWALPENNY, one penny sterling.
+   TWASOME, a pair or couple.
+   TYNE, loss or forfeit.
+   TYRO, TYRONES, beginner, beginners; novice.
+
+   UNCO, very, uncommon, strange.
+   URGANDA, an enchantress in the romance of AMADIS OF GAUL.
+   USQUEBAUGH, whisky.
+
+   VADE RETRO, get thee behind me.
+   VALE, SIS MEMOR MEI, farewell, be mindful of me.
+   VARIUM ET MUTABILE SEMPER FEMINA, woman is always variable and
+       changeful.
+   VERBUM SACERDOTIS, the word of a priest.
+   VIA FACTI, by personal force.
+   VINCERE VINCENTEM, to conquer the conquering.
+   VINCO VINCENTEM, ERGO VINCO TE, I conquer the conquering,
+       therefore I conquer you.
+   VIOLER, a player on a viol.
+   VIR SAPIENTIA ET PIETATE GRAVIS, a man of much wisdom and piety.
+   VIS ANIMI, strength of soul.
+   VITIOUS, vicious, unruly.
+   VOET, Jan Voet, author of a book on the PANDECTS.
+
+   W.S., writer to the signet, a lawyer.
+   WALING, choosing.
+   WAME, stomach.
+   WANCHANCY, unlucky, dangerous.
+   WARE, spend.
+   WARK, work, trouble.
+   WAUR, worse.
+   WEARS, weirs, dams.
+   WEIGH-BANKS, scales.
+   WHIN, gorse.
+   WHITTLE, a small clasp-knife.
+   WITHERSHINS, backwards in their courses, in the contrary way.
+   WUD, mad.
+   WYND, yard, alley.
+
+   YAULD, active.
+   YELLOCH, yell.
+   YETTS, gates.
+   YILL, ale.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Redgauntlet, by Sir Walter Scott
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